ASIA IS RISING. AUSTRALIA’S ASIA CAPABILITY IS NOT.

For International Mother Language Day, Hannah Heewon Seo reflects on a quiet but consequential trend: as Asia’s economic and strategic influence accelerates, Australia’s capacity to understand the region is moving in the opposite direction. Drawing on her experience growing up in South Korea and building a bilingual career in Australia, Seo argues that declining Asian language enrolments signal more than an education gap—they reveal a national complacency toward the very region that will shape Australia’s future prosperity and security.