Unis call for compulsory language studies in schools.

Unis call for compulsory language studies in schools. : "'What we are advocating in order to maintain a global advantage is that all students are exposed to the learning of a language from primary right through to year 10,' she said."

We used to do this and other countries can still do it. It does give people a linguistic advantage. They have a better control over their own native tongue expression as well as a chance to meet people half way. A lot of Australians are currently enthusiastically embracing other languages and like to do it for business and tourist purposes. They are realising that it's good to make that effort tot talk to people in their own language. We used to have a really good language record and lots of people still remember their high school French and Latin. It promotes thinking and a view outside of yourself. I'd love to see it come back. Our jobs are on a global market. We live in a geographical position where other languages are spoken. We are one of the few nations where a number of people do not readily swap from one language to another. I can remember sitting at the airport and hearing a young man whom I think started off on his mobile in Dutch. He then swapped to German, then French , then English. On that same trip I was in Port Vila and there were people there who had had no formal education who could speak to each other in their tribal language, swap to another tribal language, talk to me in English or French all in the space of 10 minutes. Their capacity to express themselves and their thoughts was impressive. I think we'll probably eventually go for one or two main languages in the world, but we'll always use our own language as well. You realise that each language allows you to express a different aspect of yourself. You become both more complex and more flexible and the Net and computers just make it so easy to learn a language.