Cicero said in 55 BC, ‘The one thing in which we are especially superior to beasts is that we speak to each other.’
Some people are able to do some or all of this in more than one language. Knowing another language may mean: getting a job; a chance to get educated; the ability to take a fuller part in the life of one’s own country or the opportunity to emigrate to another; an expansion of one’s literary and cultural horizons; the expression of one’s political opinions or religious beliefs; the chance to talk to people on a foreign holiday.
A second language affects people’s careers and possible futures, their lives and their very identities. In a world where probably more people speak two languages than one, the acquisition and use of second languages are vital to the everyday lives of millions; monolinguals are becoming almost an endangered species. Helping people acquire second languages more effectively is an important task for the twenty-first century.
The importance of speech has been reinforced by many linguists who claim that speech is the primary form of language, and that writing depends on speech. Few teaching methods in the twentieth century saw speech and writing as being equally important.
To quote Michael Halliday (1985: 91), ‘writing is not speech written down, nor is speech writing that is read aloud’. Vital as the spoken language may be, it should not divert attention from those aspects of writing that are crucial for students.
Virtually all teachers, students and bilinguals have assumed that success is measured by how close a learner gets to a native speaker, in grammar, vocabulary and particularly pronunciation.
