GLOBALIZATION IS JUST ANGLOFICATION:

In Georgia, English replaces retreating Russian (Reuters, September 15, 2010)

[Natela Chokhonelidze, the 70-year-old Professor Emeritus at the university’s Institute of Russian Studies,] is on the losing side of a deliberate shift in the former Soviet republic as its pro-Western leadership tries to supplant Russian with English as the default second language of 21st century Georgia.

Today, hundreds of native English speakers joined the first day of school as teaching assistants under an ambitious programme to have every child aged five to 16 speak English. English is now compulsory, and Russian optional.

The aim appears pragmatic in a globalised world where English dominates and Georgia’s investment-driven economy is seeking partners in Turkey and the European Union.

It dovetails too, however, with President Mikheil Saakashvili’s policy of dragging the Caucasus country of 4.5 million people out from Russia’s orbit, two years after war shattered already fragile ties between the neighbours.

“We’re a free and independent country and our people are free and independent. It’s their choice which language to learn,” Education Minister Dmitry Shashkin, an ethnic Russian, told Reuters, in English.