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The highest discriminatory factor I see in the tech community is the English language. You either have to invest a lot of energy to master it or you are left wi

by lixtra 8y ago

The highest discriminatory factor I see in the tech community is the English language. You either have to invest a lot of energy to master it or you are left with local niche communities. Of course that is difficult to tackle, but it can serve as a benchmark. You can offer a french speaker to be addressed with the wrong pronoun in french or the correct one in English. How would the majority decide?

kome 8y ago
The role of English (and linguistic imperialism) is overlooked not just in the tech world, but more or less everywhere (academia, job market, etc). It's another stratification fault line. Much more research would be needed to understand the impact of it. Learning a language is super expensive; but the people involved mostly don't see the cost of doing it (because sometimes it's a pleasure, but it's a pleasure that not everybody can afford).
jobigoud 8y ago
It might be the first time in the history of Human Civilization that we have the opportunity to standardize the communication pipeline on a global scale. English is not perfect, but it's the standard we have. It's like coding conventions, the exact choice doesn't really matter, consistency is the important trait. I wish we could forget about where the language is coming from and focus on where we are going. Do we want a future where everyone can understand each other? I do. I don't want some great ideas to be hidden for centuries because their author happened to speak a language no one bothered translating from. Let's standardize on English, teach it everywhere to every child, call it a solved problem and move on. (disclaimer: I am a French native speaker living in France).
rcfox 8y ago
Language barriers can be exclusionary, but they're not discriminatory. Anglophone project owners don't not work with non-English speakers because they hate other languages, they just can't understand them. Nobody's at fault for this.
ohithereyou 8y ago
I don't disagree that a language barrier exists and that it is exclusionary to non-English speaking/reading people. However, what do you propose as a solution?

by lixtra 8y ago

kome 8y ago

The role of English (and linguistic imperialism) is overlooked not just in the tech world, but more or less everywhere (academia, job market, etc). It's another stratification fault line. Much more research would be needed to understand the impact of it. Learning a language is super expensive; but the people involved mostly don't see the cost of doing it (because sometimes it's a pleasure, but it's a pleasure that not everybody can afford).

jobigoud 8y ago

It might be the first time in the history of Human Civilization that we have the opportunity to standardize the communication pipeline on a global scale. English is not perfect, but it's the standard we have. It's like coding conventions, the exact choice doesn't really matter, consistency is the important trait. I wish we could forget about where the language is coming from and focus on where we are going. Do we want a future where everyone can understand each other? I do. I don't want some great ideas to be hidden for centuries because their author happened to speak a language no one bothered translating from. Let's standardize on English, teach it everywhere to every child, call it a solved problem and move on. (disclaimer: I am a French native speaker living in France).

rcfox 8y ago

Language barriers can be exclusionary, but they're not discriminatory. Anglophone project owners don't not work with non-English speakers because they hate other languages, they just can't understand them. Nobody's at fault for this.

ohithereyou 8y ago

I don't disagree that a language barrier exists and that it is exclusionary to non-English speaking/reading people. However, what do you propose as a solution?