A humble suggestion

In just one day I've seen two flare-ups about the taken-for-granted use of English as the lingua franca in an international group. Despite the sincere efforts of many well-meaning people, the solution is not so simple as monolingual English speakers respecting diversity or intercultural communication. Neither does the answer lie in shrugging ones shoulders and saying - well English IS the international lingua franca.

I predict that the use of English as an international language is to see many more problems to come. And that those communities, even countries, that are actively looking for creative and sensitive ways to solve this problem will be the leaders in the future.

In one of the discussion groups, Enrique Stanziola, from Argentina doing his research in US said something which I think needs repeating and repeating:

"I would humbly suggest to all English-speakers to make the effort of learning at least one foreign language and travel to a
country were they have to use it to survive. That's an excelllent learning experience for anybody. Feeling what's to be 'minority' for a moment may help them to understand the need of addressing the language problem."