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Re:The Neural Advantage of Speaking 2 Languages by patio11 on Thursday January 21, 2010 @11:33AM (#1067601)
I'm a big fan of bilingualism but if you're living in America and inclined to do business primarily in America, then the advantages of it are not so great next to the prodigious effort required to learn another language. Most Americans study Spanish, but then a) countries and people who speak only Spanish are not typically great economic prospects (compared to, say, Japan or Germany or what have you) and b) supposing one were to study Spanish and use it for one's career, one would be competing with American native speakers of Spanish who probably speak better Spanish than you.

If a country like, e.g., Japan/China/South Korea were a skip over the border instead of a 10+ hour plane ride away, I'd recommend every single person to study Japanese/Chinese/Korean. In Sweden, even if English weren't the lingua franca for Europe, you'd still be close physically and economically to multiple English-speaking countries.

Re:The Neural Advantage of Speaking 2 Languages by yannis on Thursday January 21, 2010 @11:52AM (#1067660)
There is one other advantage, being able to read in another language opens up a literary world that is hidden and even a technical world which is difficult to extract with translations.
Re:The Neural Advantage of Speaking 2 Languages by rjurney on Thursday January 21, 2010 @12:53PM (#1067827)
And one great way to learn a second language is to get a bilingual book, or two copies of your favorite book in two languages :)
Re:The Neural Advantage of Speaking 2 Languages by yannis on Thursday January 21, 2010 @01:02PM (#1067849)
I watch TED videos with sub-titles!