This holiday season … learn Spanish with Radio Lingua
Posted on December 13, 2008
We felt that the cheesy jingle wasn't enough – we needed snowflakes and Christmas trees! Just a reminder that the Winter Sale is currently on, giving 20% discount on any membership with coupon code HOLIDAYS08. You can use this discount to purchase a membership for Coffee Break Spanish. Choose between level 1 (beginners: lessons 1-40) and level 2 (intermediate: 41-80) and each membership is available in bronze, silver, gold and platinum versions, giving access to a huge range of materials including pdf guides, lesson notes, exercises, word lists, additional listening materials and lots more.
Dec 14, 2008
I live in London and if anyone says to me “everyone speaks English” my answer is “Listen and look around you”. If people in London do not speak English then the whole question of a global language is completely open.
The promulgation of English as the world’s “lingua franca” is unethical and linguistically undemocratic. I say this as a native English speaker!
Unethical because communication should be for all and not only for an educational or political elite. That is how English is used internationally at the moment.
Undemocratic because minority languages are under attack worldwide due to the encroachment of majority ethnic languages. Even Mandarin Chinese is attempting to dominate as well. The long-term solution must be found and a non-national language, which places all ethnic languages on an equal footing is long overdue.
An interesting video can be seen at http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=_YHALnLV9XU Professor Piron was a former translator with the United Nations
A glimpse of Esperanto can be seen at http://www.lernu.net
Dec 16, 2008
This comment is out of place and has nothing to do with the blog post which promotes the learning of other languages, though not including Esperanto. While you’re entitled to promote Esperanto if you feel strongly about it, we would prefer that you did not share your views in completely inappropriate places. There are plenty of places including on our discussion board where you are entitled to engage in relevant discussion, but please refrain from posting this Esperanto spam on our blog.