Why Learn a Language Other Than English?
                 A Cross-Cultural Psychological Perspective Language 

 Language is the principal means by which we communicate with one another and by which we store information.  Language is also the principal means by which each generation receives its cultural inheritance form the previous generation.  Indeed, without language, culture as we know it would not exist at all.

 On a global level, monolinguals (those who speak only one language) are a minority.  The majority of the inhabitants of our "global village" speak more than one language.  Besides being an issue of considerable global importance, we in the United States have a large (and growing) number of people who regularly use both English and another language.  In fact, in many cases this other language is often their native tongue.  Many of these people have come to this country from elsewhere.  Moreover, many bilinguals report that they think and/or feel differently, depending on their current linguistic context.  This may be thought of as having a different sense of self, depending on which language is being used.  Such a situation is clearly a natural and healthy part of the bilingual/bicultural experience.

 Earlier this century, many Americans thought that knowledge of more than one language should be avoided. It was commonly believed that humans have only limited "room" to store language; if you learn "too much" language, you take "space" away from other functions such as intelligence.  We now know that such notions are wrong and that there is no evidence that bilinguals do worse on intellectual (or other) tasks.  On the contrary, there is evidence that knowledge of more than one language may improve cognitive flexibility.

 Our understanding of language and its relationship to behavior and culture is becoming increasingly important in our world today.  In our current "global village," knowledge of more than one language has become a vital tool in understanding and communicating with people from other cultures. This is true within a pluralistic, multicultural society such as the United States as well as between people living in different nations.  Also, no matter how important multilingualism is now, the future suggests that it will become even more important.

 Our ignorance of languages other than English, and the unfortunate ethnocentrism that often accompanies this ignorance, may be the root of a future downfall. For many of us who have little exposure to these issues in our everyday lives, now is the time to begin our study of language, and culture, for a better understanding of the partners within our global village.

 Excerpted from "Language and Language Acquisition," by
 David Matsumoto with Phillip Hull, in People: Psychology from a Cultural Perspective,
 Brooks/Cole, 1994, pp. 83-100.

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