Name: 【TED】Patricia Ryan: Don't insist on English!
Uploaded: 2013-04-14T05:29:24.000Z
Duration: 10 min 36 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

and somebody's going to come on the stage in a minute

Well actually, I hope for a while longer yet.

I have been living and teaching in the Gulf

And in that time, I have seen a lot of changes.

who was teaching English to adults in Abu Dhabi.

all the Arabic words for the local plants,

How did those students get all that knowledge?

It's not necessary to tell you how important it is

English is the undisputed global language.

But I do know that I've seen a lot of changes.

When I first came out to the Gulf, I came to Kuwait

in the days when it was still a hardship post.

to teach in the state schools there in Kuwait.

because the government wanted to modernize the country

and to empower the citizens through education.

Now this is the major change that I've seen --

from being a mutually beneficial practice

to becoming a massive international business that it is today.

No longer just a foreign language on the school curriculum,

for every English-speaking nation on earth.

according to the latest World University Rankings --

So everybody wants to have an English education, naturally.

Would he need the same language as a lawyer, for example?

We English teachers reject them all the time.

They can't pursue their dream any longer,

would I stop him from entering my British University?