Should Portuguese be taught in Geneva? 200+ comments have an opinion too.

Saturday, September 08, 2012

The articles I manage to find on which part of which country may or may not learn which language are usually quite bereft of comments - not so this one, about the possibility of teaching Portuguese in Switzerland. The reason for the comments is because it's not just the idea of giving the option to learn it in schools, but rather a petition asking Portuguese to be put into the curriculum in Geneva due to the large number of ethnic Portuguese there:

"We are the canton where is found the largest number of Portuguese in Switzerland, some 50,000 people...Our children represent 10% of schoolchildren, and so we hope to give them the possibility to learn their language, as is the case with Spanish or Russian children in certain schools."

Most of the comments in the article seem to be negative, for two reasons: 1) taxation (paying for education in a non-official language), and 2) opening the door to more and more languages such as Albanian and Serbian and whoever else is able to gather enough signatures and support to make the case for their language. Positive comments tend to stress the importance and opportunity of Portuguese as a world language.


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