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I'm one of the lucky ones who have been able to study programming in Finnish (my native language). I don't even recall when was the change when "osoitin" (a Finnish word for pointer) did change into "pointer" in my life. I just took that example because I think pointers have been the hardest thing to grasp when I was coming from Turbo Pascal world and learning C++. I have got a small language bath younger when my parents were going through some private English lessons and constantly practiced at home by speaking it. Still, I see it has been very beneficial to learn with my own language, and afterward, it has been very easy to start using English. The same applies e.g. to knitting, I would have no idea what to do if I would have needed to learn in English, but afterward, it has been easy to google translations for terms to access international material. I think the counter-argument I've heard the most is the terminology, as you mentioned, to save time to learn it once with the "terminal" language. But as my experience shows it's very easy to find out those translations afterward, the point is invalid. So, even if I, a mediocre learner with no disabilities find it beneficial to learn in my native language, I can sure see the benefits for people who struggle with different things. Let's not burden them more with the translations and let them focus on learning. Great post!
Note that TurboPascal does have pointers. ;)
I don't really have a strong opinion on the question of the right to learn programming in one's native language, but I know first hand that translations can be very hard to find. This is especially true for error messages: if you have a localized program without fully localized documentation (which is often the case), good luck searching the web for its errors.
I probably was not deep enough in Turbo Pascal to have used them. My background in learning by my native language included only that teaching and books and other materials were in Finnish. Software was not, and I agree it would be really hard to localize the errors etc. though back in the day I studied, there was no possibility to google anything either 😅
There's a modern, cross-platform, and free (as in freedom) successor to Borland Pascal/Delphi: freepascal.org/
Has a classic "white on blue" console IDE for a nostalgia mode, too. :)
Cool! I should check that out. I even might try to turn on my 486-laptop which has all my pascal code.
The most ridiculous argument I've heard about this topic is that it's difficult to talk about technical stuff in Finnish because there is no technical terminology available. Well, why is that? Because no one has bothered to translate it! Sure, the terminology grows really really rapidly but they have to pick those originating terms, too, so why not do the same for other languages.
I see your point, this is kind of a chicken and egg type of problem. I love that there are some original translations for words in Finnish which are not straight finglish, and one of my all-time favorites is "ikikieriö" (eternal loop in Finnish). We should have more of those. Should we start coming up with translations for words that don't have any? I would be happy to help to suggest some 😇
Funny/inventive ones are sometimes good when they describe the concept better than a direct translation or finglish. But perhaps those translations don't catch on if they require understanding the underlying concept first (instead of the translation explaining/clarifying the concept).
I'll have to investigate for proper resources, but I just found this project in GitHub: github.com/HankiDesign/IT-sanasto (most likely a one-man project but a nice collection of terms nevertheless)
A more official resource for IT terminology etc. is Sanastokeskus:
tsk.fi/tsk/
termipankki.fi/tepa/fi/
'Right' is a strong word. I would say everyone should have option to learn in local language, but this creates a language barrier when working with overseas clients. Also if someone thinks they should have a translated option, this cannot be expected of someone who speaks/writes english. This should be seen as an opportunity/ responsibility to make a localized terminology by ones who would want that option.
Thanks for you thoughts Omar! I agree with you, if someone doesn't speak the local language, it shouldn't be expected or demanded of them, because it would just build another language barrier. I added a clarification to my post, that I wish that both the local language AND English material would be available.
You have an excellent point about working in a team that has some members overseas, and I also agree with that - when the only common language with your clients or team members is English, everyone should communicate using English. And I'm always telling people who want to work in IT industry, that they really need to have good English skills, if they want to work in IT, they have to be prepared to do so in English.
However, in this post, I'm talking about learning the very basics of programming - someone who is learning the very basics, isn't ready to code for work yet. If they want to work at some point, sure, they will have to learn the English terms (because all the advanced materials are in English, and in many companies/teams/projects communication is in English), but I'm saying that they don't need to do it immediately. They should have the peace of mind to learn the basic concepts first, and then learn the new vocabulary.
I agree with what you are saying but the way you are putting it sounds wrong. Everyone already has the right to learn whatever it is they want to learn in their own language, its just that they don't have the opportunity due to a lack of resources.
Nobody is stopping anyone from learning anything in their native language. There are significant disadvantages in doing so, which has lead to people not prioritizing translations. That's not wrong in any way. It's sensible to not do something that doesn't provide a significant net benefit after all. So the solution is providing facts, evidence or justifications to counter those disadvantages and ignite the movement to accessible resources yourself!
When you do so, you'll be in a position to gather the required metrics to convince peers :)
Interesting