Madam, - In response to Michelle Lee's assertion (August 19th) that French is "an increasingly redundant language", I would like to draw her attention to the following.
There are 113 million Francophones in the world (those who speak French as a native or adopted language) and French is the official language in more than 17 countries as well as being a co-official language in 14 others. Furthermore, French and English are the only two languages spoken as a native language in five continents. French is the 11th most spoken language in the world.
Spanish is undoubtedly spoken by more people - about 330 million - but I fail to see how this means French is a language in terminal decline. The US model which Ms Lee uses to illustrate her point is wholly irrelevant in Ireland because our Spanish-speaking population cannot be compared with that of the United States. Interestingly, many members of Ireland's African population speak French fluently.
Ms Lee is to be commended for her efforts to promote the learning of Spanish, but I am puzzled as to why she seeks to do so by attacking French. As a language teacher myself, I notice that students benefit from learning more than one foreign language as the skills acquired by the learner transfer between languages.
It is not a case of either/or - more a case of embracing the rich linguistic cultures open to us all. Why, Ms Lee even has a French Christian name. Vive la différence! - Yours, etc,
LOUISE CURTIN, Cabra, Dublin 7.