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- Numerical reason: Spanish is one of the most spoken languages worldwide.
In addition to the Latin American Spanish speaking countries with its almost 400 millions speakers, Spanish is spoken by large number of people in the United States of America. Moreover, there are small Hispanic communities in many non-Spanish speaking countries around the world including Great Britain, Germany, Russia and others.
Notably, the 42 millions Hispanics population size of the United States of America makes the US the fifth largest Spanish speaking country in the world. This is a reality that is already having important consequences in the way investors are doing business within the US and in Latin America.
- Economic reason: Latin America is one of the most important trading partner region for the United States. Free trade agreements, such as NAFTA, CAFTA, ALCA and MERCOSUR make the Spanish language an even more important asset for Americans investors. Many of U.S. manufacturing jobs are being relocated to Latin America. Therefore, for investors or economic advisors the ability to communicate in Spanish is a key factor, since many businessmen in Latin America do not speak other languages very well, if any. Currently, hundreds of American companies have already established subsidiaries across Latin America and the region remains as one of the largest recipient of US foreign investment.
Within the United States, businesses have recognized the importance of the number of Hispanic consumers. Not surprisingly, speaking Spanish is a nice plus for nearly every profession within the United States (medical, police/fire, public service, legal, education, sales, etc.). Southern California, Texas and Florida have important Spanish speaking communities and knowledge of the language is important for many business companies and public services.
- Travel reason: Latin American holds beautiful destinations with immense diversity of flora and fauna. Common destinations have been Mexico and Costa Rica, but newly open countries have amazing amounts of things to be discovered, such is the case of Nicaragua and Cuba.
Spanish speaking countries are: Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Equatorial Guinea (Africa), El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Puerto Rico (US territory), Spain, Uruguay, Venezuela.
Non-Spanish speaking countries where Spanish is spoken by a significant part of their population: Andorra, Australia, Brazil, Belize, Canada, Gibraltar, Morocco (Africa), Philippines (Asia), and the United States.
- Linguistic reasons: Spanish is a romance language that shares roots with Portuguese, French, Italian, and Romanian and has a lot Latin words, commonly used in international scientific language. Spanish shares a strong lexical similarity with Italian and Portuguese, another very important language worldwide. Spanish is close to French and Romanian, and shares thousands of similar word with English. Depending on the level of Spanish proficiency, Spanish learners may find a way to communicate with Italian and Portuguese speakers. Learning Spanish can pave the way to understand easier French grammar and written French, and will for sure expand the vocabulary of English itself.
- Cultural reasons: The expansion and recognition of the Latin American culture and Spanish language in literature, television and music make Spanish learning an asset for just anyone. Who wants to dance some salsa, meringue, rumba, mariachi, bachata or regueton? All of these hot dances are already immensely popular all over Southern California, Texas and the East Cost of the United States. Perhaps, even more importantly for Spanish learners, is that these dances are prevalent all across Latin America, so there will be a lot of fun in one wants it that way!
- Practical reasons: Spanish is way much easier than Slavic languages or Asian languages. Many native English Speakers finds Spanish the easiest second language to be learned. This important because most people will not master more than two or three languages and Spanish should not be missed. If one considers all the implications it has in terms of travel, economics, cultural, discoveries and convenient factors, Spanish should be a top language to be learned.
- Political and historical reasons: Spanish is one of the official languages of United Nations, European Union, and the Inter-American System, such as the OAS (Organization of Americas States) and its specialized agencies. Since the foundation of Western Hemisphere countries, there has been an intense, not always a good one, relation between the United States and Latin America. Being the closer neighbors has meant a lot for some countries, both for the good and for the bad.
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