LL-L "Language politics" 2010.11.30 (10) [EN]

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L O W L A N D S - L - 30 November 2010 - Volume 10
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From: Marcus Buck <list at marcusbuck.org>

Subject: LL-L "Language politics" 2010.11.30 (08) [EN]



From: Hellinckx Luc <luc.hellinckx at gmail.com>

Why French Scholars Love U.S. Colleges - Room for Debate -
NYTimes.com<http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2010/11/28/why-french-scholars-love-us-colleges>



French scholars leaving France for the States, even though French is still
pretty dominant within France (mildly speaking here ;=)).



It's interesting that the article quotes a rise in the proportion of
academics among emigrants instead of providing real numbers. This usually is
a tool of the media to cover the fact that the real numbers are rather
unimpressive ;-) I guess the real reason for the "rise" in the percentage is
the general increase of academics among the populace and generally
decreasing emigrant numbers of non-academics. Have they evaluated the number
of US academics coming to France? What is the net gain/loss?

I know similar "brain drain" scenarios from German media and they usually
lack hard evidence. It's normal that scientists take jobs in foreign
countries. There's a limited number of employers if you are a quantum
physicist or a world expert in biotechnology. Of course the US has some kind
of special attraction. E.g. a stratification that is unknown in most
European countries. There's nothing like the Ivy League in Germany. We have
some good universities in Germany but their quality is much more uniform.
"Harvard" is a synonym for excellency. So for a German or French scholar
it's very attractive to get a job at an institution like that. It's good for
your reputation and you don't have to worry much about money.

But apart from that I don't see a big brain drain. And we should consider
that most of these scholars don't emigrate forever. Often it's a work
station for them and they come back to their homeland later.

In other words: France is safe.

I always like to refer to Estonia because it is a national state with a
national language that is spoken by just a bit more than 1 million people.
If brain drain would be dangerous to a developed Ausbausprache then Estonian
should be out-brained rather quickly. No, brain drain is mostly a problem if
people switch the language but stay in the same place. If the upper class
adopts a new language.



people are so much more mobile for instance.



People are mobile but don't overestimate that. If you look ath the list here
with Ron, Mike Morgan and others you will get the impression of very mobile
folks but most people in the world are not very mobile. They usually stay in
the same place.

I don't think a language needs a "strategy" to survive, like "seduction" or
something. A language just needs to provide all basic needs and it needs to
cover all social strata (well, the only "necessary" stratum is the upper
class).

Marcus Buck



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