The Spanish lecture was given by Miss Saida Ruiz de Temiño (Teacher of Spanish) on Thursday 27 October. Review by Sophia Lancaster (Year 13):
Why have we all studied Spanish? We, being all of the pupils studying Spanish for sixth form, were presented with this seemingly obvious question. I think I can speak for most people attending the third lecture of the Spanish lecture series in saying that we chose to study Spanish because we felt it was a skill worth developing. Perhaps we felt we would someday like to work in a Spanish speaking environment, or we wanted to feel like global citizens, or maybe we simply enjoy going on holiday in Spain or Argentina, for example. What we probably didn’t realize, however, is the value of learning Spanish as an economic advantage. It didn’t take long for Señorita Ruiz to make clear the influence of Spanish throughout the world, and the opportunities that speaking this language fluently can offer us.
From a wide global perspective, Spanish is the official language of 21 countries. Although, Spanish is an unofficial language spoken widely in many countries such as the US, Puerto Rico, and the Philippines. Spanish is also used frequently in organizations such as the EU and the UN. However, these figures only illuminate the surface of a language with such extensive depth and breadth. Spanish is the second most spoken first language by the number of speakers and 7.8% of the world’s population are ‘hispanohablantes.’
The growth of Spanish in recent years and into the future is also a factor worth considering. The number of people wishing to learn Spanish has grown about three fold since 1950, as estimated by El Instituto Cervantes, and will supposedly continue to grow in line with population until 2100. Although some may argue that English is eradicating the need for other languages, Spanish will be a relevant skill well into the future. Especially considering the fact that 9.8% of world GDP is produced in Spanish, tourism in countries like Spain is at its highest levels in history, and Spanish is predicted to become the most spoken language in the United States by 2050, Spanish is only becoming an increasingly dominant force worldwide.