For francophiles [and francophobes (; ], more than 75 reasons to learn
French, from Australia:
http://www.fste.ac.cowan.edu.au/arts/french/motivation/whyfren.htm
Btw a slight piece of outdated data in it: Francophonie counts 49 members,
not 43. On the increase too.
Furthermore French is the official language of the international court of
justice in La Haye (The Hague, The Netherlands, or Den Haag, or better
s'Gravenhaag, Nederland), the language of UPI, one of the 3 official
languages of ISO, is perhaps one the most important languages (if not the
most) for mathematics research [although it now has competition from
English, French-speaking mathematicians also publish in a franco-English
sabir nowadays (; like I do], is extremely important in medicine and
biology research and has many more goodies than those listed.
This is encouraging, sometimes I'm discouraged by atavic and endemic (often
unconscious) francophobia in English-speaking countries (mainly
international audience English-speaking media who writes like if French was
a mortal sickness [btw if it is the case it's like life, which is a mortal
sickness sexually transmitted (;]).
French, which is not threatening, is often seen as a serious and hated
competitor to the hegemony of English in the world. Not because of the
world population of speakers though... in numbers of speakers, it is the
11th language. As a second language, the 2nd one. As a third language, the
1st one.
French is a good door to learning other languages and the existence of
versions of standards and other technical documents in English and French
is a very valuable tool for accurate translations in other languages or
even to correct ambiguities of originals.
This was my today's worldwide propaganda. Sorry if I put you at risk of
getting my uncurable disease (:
Alain LaBonté
Québec
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