Your contract, could you read it?

Language could be the biggest trouble in your life when you move out of your home country for studying or work. This somewhat quite trivial reasoning was not actually obvious for me. Well, let’s admit it, schools never teach you something really useful in your life.

We researchers (or students) frequently assume that if you can use a somewhat ok level of English then you can survive anywhere. Journals are written in English, we do presentations in English and even your thesis sometimes written in English. English English English, so if you are ok with it then you should be ok when you are outside huh?

But the reality is not that simple. And I should have already realized this when I was working in my first postdoc laboratory, which was a Korean one. The first clue came to me when I asked the lab office for the English version of my contract. My original one was in Korean and I did not think twice when I signed it.

Even though the majority of members were Korean, it was a huge lab and quite international. I had many foreign postdoc colleagues, few exchange students, some senior position researchers and even visiting faculties from other institutions. All had diverse backgrounds. So without a doubt, I thought there should be the official English version of contract form. But the response I got was shocking, THERE WAS NO ENGLISH VERSION!

So I had to translate it by myself, luckily worked for me. But what about my foreign colleagues? As far as I remember nobody even speaks some Korean! They might have to go to a sworn translator with legal authority. When I was in Korea, of course, I had no problem with language. I am native. Because of that I was so blinded to the difficulties for foreign students and researchers who chose Korea for their new habitat. With quite a homogeneous ethnicity and culture, these issues have been frequently ignored or not been dealt with seriously. Back in Korea, I was a fish in a small pond.

Imagine that you just arrived completely new world because you got offered a job for a few years. Then you realise you have to sign the contract that you cannot even read! Now try to imagine opening a bank account, getting a phone number and finding accommodations. With limited budget and time. Yeap, life can get quite tough… I don’t have to mention that you have to adujust yourself fast in new research environment which is already mind blowing.

Now the situation is reversed, I am in France for a new job. And I am signing my contract… yeah I could not even understand how much vacation I have. Lucky for me I have help from the new technology, ‘Google translate’ is working magically. Praise Google and smartphone! But still, I had to memorize desperately the sentence “Je suis désolé, vous parlez anglais?” which is ” I am sorry, do you speak English?”

I guess every organisation can have its own reason (mainly legally) to prefer their own mother tongue. And also I am not super happy with language dominance of one language, aka English in science. Anyway, I am in a minority language group and native English speakers get some unintentional benefits. But still, I think there should be some kind of awareness of this problem for young researchers. Unions are non-existence or not strong enough for students and postdoc and even if you have any, yes! again the language barrier. So foreign science nomads always become vulnerable in every possible aspect in their life

Don’t get me wrong, I am grateful that I had landed in France. I had amazing help here. Special accommodation dedicated people like me, ‘Cité internationale universitaire de Paris’. My colleagues and administration were helpful. English proficiency is uncomparable to Korea and especially for the younger generation. Numerous orgnisaations helping students and researchers from outside, such as Sicence Accueil. And my company is willing to pay for my French classes. I am pretty sure I was much much better off than my foreign friends in Korea.

But it still bothers me. Probably somewhere in the world a young researcher who was excited and motivated about experiencing a new culture and society, suddenly realize that life is tough and when you need help you don’t even know where to ask. Learning a new language is an amazing thing, I cannot agree more. This is the best way to immerse yourself to the new environment. I am a strong believer, I tried French classes. But you are a nomad, you are not sure where you would work next year. Even you are not sure whether you would continue working on research. And your career is hanging on your result, global competition, everybody is brilliant, competitive, your publication date should be yesterday. Here ‘working hour per week’ does not mean anything. I believe that for many nomads like me, sadly they had to take a side between work and learning a new language. Like a movie cliché, career or love?

I don’t know a good solution to this. Every society has different rules and regulation. And we nomads do not really bring big economic impact usually. We are not cost-effective. But if we believe that science is not only about growth and economy but more about advancing and sharing knowledge without borders, we need something here. It could be a skill-sharing organisation with a group of bilingual, offering free translation with minimal cost? Or maybe global agreement on providing English document for foreign fixed-term researchers. What do you think?