Why bother learning a foreign language?

My cousin recently wrote in his blog that it seems like everyone now speaks English. It’s worth mentioning that we both live in a non-English-speaking country. But he has such a selective social circle that it’s no wonder that all of his friends speak English. Imagine that you’re studying French at the university and all of your friends are from the same course. So, you can honestly say that all of your friends speak French.

I feel exactly the opposite. It seems to me that although many people all over the world learn foreign languages, very few of them can put their knowledge to proper use. I have many friends who at certain points of time tried to learn English, they have even completed some courses, but it’s really difficult to say that they can do much with what they’ve learned. They can’t watch a movie in English or read a book without a dictionary, let alone watch some educative course for example.

I have a friend who completed a two-year English course. And, she wanted to learn SQL for her work. I told her: “Hey, I know a great video course, I’ll send you a link”. I was very surprised when she said that she couldn’t watch it since it was in English.

I often meet people who don’t know any foreign languages and don’t want to learn any. And, I always struggle to find solid arguments that can induce them to try. So in this article, I’ll try to come with as many pros for learning a foreign language as I can that are based on my own experience.

First thing that many people don’t understand is that learning a foreign language is difficult. Very difficult. It requires a lot of work, patience, and persistence. And, unfortunately, one can truly understand why it is important to learn a language only after he or she has learned one. It just that many people don’t know what they’re missing. Obviously, you don’t need to explain the benefits of learning a language to a person, who has already learned one.

Secondly, I think you can’t learn a language without proper motivation. I’ll tell about mine. When I was at the university and had no job I saw an ad in the local version of Classic Rock magazine in which they looked for a writer. They had only two requirements — a passion for rock music and knowledge of English. I had the former and was lacking the latter. So, I thought: “Whoa, if I only knew English I could be working at my favorite magazine.” That’s why I started learning English.

I also know some people who started learning foreign languages because they wanted to know what their favorite bands sing about. It can be a powerful motivation too.

But one should find one’s own reason. Having said that, here’s a list of several ideas why it is useful to learn a foreign language that can help you find your motivation:

1) Learning a foreign language boosts your memory. Language learning in many ways is about learning new words and phrases. So if you’re diligent and don’t skip on that important part then after some time you will notice that your memory works better. In fact, much better. Too many people stop learning anything by heart after some point in time (usually after the university or after they settle down at their job) and their memory degrades. So learning new words freshens up your memory and exercises it.

2) It makes you a better writer. Writing is also a crucial part of learning a language. One can say that language exists in writing. Take some classic books in any language — there you have it, the language is in there. So if you start learning a language you start writing in it, and then you start writing better in general, also in your own language.

3) It makes you a better speaker. Obviously, speaking is a huge part of language learning, probably the crucial one. It is the ultimate goal — to be able to fluently speak the language. And, speaking a foreign language also affects how you speak in your mother tongue.

4) It opens a whole new world for a person. It is a rare pleasure to be able to read a book written in its native language, I think only then you can fully and truly understand what the author meant to say. Or watching a movie without the translation — I’m sure that any kind of audio dubbing (even a very good one) loses about 20% of the movie’s impact at the very least.

And the greatest thing is the ability to actually speak with foreign people. The Internet made it really easy and it is such a great feeling to speak with someone who is at the other continent and to understand each other. But, unfortunately, these are only words — you can’t feel it until you try it.

5) It educates you. Apart from knowing the language itself a person will surely learn quite a lot of stuff about the country from which the language comes from. And, sometimes it can even be thought-provoking because you will learn about the subjects that you’ve never known ever existed.

6) As my German teacher told me: “Well, learning a foreign language brings you closer to the people of the language and you begin to understand people better.”

So, to sum it up, if you start learning a foreign language, you will start reading more, writing more, communicating more, and it surely can do you no harm, only good, and thereby you will become a better person in general.

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