From the U.S. military to the FBI to the State Department and the Pentagon, there seems to be no shortage of demand for people who speak Arabic or Urdu (the official language of Pakistan). But there’s no need to look outside the United States’ borders to find translators for federal law enforcement, diplomats or the Department of Defense. America the melting pot has plenty of people from whom to choose.

 

According to information from the U.S. Census Bureau, nearly 20% of the U.S. population speaks a language other than English at home. The majority speak Spanish, Tagalog or Chinese. But there are also 786,210 individuals who know Arabic and another 352,617 who speak Urdu.

-Noel Brinkerhoff

 

Time to Take a Hard Look at U.S. Linguistic Preparedness (by Nataly Kelly, Huffington Post)

Foreign-Language Speakers in State and Defense Departments on Decline (by Noel Brinkerhoff, AllGov)

FBI Translators Eliminated as Untranslated Files Piled Up (by Noel Brinkerhoff, AllGov)

U.S. Military Looking for Skilled Immigrants (AllGov)