Karl: “Je respecte énormément certains carnetiers anglophones pour leur esprit d'ouverture, comme Richard qui lit des carnets Web dans d'autres langues et en parlent. Mon propos n'est pas de dire que les carnetiers anglophones devraient absolument lire d'autres langues que l'anglais (quoique ;) mais surtout qu'il faut arrêter de penser que l'anglais est l'unique voie d'expression.”
I must admit that Karl's is the only French-language weblog I read. His weblog is about half technical and half personal, though speaking more in general terms about l'amour and the beauty he sees around him, especially in Montreal. I once did try to read a half-dozen French-language weblogs, and I need to make a greater effort to find some French weblogs that aren't too technical and aren't too political.
Karl argues that readers (of weblogs and I'm sure of other print media) suffer from what he calls monolinguism, or at least that they think that English should be the only language of communication, at least in technical fields. From strongest to weakest in ability, I can read, hear, write and speak French all due to my parents' putting me in French immersion starting in kindergarten. I was in the first class the school district had for French Immersion, and I'm pretty sure I hated it but I am grateful to be bilingual in a country that has two official languages. (It should probably be three, Chinese being the third, but that only really matters in cities.) I'm grateful because if necessary, I can communicate in another language that is fairly common around the world. The most interesting place I've spoken French in was China, because some of the African international students could speak French better than they could English (and some of them Chinese better than both), so it made more sense to practice what was remaining at the time of my French and have a better idea of what they were trying to tell me.
I'm with Karl: you don't (necessarily) have to read weblogs or other printed material in another language, but if you can, it's probably a lot easier to understand what people from other countries think or are trying to say if you are reading it in the language they are most comfortable or best able to communicate in. French is one of those languages, I'd like to work on my Chinese reading ability, which approaches nil at this point, after having stopped studying it 2 years ago. I've managed to avoid a lot of what Karl talks about by reading his weblog, and hopefully I can find some more like (or even unlike) his so that I have a few more sources of French-language information than, well, just the one.
