Learning French with Alexa

My experience using the Amazon AI’s multilingual mode

Amazon introduced a multilingual mode to its Alexa AI in 2019, starting in three countries: Canada, India, and the United States. Since late 2019, I have been interacting with Alexa in both Canadian French and English, switching back and forth from one sentence to the next without changing any setting.

The multilingual mode is perhaps more precisely called a bilingual mode, since in every case it is two languages. One of those languages is always English. Spanish is paired with English in the States, Hindi in India, and French in Canada. More recently, Amazon added support for Japanese-English and German-English multilingual modes, and expanded French and Spanish multilingual support beyond Canada and the United States.

New internet-based technologies, devices, software, and services have enabled remarkable new tools for language learning. Mobile apps such as Duolingo provide an interactive, multimedia, gamified learning experience that can be an effective introduction to a language and tool for moving into an intermediate level. Radio, podcasts, video, online news, media from around the world means there is lots of content in different languages out there for intermediate and advanced learners to access. My experience with Alexa suggests that interactive Artificial Intelligence will be a…