I want to create a blog where posts can be in various languages. In the current version, I have 209 posts total, with 29 in English and 1 in Italian (the rest is in French).
I've read that Google prefers if you don't mix two or more languages on the same page; so I'm guessing that showing a blog post in Italian means that the interface (links, pagination, title, etc.) has to be in Italian as well.
Most (all?) websites seem to let the user choose a language at the beginning and then allow him or her to switch between translations (ie. Wikipedia)
My problem is that I would like visitors to see all posts; even those in other languages, even if they don't fully understand it.
I want to do this because :
- even if most of my users are French, they have a basic level of English, especially since I mostly write about technical stuff.
- Trying to understand a short paragraph in another language is fun :)
- Someone who speaks English and French will want to see all posts
But if I mix all the posts together, the user will be very confused when the navigation links switch from English to French, for instance...
Is there a solution to my problem, or should I just compartmentalize languages like every other site ? How can I separate languages without hiding them completely from view ?