9 ms·

And they are 1st in Japanese Skills !

by lakis 2y ago

johnnyanmac 2y ago
Wow what an upset! I wanted Korea to win. The fact that we have an English proficiency Index worth spending more than 10 words on really highlights the bias of the people who organize this data.
- DiogenesKynikos 2y ago
  English is the international lingua franca. Not being able to speak English means you have limited ability to speak to people from around the world. That's worth 10 words in a report.
  - gerdesj 2y ago
    Saying "English is the French language", half in Latin says much about English!
    - card_zero 2y ago
      It gets worse than that, it's a term for a trading language that was mostly Italian and originated in Turkey.
      - gerdesj 2y ago
        Which Turkey are we on about here? The Franks were mostly Germanic which is why English is considered a Germanic language and why Lingua Franca is a thing and why I can riff on the French (Franks) language being English as a silly joke. English absorbs vocabulary from wherever and whomever it touches because it abhors a vacuum. I will give you a gold star if you can tell me how many languages I have referenced in that last sentence, and this one.
        card_zero 2y ago
        Byzantine Constantinople, I think, and the Fatimid Empire along the Mediterranean coast to the east. I could have said "Anatolia", but I didn't care to (to be Frank).
    - jfengel 2y ago
      A better translation is "Frankish language". The term predates "France" as we know it. Frankish was a Germanic language that was the source of a widely used pidgin throughout western Europe. It's kind of ironic that we remember the name via the Roman scholars. Rome had fallen and the Holy Roman Empire was very not holy and sure as heck not Roman.
  - alephnerd 2y ago
    > English is the international lingua franca True, but this underestimates Japanese's prominence. Japanese (and Korean) fluency is fairly important in much of ASEAN (for example, Vietnam and Thailand), as much of their leadership, rising executives, and rising academics tend to study abroad in Japan.
    - KeplerBoy 2y ago
      What's higher education in Japan like? In Germany and Austria, for example, a lot of graduate level STEM university programs are taught in English, even when everyone in the room is perfectly capable of speaking German, just because the literature is English.
      - alephnerd 2y ago
        I'm not Vietnamese, but my SO is Vietnamese and used to do medical research in Japan as part of that ASEAN-Japan pipeline (and it's the same model in South Korea and Taiwan). There are two types of ASEAN students: 1. "Students" - guest workers brought under the "Trainee" program who in reality are temporary guest workers cleaning toilets, gutting fish, manually harvesting strawberries, or working in hostess bars. They are treated similar to how Nepali and Bangladeshi migrant labor would be in UAE because these trainee workers in Japan lack legal support and often in debt to a broker in the home country. 2. Actual Students - brought as part of Japan's soft power diplomacy in ASEAN. They will study in a mix of Japanese and English or full Japanese (depending on the university). They will also be housed in dorms for international students. These students end up becoming civil servants, professors, and potentially business leaders. Most junior and mid-level professors and medical leadership at top medical universities in Vietnam like UMP tend to be alums of these programs in Japan and SK.
- travisjungroth 2y ago
  Which bias is that? English proficiency is extremely relevant to a country’s ongoing development for all sorts of reasons I would think are obvious. Read the report. It’s really well put together. https://www.ef.com/assetscdn/WIBIwq6RdJvcD9bc8RMd/cefcom-epi-site/reports/2024/ef-epi-2024-english.pdf https://www.ef.com/assetscdn/WIBIwq6RdJvcD9bc8RMd/cefcom-epi...
  - johnnyanmac 2y ago
    That exact bias: >English proficiency remains a reasonable indicator of a nation's ability to produce goods and services that generate economic growth, and it correlates well to national investment in helping people achieve their full potential by providing education, healthcare and a decent standard of living. Meanwhile China's boom in the mid 2010-s (China is 2nd to dead last on this chart, above Japan) still had westerners flock to them. In a few instances, disgustingly so. The language barrier at that level of economy is negligible. A few skilled translators are a rounding error for that gold mine. I'm more than fine with data for data's sake. I have all sorts of useless trivia and statistics that simply put a smile on my face and have little practical use. But using "how good you are at English as a society" to predict economics seems a bit tonedeaf.
    - travisjungroth 2y ago
      That’s not a bias it’s just reality. Of course English proficiency isn’t perfectly correlated with economics. It’s one factor of many. People aren’t usually trying to just predict GDP or something. A report like this is useful for a big company deciding where to expand. I’m writing this from Colombia, which has a big call center industry, much of it in English. “English proficiency of a nation doesn’t matter, don’t talk about it much”, which is what you seem to be getting at, is so clearly wrong to me. Maybe it’s the bias of personal experience. Just because it’s not important to you doesn’t mean it’s unimportant in general.
      - johnnyanmac 2y ago
        You can talk about it all you want, but the correlation just seems too weak for a statement like the above to track. Nothing in statistics is perfect, but they should at least be reasonable (don't make me bring out the XKCD comic). And sure. I have bias and didn't do any mass survey. But when you see more and more of your country falling in education ranks, and the people up top trying to appeal more to countries with very poor english skills as opposed to building those facilities domestically. , I'm going to be skeptical that the language of the country matter much in the grand scheme of things.
- fngjdflmdflg 2y ago
  >the bias of the people who organize this data. It seems that IMD is based in Switzerland and Singapore.[0] Singapore and Switzerland hold ranks 1 and 2, respectively, in digital competitiveness.[1] Singapore has a high level of English proficiency.[2] I don't think the mere fact that an English proficiency Index worth spending more than 10 words on exists shows that the people who organized this data are biased. English proficiency is important in business, science and programming, to name some examples. I think an argument as to why the inclusion of such a metric is biased should be given. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Institute_for_Management_Development https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Institute_for_Ma... [1] https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/hong-kong-economy/article/3286511/hong-kong-rises-no-7-digital-competitiveness-ranking-singapore-takes-top-spot https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/hong-kong-economy/articl... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EF_English_Proficiency_Index#2023_country_rankings https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EF_English_Proficiency_Index#2...
  - delta_p_delta_x 2y ago
    Singapore is de facto part of the Anglosphere, ergo its 'high level of English proficiency'. Singaporeans are effectively bilingual, and English is used at all levels of interaction, from the wet markets and supermarkets, to the public and private schools and universities, to the highest levels of government administration and communication. Can't get more 'Anglo' than that. It's natural for the citizens of a country that uses English as though it were its native language to be proficient in it.
    - fngjdflmdflg 2y ago
      To add, I've read about Singapore's English proficiency before in their 2020 census report, which notes that 48% of households speak mainly English at home which is definitely very high and clearly shows that Singaporeans speak English.[0] [0] https://www.singstat.gov.sg/-/media/files/publications/cop2020/sr1/cop2020sr1.pdf https://www.singstat.gov.sg/-/media/files/publications/cop20... p. 40
  - AlchemistCamp 2y ago
    It's somewhat ridiculous that Singapore is included in the English proficiency index given that is English is one of its four official languages. Not only that, but it's also the privileged official language that all children must use in school. The other official languages are widespread but not universal.

And they are 1st in Japanese Skills !

by lakis 2y ago

And they are 1st in Japanese Skills !

Wow what an upset! I wanted Korea to win. The fact that we have an English proficiency Index worth spending more than 10 words on really highlights the bias of the people who organize this data.

DiogenesKynikos 2y ago
English is the international lingua franca. Not being able to speak English means you have limited ability to speak to people from around the world. That's worth 10 words in a report.
- gerdesj 2y ago
  Saying "English is the French language", half in Latin says much about English!
  - card_zero 2y ago
    It gets worse than that, it's a term for a trading language that was mostly Italian and originated in Turkey.
    - gerdesj 2y ago
      Which Turkey are we on about here? The Franks were mostly Germanic which is why English is considered a Germanic language and why Lingua Franca is a thing and why I can riff on the French (Franks) language being English as a silly joke. English absorbs vocabulary from wherever and whomever it touches because it abhors a vacuum. I will give you a gold star if you can tell me how many languages I have referenced in that last sentence, and this one.
      - card_zero 2y ago
        Byzantine Constantinople, I think, and the Fatimid Empire along the Mediterranean coast to the east. I could have said "Anatolia", but I didn't care to (to be Frank).
  - jfengel 2y ago
    A better translation is "Frankish language". The term predates "France" as we know it. Frankish was a Germanic language that was the source of a widely used pidgin throughout western Europe. It's kind of ironic that we remember the name via the Roman scholars. Rome had fallen and the Holy Roman Empire was very not holy and sure as heck not Roman.
- alephnerd 2y ago
  > English is the international lingua franca True, but this underestimates Japanese's prominence. Japanese (and Korean) fluency is fairly important in much of ASEAN (for example, Vietnam and Thailand), as much of their leadership, rising executives, and rising academics tend to study abroad in Japan.
  - KeplerBoy 2y ago
    What's higher education in Japan like? In Germany and Austria, for example, a lot of graduate level STEM university programs are taught in English, even when everyone in the room is perfectly capable of speaking German, just because the literature is English.
    - alephnerd 2y ago
      I'm not Vietnamese, but my SO is Vietnamese and used to do medical research in Japan as part of that ASEAN-Japan pipeline (and it's the same model in South Korea and Taiwan). There are two types of ASEAN students: 1. "Students" - guest workers brought under the "Trainee" program who in reality are temporary guest workers cleaning toilets, gutting fish, manually harvesting strawberries, or working in hostess bars. They are treated similar to how Nepali and Bangladeshi migrant labor would be in UAE because these trainee workers in Japan lack legal support and often in debt to a broker in the home country. 2. Actual Students - brought as part of Japan's soft power diplomacy in ASEAN. They will study in a mix of Japanese and English or full Japanese (depending on the university). They will also be housed in dorms for international students. These students end up becoming civil servants, professors, and potentially business leaders. Most junior and mid-level professors and medical leadership at top medical universities in Vietnam like UMP tend to be alums of these programs in Japan and SK.
travisjungroth 2y ago
Which bias is that? English proficiency is extremely relevant to a country’s ongoing development for all sorts of reasons I would think are obvious. Read the report. It’s really well put together. https://www.ef.com/assetscdn/WIBIwq6RdJvcD9bc8RMd/cefcom-epi-site/reports/2024/ef-epi-2024-english.pdf https://www.ef.com/assetscdn/WIBIwq6RdJvcD9bc8RMd/cefcom-epi...
- johnnyanmac 2y ago
  That exact bias: >English proficiency remains a reasonable indicator of a nation's ability to produce goods and services that generate economic growth, and it correlates well to national investment in helping people achieve their full potential by providing education, healthcare and a decent standard of living. Meanwhile China's boom in the mid 2010-s (China is 2nd to dead last on this chart, above Japan) still had westerners flock to them. In a few instances, disgustingly so. The language barrier at that level of economy is negligible. A few skilled translators are a rounding error for that gold mine. I'm more than fine with data for data's sake. I have all sorts of useless trivia and statistics that simply put a smile on my face and have little practical use. But using "how good you are at English as a society" to predict economics seems a bit tonedeaf.
  - travisjungroth 2y ago
    That’s not a bias it’s just reality. Of course English proficiency isn’t perfectly correlated with economics. It’s one factor of many. People aren’t usually trying to just predict GDP or something. A report like this is useful for a big company deciding where to expand. I’m writing this from Colombia, which has a big call center industry, much of it in English. “English proficiency of a nation doesn’t matter, don’t talk about it much”, which is what you seem to be getting at, is so clearly wrong to me. Maybe it’s the bias of personal experience. Just because it’s not important to you doesn’t mean it’s unimportant in general.
    - johnnyanmac 2y ago
      You can talk about it all you want, but the correlation just seems too weak for a statement like the above to track. Nothing in statistics is perfect, but they should at least be reasonable (don't make me bring out the XKCD comic). And sure. I have bias and didn't do any mass survey. But when you see more and more of your country falling in education ranks, and the people up top trying to appeal more to countries with very poor english skills as opposed to building those facilities domestically. , I'm going to be skeptical that the language of the country matter much in the grand scheme of things.
fngjdflmdflg 2y ago
>the bias of the people who organize this data. It seems that IMD is based in Switzerland and Singapore.[0] Singapore and Switzerland hold ranks 1 and 2, respectively, in digital competitiveness.[1] Singapore has a high level of English proficiency.[2] I don't think the mere fact that an English proficiency Index worth spending more than 10 words on exists shows that the people who organized this data are biased. English proficiency is important in business, science and programming, to name some examples. I think an argument as to why the inclusion of such a metric is biased should be given. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Institute_for_Management_Development https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Institute_for_Ma... [1] https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/hong-kong-economy/article/3286511/hong-kong-rises-no-7-digital-competitiveness-ranking-singapore-takes-top-spot https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/hong-kong-economy/articl... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EF_English_Proficiency_Index#2023_country_rankings https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EF_English_Proficiency_Index#2...
- delta_p_delta_x 2y ago
  Singapore is de facto part of the Anglosphere, ergo its 'high level of English proficiency'. Singaporeans are effectively bilingual, and English is used at all levels of interaction, from the wet markets and supermarkets, to the public and private schools and universities, to the highest levels of government administration and communication. Can't get more 'Anglo' than that. It's natural for the citizens of a country that uses English as though it were its native language to be proficient in it.
  - fngjdflmdflg 2y ago
    To add, I've read about Singapore's English proficiency before in their 2020 census report, which notes that 48% of households speak mainly English at home which is definitely very high and clearly shows that Singaporeans speak English.[0] [0] https://www.singstat.gov.sg/-/media/files/publications/cop2020/sr1/cop2020sr1.pdf https://www.singstat.gov.sg/-/media/files/publications/cop20... p. 40
- AlchemistCamp 2y ago
  It's somewhat ridiculous that Singapore is included in the English proficiency index given that is English is one of its four official languages. Not only that, but it's also the privileged official language that all children must use in school. The other official languages are widespread but not universal.