Mxsmanic wrote:

David Horne, _the_ chancellor (*) writes:

The next language _you_ try maybe. It's rarely of any use to me when I
travel (outside French speaking countries)- even in Europe. Despite
being an American, you have adopted a very French perspective, but it's
******** if you travel to most countries outside France.

There's nothing specifically French about the perspective, although I'm sure
it pleases the French.

It's a skewed perspective with no basis in the reality of the world
today.

I've still had cases in which I've been asked to speak
to executives from non-French-speaking countries in French rather than English
because they knew French far better (having studied it in school).

There are cases where non-German native executives would rather you
speak to them in German than English too. So what? It's the numbers that
matter.

There are many people who study only French (particularly if their first
language is already English),

See below!

or both English and French. French has long
been extremely popular as a foreign language.

Extremely popular is meaningless. In the US, for example, which is the
most populous English speaking country in the world, high school
students are now learning Spanish at a rate almost 4 times that of
French. In the UK too, learning French as a second language is seen as
less important than it used to be.

--
(*) ... of the royal duchy of city south and deansgate
http://www.davidhorne.net - real address on website
"Abominable, loyal, blind, apparently subservient."
Pres. Carter on Pres. Blair- May, 2007