President Trump and his team value multilingualism
As automated translation improves and college language program enrollments drop, it’s encouraging to hear how valuable language skills are, especially when the source is an advocate for English-only policies and the president of the United Sates.
At the recent Shield of the Americas Summit, President Trump made headlines with his emphatic refusal to learn Spanish, stating, “I’m not learning your language—I don’t have time. I was OK with languages, but I’m not going to spend time learning your language.” However, he went on to comment on how valuable Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s bilingualism was, even suggesting that his own monolingualism was a rare weakness by the admission, “he’s [Rubio’s] got a language advantage over me.”
Secretary Rubio, a Cuban American born in Miami, is fully Spanish/English bilingual and a heritage Spanish-language speaker, having learned it at home with his parents, who emigrated from Cuba, and practiced with his grandfather, who only spoke Spanish. Rubio has often used his language skills to engage with Latin American leaders and media. His story parallels that of millions of Americans, who deserve the same opportunity to nurture their home language into a valuable asset while they develop their English and other core skills.
Rubio’s speech in Spanish elicited widespread praise, including this online comment: “Something as small as speaking for a few seconds in Spanish (or another language) can have a huge impact on making all of us feel included and united”—a sentiment that all of us can appreciate.
The president continued his thread on the importance of languages by stating, “Interpreters are really important. People have no idea how valuable a good interpreter is,” having described a less-than-positive experience with a specific interpreter. Of course, most interpreters meet strict quality and ethical criteria, so such experiences are very rare. However, with the widespread use of automated translation and interpretation, we should ask ourselves, how can we be sure of interpretation/translation quality without some knowledge of the target language? With intergovernmental diplomacy, choice of words can be so crucial that it borders on reckless to rely on automated or unqualified interpretation without personal language expertise. Who knows how many conflicts may have been avoided through upper-level negotiators’ better command of languages?
The message from the president is clear—Americans would do well to improve their language skills, so multilingual learners should be incentivized to develop their heritage languages while they master English, and their home language skills should be recognized as assets throughout all levels of public and private enterprise. Likewise, all Americans should be supported to become multilingual.
Diplomacy is such a valuable skill at all levels of society. It requires empathy acquired through deep understanding of different cultures and priorities, some of which can only be achieved through language knowledge. Communication in your audience’s language can be the key to breaking down barriers, overcoming differences, and ultimately resolving conflicts.
Let’s hope that the president and Congress remember the value of language education—bilingual, dual language, heritage, world language, and immersion programs—when they’re next juggling their budgets.
Daniel Ward/editor