John Womack wrote, among others:"It is odd, however, that all of a   
sudden we seem to have returned without a memory of it to a discussion   
that ended a couple of years ago, on language and economics. As I   
remember, most discussants then seemed to conclude, happily (at least   
for them), that since 'English [I paraphrase] is now the language of   
economics around the world,' that's the only language an economist need   
know, or that a historian of economics need know.  
I wonder what we will now (tentatively) conclude."  
  
I don't think the slant in the current discussion requires changing the   
"conclusion" we reached earlier.  The generalized claims about the   
utility of multiple foreign languages as a prerequisite to doing good   
economics or the history of economic thought are being made outside the   
context in which I made the remark:  
"In an effort to rescue some useful meaning from Keynes's famous quip   
'In the long run we are all dead,' Nicholas J. Theocarakis first posts a   
text in French which I would not trouble myself to try and read or   
understand.  It's been a rather long time since I took lessons in   
reading French.  (Why wouldn't he translate the text, anyhow?)"  
  
There might have been a need to change the previous conclusion on   
multiple foreign languages (at least on my part) had anyone shown how my   
reading the quoted French piece would have made a difference to my   
argument that Keynes was quite capable of saying inconsistent things at   
different times, and sometimes in the same text.  Thus, he could write   
"The Economic Possibilities for Our Grandchildren" and also argue   
short-term monetary actions that would hurt the future generations,   
besides those of the present since the long run in monetary analysis   
does not take a generation to arrive.  No one also contradicted my claim   
that Keynes's ability to function in French did not rescue him from his   
misrepresentations of J.-B. Say's Law of Markets.  
  
Besomi talks about the difficulties of interpreting Marx from German.    
That may well be so.  However, one has to point out, for example, that   
Marx really was not claiming to contradict Smith's theory of value when   
he is quoted as having written that Smith "sometimes confuses, and at   
other times substitutes, the determination of the value of *commodities*   
by the quantity of labour required for their production, with its   
determination by the quantity of living labour with which commodities   
can be bought ..." (1975, 70; emphasis original).  Otherwise, a reader   
of English who understands Smith can legitimately dismiss Marx as the   
one who failed to understand Smith's theory of value, without having to   
bother him- or herself with first learning to read German and then   
reading Marx.  The same applies to Austrian criticisms of classical   
capital and interest theories.  A reader of English who understands the   
classics in English could point out the errors of Bohm-Bawerk's and his   
followers' criticisms (translated into English) without reading them in   
German.  A reader of German who thinks the German translations are   
faulty may then rescue the Austrians from their subsequent criticisms.    
Before then, one need not handicap oneself with the burden of learning   
German before writing the criticism.  
  
Besomi also says "in reality [Say's Law] was widely discussed and   
rejected, or at least explicitly set aside, in the non-English   
literature, out of which grew some of the most interesting business   
cycle theories in the two decades before WW1 (in the German-speaking   
area) or where the premises of economic dynamics were laid (Italy)."    
But anyone who understands Say's Law as elaborated by James Mill, David   
Ricardo, John Stuart Mill, and Alfred Marshall loses little by not   
knowing that writers in the non-English literature didn't think much of   
it.  It was their mistake not to have fully understood the Smithian   
market principles Say had reformulated.  Why unprofitably spend one's   
precious time worrying about "the wrong ideas of dead men/women"?    
Historians of economics should not forget economic principles   
themselves, particularly, the "felicific calculus" or benefit-cost   
analysis!  Besides, what are called business cycle theories are merely   
variations or a renaming of the classical forced-saving doctrine that   
can be traced to David Hume through Fisher, (Wicksell) Marshall, J.S.   
Mill, Malthus, Ricardo, Bentham, Thornton, and Smith, in reverse order.   
   
Finally, I'm at loss making meaning of Womack's last point: "And I   
wonder what will be the effect on the economic thought of US-based   
economists, speaking and reading only English, when massive outsourcing   
of economics jobs starts to India, Pakistan, or (why not?) China, where   
if not already, then soon, there will be more English-speaking and   
-reading economists than in the 'West,' and working for much less."  
  
If they are already speaking English, what's the problem?  
  
James Ahiakpor