What should be the International Olympic Committee's official language policy?

[talloola]

Vancouver's olympics is successful as well, I have heard so
many good comments coming from those attending the event
in vancouver.
I have no negative thoughts about french/english, both are
our national languages, so use both of them at the extravaganza, that is the olympics.
It amazes me how this is translated into something political, and also how many have negative thoughts
towards french canada.
I loved it in Montreal when I was there for a short time,
wished I could speak french so much, it was nice hearing
it everywhere, but they also changed to english immediately
as soon as they realized we are not bi-lingual. We would
learn it in the blink of any eye if we needed it here, but
we don't, and that's too bad, it is valuable to know more
than one language.
I love all kinds of sports, so watching the athletes participate in the olympics,
for me is great.
Politically, I would not have voted to spend that much money to have it here,
let someone else spend the money, and watch it on TV, I can't go anyway, wish
I could.

The french canadian people were very gracious to us.

I voted french/english and local language.

 

[L Gilbert]

Hey, I know. The OIC should have used katajjaq as the official language at these Olys.

 

[YukonJack]

For future Olympic Games, the official language should be:

1. English, wherever the Games are held.

2. The official language of any unilingual country.

3. The dominant and prevaling language of the region, where the Games are held, in a multilingual country. (i.e. French when - and ONLY WHEN - the Games are held in Quebec).

 

[JLM]

Hey, I know. The OIC should have used katajjaq as the official language at these Olys.

I think you are getting close. Maybe ALL languages should be scrapped. When people open their mouths they generally create more problems than they solve. :lol:

 

[countryboy]

I think you are getting close. Maybe ALL languages should be scrapped. When people open their mouths they generally create more problems than they solve. :lol:

Perhaps we should consider eliminating language altogether. Just show the games with those little digital score things on the screen. Then we wouldn't have to listen to the non-stop yammering of Brian Williams and his colleagues, filling otherwise dead air space with drivel and "analysis." We could also do without the tear-jerking interviews of the hopefuls who missed getting a medal. Who cares? You lost - get over it. If you have a field of 25 athletes competing for one gold medal, there are going to be 24 "losers", so if you lost, you're at least in the majority. Sheesh.

The opening and closing ceremonies would be without any controversy at all...just give us the show and never mind the talking. Ahh, wouldn't it be great?

 

[Machjo]

For future Olympic Games, the official language should be:

1. English, wherever the Games are held.

2. The official language of any unilingual country.

3. The dominant and prevaling language of the region, where the Games are held, in a multilingual country. (i.e. French when - and ONLY WHEN - the Games are held in Quebec).

Oh I love this. If the Olympics in Beijing had had no English even though it's not even one of the nation's official languages, you would have bitched. But God forbid there should be French in Vancouver when it's one of the nation's official languages?

No double standard there:lol:

 

[YukonJack]

Machjo, I think you misread my post.

I meant - and I thought my post was clear about it - that English, since it is THE acknowledged international language of commerce, art, industry etc. should be one of the official languages of any Olympic Games, regardless where it was held.

Points 2. and 3. were after that.

And YES, if Beijing had had the ignorance of NOT designating English as one of the official languages, I would have complained, and justifiably so.

French in Vancouver is just about as foreign as Urdu or Sanskriit.

No double stardard.

 

[Machjo]

Machjo, I think you misread my post.

I meant - and I thought my post was clear about it - that English, since it is THE acknowledged international language of commerce, art, industry etc. should be one of the official languages of any Olympic Games, regardless where it was held.

Points 2. and 3. were after that.

And YES, if Beijing had had the ignorance of NOT designating English as one of the official languages, I would have complained, and justifiably so.

French in Vancouver is just about as foreign as Urdu or Sanskriit.

No double stardard.

So show me where it says that English is the official world language. Though about 25% of the world's population studies it, only about 10% (and this includes native speakers) really speak it well. You obviously haven't traveled much or if you have, you've stuck around the tourist traps. Travel off the beaten tourist paths, and you'll find English is nowhere to be found but on vulgar T-shirts with words you wouldn't wear yourself and which the wearer doesn't know the meaning of.

Except for most aeronautical and maritime communications, or for major multinational corporations (the vast majority of smaller businesses, even international and global ones) simply cannot afford the interpretation ad translation staff necessary. I'd worked for a few such businesses before, and they usually rely on either a neighbouring language or expect their guests to know the local language.

The idea of English being the 'Latin of the people' is ludicrous. With only 105 of the world's population knowing the language, and with English being among the more difficult world languages requiring much time and money to learn, it's about as elitist as you can get.

Looking at it that way, perhaps simply limiting the Olympic events to the local language would be a little more fair and equal, or are you worried about looking out for your privileged world status?

 

[Machjo]

I certainly could agree in principle with not having French at the Vancouver games. But the rule must be fair and consistent across the board if we believe in justice. So if that's the case, then no English in Beijing either, unless of course you think to be civilized, one needs to know the language of Britannia?

 

[Machjo]

The way I see it, the only just options are either:

1. Local language only,

2. local language followed by an international auxiliary language designed to be easy for all to learn,

3. Same as 2 above, but the order of precedence reversed,

4. an international auxiliary language designed for all to learn, and no other language, or

5. All languages.

5 above could be a little unmanageable mind you, but it would apply to all equally none-the-less.

As for all the other options, as diverse as they are, at least they put all on a relatively equal footing while applying the rule universally.

To insist on one ethnic language dominating all Olympics worldwide ought to belong to a bygone era of imperialism.

 

[YukonJack]

Hey, why not resort to the language promoted by some well-meaning, but blind to the world scene, European do-gooders: ESPERANTO.

Now here is an artificial language that died on the drawing board.

 

[JLM]

Machjo, I think you misread my post.

I meant - and I thought my post was clear about it - that English, since it is THE acknowledged international language of commerce, art, industry etc. should be one of the official languages of any Olympic Games, regardless where it was held.

Points 2. and 3. were after that.

And YES, if Beijing had had the ignorance of NOT designating English as one of the official languages, I would have complained, and justifiably so.

French in Vancouver is just about as foreign as Urdu or Sanskriit.

No double stardard.

Don't the fifty thousand residents of Maillardville count?

 

[Machjo]

Hey, why not resort to the language promoted by some well-meaning, but blind to the world scene, European do-gooders: ESPERANTO.

Now here is an artificial language that died on the drawing board.

Ah, ignorance is bliss. This 'dead' language has established a profitable publishing industry in books, CD's, etc. It might not be quit as big as the English one, but it still stands on its own two feet without government assistance. The following is just one distributer:

UEA.ORG: Katalogo

Then we have public education. The Italian Ministry of Public Instruction added Esperanto to the list of languages students could choose from for high school graduation in 1993:

http://www.internacialingvo.org/public/study.pdf

Poland, Croatia, and Hungary in 2000; and Britain in 2000 too:

Springboard... to Languages

The Australian state of Victoria has been teaching it experimentally in some elementary schools since 1997, and a school in Halifax has stated teaching it since this past September as part of an experiment to test its propaedeutic value in language learning. Some schools in the US teach it too. For more on its propaedeutic value and research related to it, see:

http://www.springboard2languages.org/documents/springboard_rationale.pdf

I'd also met a few businessmen relying on Esperanto for international commerce. One man takes Polish tourists across China every year. Another relies on it for small-scale import-export. Add to that that a few radio stations around the world broadcast in Esperanto too and there are plenty of organizations, scientific, cultural, religious, political, and other that rely on Esperanto. Even Google is in Esperanto:

Google

Now as for being well-intentioned, well, God forbid that should be the case. Good intentions always lead to folly. Looking out for number one always brings about more peace between nations and peoples.

 

[talloola]

B Cers are being very snobby by saying french should not
be part of the vancouver games, it is one of canada's
'official' languages, and when games were in montreal,
both languages were spoken, that is only right, quebec
is part of canada, lets remember that, and I want it to
remain, as part of canada, and I welcome the french language into our
vancouver games, are we really that snobby and snitty.

what's the problem anyway, is everything so good with
us bc ers, that we have to invent this political silliness.

 

[Machjo]

Don't the fifty thousand residents of Maillardville count?

That depends? If the Olympics are funded by the BC or Federal government, then yes, since they're taxpayers too. Otherwise, no. As far as I'm concerned, the Olympics should have gotten no government funding, and then they could have been done in the local language, English in this case, and that could have sufficed. Though granted it would mean changing the Olympic rules.

 

[YukonJack]

So, Machjo, do YOU speak this great language of ESPERANTO?

And how many people do you know who do?

 

[Avro]

Until this changes the games in this country should reflect it.

 

[Machjo]

So, Machjo, do YOU speak this great language of ESPERANTO?

And how many people do you know who do?

I speak 3 languages fluently, and that includes Esperanto. I'm also functional in spoken Mandarin Chinese, and can read some Arabic and Persian. From my experience, Esperanto is far easier to learn than either English or French.

As for my acquaintances with Esperanto speakers, I don't have many Esperanto speaking Friends in Canada, though I have a few, mostly in Quebec; but I do keep in touch with my friends abroad via the internet.

In China, however, I'd actually found Esperanto to be more useful than French or English, with only Chinese surpassing it in usefulness. As for French, most Chinese are busy learning English. And as for English, few learn it well. In most cases, they learn English in a specialized manner according to their trade or profession. As a result, beyond professional conversations, making friends in English was usually very tedious, and usually ended up more like a teacher-student relationship rather than a friendship. In fact in some cases, I ended up feeling like they were trying to use me for free English lessons.

With Esperanto I never had that problem. Sure more people spoke English than Esperanto in China, but those who knew Esperanto could actually hold an interesting non-work-related conversation. In fact, the vast majority of Esperanto speakers I'd met in China spoke it with native-like fluency, so much so that I felt like we were actually chatting in a common mother tongue. We could easily discuss literature, religion, politics, culture, etc. etc. etc. without hindrance. With English, I always felt mentally exhausted after a few hours of a 'friendly conversation', which usually degenerated into a grammar lesson.

In the end, it was much more pleasant to leave English in the office where it belonged, except when out with native English speakers or the rare case of an actually fluent English speaking Chinese who possessed the necessary vocabulary do discuss topics outside of work.

Of course as my Chinese developed, I came to find Chinese to be far more useful than Esperanto, leaving even Esperanto in the dust as far as usefulness went. But still, English was useful only for the most professionally-related of tasks, with Esperanto, though a distant second to Chinese, leaving English in the dust as far as its usefulness went in terms of actually holding a human conversation and not talking like a working robot.

 

[L Gilbert]

Perhaps we should consider eliminating language altogether. Just show the games with those little digital score things on the screen. Then we wouldn't have to listen to the non-stop yammering of Brian Williams and his colleagues, filling otherwise dead air space with drivel and "analysis." We could also do without the tear-jerking interviews of the hopefuls who missed getting a medal. Who cares? You lost - get over it. If you have a field of 25 athletes competing for one gold medal, there are going to be 24 "losers", so if you lost, you're at least in the majority. Sheesh.

The opening and closing ceremonies would be without any controversy at all...just give us the show and never mind the talking. Ahh, wouldn't it be great?

...... unless you want to catch the news over the radio.

 

[L Gilbert]

I speak 3 languages fluently, and that includes Esperanto. I'm also functional in spoken Mandarin Chinese, and can read some Arabic and Persian. From my experience, Esperanto is far easier to learn than either English or French.

As for my acquaintances with Esperanto speakers, I don't have many Esperanto speaking Friends in Canada, though I have a few, mostly in Quebec; but I do keep in touch with my friends abroad via the internet.

In China, however, I'd actually found Esperanto to be more useful than French or English, with only Chinese surpassing it in usefulness. As for French, most Chinese are busy learning English. And as for English, few learn it well. In most cases, they learn English in a specialized manner according to their trade or profession. As a result, beyond professional conversations, making friends in English was usually very tedious, and usually ended up more like a teacher-student relationship rather than a friendship. In fact in some cases, I ended up feeling like they were trying to use me for free English lessons.

With Esperanto I never had that problem. Sure more people spoke English than Esperanto in China, but those who knew Esperanto could actually hold an interesting non-work-related conversation. In fact, the vast majority of Esperanto speakers I'd met in China spoke it with native-like fluency, so much so that I felt like we were actually chatting in a common mother tongue. We could easily discuss literature, religion, politics, culture, etc. etc. etc. without hindrance. With English, I always felt mentally exhausted after a few hours of a 'friendly conversation', which usually degenerated into a grammar lesson.

In the end, it was much more pleasant to leave English in the office where it belonged, except when out with native English speakers or the rare case of an actually fluent English speaking Chinese who possessed the necessary vocabulary do discuss topics outside of work.

Of course as my Chinese developed, I came to find Chinese to be far more useful than Esperanto, leaving even Esperanto in the dust as far as usefulness went. But still, English was useful only for the most professionally-related of tasks, with Esperanto, though a distant second to Chinese, leaving English in the dust as far as its usefulness went in terms of actually holding a human conversation and not talking like a working robot.

Yeah, I pretty much agree with this. I don't know Esperanto, but I do know a little Chinese and in a general sense it is immensely more descriptive than English and I'll have to take your word for it concerning Esperanto.