At the turn of the twenty-first century, it has become a commonplace to remark how the world has become a village where people of many different places and origins encounter each other in real or virtual space, in ways which a generation ago would have seemed impossible. Encounters mean communication, and communication should lead to understanding and harmony, or at the very least a reduction of conflict. Yet communication depends above all on overcoming the barriers which languages can symbolise, especially for those who do not live in societies where a variety of languages are already part of their environment