Multilinguilism

There is a story about an Englishman, a Frenchman and a German who are debating the merits of their respective languages. The German starts by claiming: ‘German is off course ze best language. It is ze language off logik and philosophy, and can communicate viz great clarity and precision even ze most complex ideas.’ ‘Boeff’ shrugs the Frenchman, ‘but French, French, it ees ze language of lurve! In French, we can convey all ze subtletees of romance weez elegance and flair.’ The Englishman ponders the matter for a while, and then says: ‘Yes, chaps, that’s all very well. But just think about it this way. Take the word “spoon”, for instance. Now you French call it “cuillère”. And what do you Germans call it? – a “Löffel”. But in English, it’s simply called a “spoon”. And when you stop to think about it…isn’t that exactly what it is?’ (from Deutscher 2005: 45)

Underneath the absurdity of this story is a profound truth about language; that while it is at one level completely arbitrary, if we wish to communicate our thoughts and emotions, even our visions of reality, we cannot escape words. When John Donne wrote ‘No man is an Island’ he was in one sense completely wrong; we cannot transfer experience except through words; the metaphor of islands of experience, mediated by smoke signals of words, is apt.

For all humans, therefore, language is of profound important, and especially true for educators who are intentionally seeking to reach into individual islands. All teachers are, at some level, teachers of language, whether they realise it or not, and we are giving a good deal of thought to our articulated language provision. It’s work in progress, of course, and always will be – but we’re delighted to be hosting a multilingualism conference this weekend which will inform and improve our thinking on this matter. Some details are here – do take a look. Many of our teachers from across the age and subject range will be attending to hear about how they can use modern findings to improve what we do. I’m looking forward to learning with them, and I hope to pass on to what we discover. In words, of course.