The car's on fire and there's no driver at the wheel - The Tory leadership elections

tbf pinker is a massive twat in other areas of his life also

Can't argue with that.

Mind you the francophone bruxellois don't bother to learn Flemish, although they're literally surrounded by Flanders

Yeah, there's a clear hierarchy. Regional languages in France have also been systematically quashed. My wife's grandfather, who was German-Alsatian, decided not to teach his children either German or Alsatian after WW2, although he himself continued speaking them as needed (in Strasbourg).

my father, a South American immigrant to the USA, didn’t teach us Spanish because he thought it would slow our assimilation. We learned it anyway.

I don’t know anything about pinker (some popular scientist? not gonna bother) but people at the ENS pride themselves on doing everything public in English. Of course internal ENS power (all ENS people *really* care about) is carried out in French. Pinker just showed himself uninterested in that, which is fine, for the locals as well.

Most francophones wouldn't go out of their way to give a talk in English at the ENS for the sake of showboating. And no bilingual Montrealer would ever consider such a thing, in such a context. I'm not taking issue with the ENS's openness to English here, I'm just saying that given the environment in which Pinker grew up, it's fair to expect some amount of linguistic sensitivity. Same goes for Naomi Klein, who comes from a similar background, and whose politics are far removed from Pinker's.

No, I meant he probably asked what language to speak and was told English (maybe with relief). Unless the entire audience is francophone an academic talk in Paris will be given in English. At least that is the norm ime

he probably asked what language to speak

What I'm saying is this certainly didn't happen.

It’s probably the least of his problems today...

but what about Steven Pinker pic.twitter.com/YNwqNZ0SRM

— Matt Hammington (@MattHammington) July 7, 2019