As most people who have been through the UK state school system will know, language learning is, for many, a difficult process. Many adults will remember struggling through French lessons in secondary school, others will remember fighting the urge to fall asleep in a German class. Others still will remember the feeling of achievement after embarrassing their Latin teacher with a question about the number “six” – you know who you are. Nowadays, we as a society are caught in a trap: the younger generations – mine included – are being socialised into the idea that learning foreign languages isn’t as important as it used to be, on the grounds that the internet provides us with easy digital translation software. But is this a reasonable argument? Does Google Translate really mean we don’t need to learn how to greet our fellow humans in their own languages? Can we get away with not understanding the waiter in a Mediterranean restaurant, because “they all speak English anyway”? No. We can’t. And here’s why. Continue reading →