Education, Language, Learning Links
Choose from our broad
range of French courses to suit your exact requirements!
- 200 million people in the world understand, speak, read or write French
- French is the most widely taught second language after English
- French is spoken in over 43 countries in the world.
- France is the world's major tourist destination (over 70 million tourists a year including 30 million in Paris).
- French is the 11th most widely spoken language in the world
- French is an official language of 33 countries
- France is Europe's foremost investor abroad
- French is the official language of the international postal service
- France is renowned for the quality of its high tech. (The French TGV is the fastest train in the world - 515 kph)
- French is the official language of the International Red Cross
- France is one of the two official languages at the Olympic Games
- French is not limited to one or two continents.
- French-speaking Africa represents an area larger than the USA
- French is one of the official languages of the United Nations
- Learning French can help you improve the interpersonal skills you bring to your international career
- You can do so many more interesting things on the Internet if you speak
French
(There are many high quality Internet sites available in French ranging from fashion to finance, society to science, music to medicine... just to mention a few)
- Over 20,000 English words have their origins in French
- In terms of number of words, French is the second largest language after English (probably due to the 20,000 French words !)
- France offers a range of generous scholarships to foreign graduate students
- Be able to fully enjoy, at the cinema or on TV, famous films from the French speaking world
- France has the world's greatest number of Nobel Prize winners in literature (12)
- In human and social sciences, a great many of the most important writings have come from France
- French is a major language of high tech and business in the world
- Montréal is the second largest French speaking city in the world
- For those with the appropriate skills there are also possibilities
for work in the following fields:
-international French businesses
-international agencies where French is the required language
-the tourism and hospitality industries
-the diplomatic service
-French research institutes
-as a French teacher
-as a French translator or interpreter
- France is the third greatest exporter and fourth greatest manufacturer of automobiles in the world
- France exports more per capita than Japan, while Japanese exports are more than double those of the United States. France is the fourth greatest exporter in the world
- France is the second greatest exporter of agricultural products, after the United States
- French is spoken in two of the G8 countries.
By Dr David ELDER,
Edith Cowan University, Perth, Australia.
