A return to the past? The Spanish as the First Foreign Language policy in Trinidad and Tobago

Situated close to the coast of Venezuela, the small twin-island nation of Trinidad & Tobago is geographically South American, but culturally Caribbean. Despite colonisation by various European powers, years of British rule and the ensuing dominance of English have meant that the country’s rich ethnic and cultural heritage is currently not paralleled by equivalent linguistic diversity. Building on the country’s natural position as a bridge between the English and Spanish-speaking worlds, the government launched the Spanish as the First Foreign Language (SAFFL) policy in 2005, with the aim to enhance trade links with Latin America through increased use of Spanish in the education system, civil service, and wider society. After outlining the historical and sociocultural background underpinning the SAFFL policy, this study examines the initiative’s implementation and surveys its impact, seeking to evaluate the policy’s effectiveness as a whole.

Englisch als Lingua franca versus andere Sprachen im Bildungswesen: Polen und Japan im Vergleich

The purpose of this study is to compare Poland’s and Japan’s foreign languagepolicies in preschool, elementary, lower/upper secondary and higher education and shed light on the aspect of multilingualism in this milieu as well. Based on secondary data (ministerial ordinances, governmental reports, curricula) and literature knowledge, the paper provides a comparative overview of the Polish and Japanese contexts which differ in a strong way. While Poland’s foreign language policy is mainly based on the objectives of the EU’s policy according to which every European citizen should master two other languages in addition to his or her mother tongue, the Japanese government’s policy aims at improving English education.

Changes in English language policy in Kim Jong-un's North Korea

One of the most important components of a country's language policy is its planning on foreign languages and its decisions regarding which foreign language(s) to choose and teach to its people in the nation's school system (Cenoz & Gorter, 2012). The government generally makes a selection among the candidate languages on the basis of the languages' perceived economic and socio-political value inside and outside the country. However, the socio-economic power and prestige of languages are variable and bound to change over time (Wright, 2004). For this reason, changes are almost always observed in any country's foreign language policy.