Brits don't speak foreign languages

On 11/29/2011 6:56 PM, Dave Smith wrote:
On 29/11/2011 11:21 AM, Markku Grönroos wrote:
A recently published study tells that 64% of all the Britons can speak
only English.

And the rest of them are immigrants?

Some of them are Welsh.

On Tue, 29 Nov 2011 17:34:30 -0600, Mark Brader wrote:

David Hatunen writes:
Not quite: *most* Americans never have need or opportunity to speak
anything other than English.

Bert (in St. Paul, Minnesota) writes:
Our European friends forget how far most of us have to travel before
getting to a country where English isn't the national language.

In your case that'd be about 250 miles (400 km). (Hint: The key word is
"the".)

And, for that matter, the US doesn't have a national language.

But that's more a point of language politics than language usage, and I
probably shouldn't've mentioned it here.

The problem for Americans is: What language should they learn to speak?

Here in the Southwest a lot of native English-speakers can get by with
Spanish, but it doesn't seem like much of a choice for anywhere east of
the Rocky Mountains save, maybe for southern Florida. There's not much
point in Westerners learning French, not even that unhelpful variant,
Quebecois. And I don't think it's all that helpful for even New
Englanders.

From a practical standpoint it doesn't seem like there's much point in
just learning a language for the sake of learning a language. It may be
very helpful that I learned e and French in school well enough that I can
still, forty years later, get the gist of the signs in France and German.
But on one trip we passed through Belgium just long enough to change
trains and have a meal at a cafe across from midi station. Then by night
train to Copenhagen where neither my French nor my GErman did any damn
good, but, of course, most of the Danes spoke English.

Thence again by night train to Stockholm where ditto for my French and
German. And then by night ferry to Helsinki where ditto and ditto (I
know, I should know Finn) but everyone under the age of forty knew
English.

It all seems rather hopeless.

--
Dave Hatunen, Tucson, Baja Arizona

On Wed, 30 Nov 2011 02:15:44 +0000 (UTC), David Hatunen wrote:

Here in the Southwest a lot of native English-speakers can get by with
Spanish, but it doesn't seem like much of a choice for anywhere east of
the Rocky Mountains save, maybe for southern Florida....

Have you visited New York, Philly, or DC in recent years? 8

-- Larry (in DC)

On 11/29/2011 9:39 PM, wrote:
On Wed, 30 Nov 2011 02:15:44 +0000 (UTC), David wrote:

Here in the Southwest a lot of native English-speakers can get by with
Spanish, but it doesn't seem like much of a choice for anywhere east of
the Rocky Mountains save, maybe for southern Florida....

Have you visited New York, Philly, or DC in recent years? 8

Or New Jersey?

David Hatunen writes:

On Tue, 29 Nov 2011 17:34:30 -0600, Mark Brader wrote:

David Hatunen writes:
Not quite: *most* Americans never have need or opportunity to speak
anything other than English.

Bert (in St. Paul, Minnesota) writes:
Our European friends forget how far most of us have to travel before
getting to a country where English isn't the national language.

In your case that'd be about 250 miles (400 km). (Hint: The key word is
"the".)

And, for that matter, the US doesn't have a national language.

But that's more a point of language politics than language usage, and I
probably shouldn't've mentioned it here.

The problem for Americans is: What language should they learn to speak?

Here in the Southwest a lot of native English-speakers can get by with
Spanish, but it doesn't seem like much of a choice for anywhere east of
the Rocky Mountains save, maybe for southern Florida. There's not much
point in Westerners learning French, not even that unhelpful variant,
Quebecois. And I don't think it's all that helpful for even New
Englanders.

Yes, and it is more complicated than that. If I were to learn a
language to satisfy the goal of being able to speak the language of my
nearest neighbors as an American, and to be able to speak to the
largest group of Americans that don't speak English, then Spanish is
logical.

But my travel and cultural interests run in other directions, and as
far as European languages go, I'd much rather know French and German.

But really none of this is _practical_. Living in the US, unless you
have some specific need, learning a language besides English just
isn't the most practical way to spend your time. I'm not saying it
isn't worth doing for other, non-practical reasons. But given the
lack of practical reasons, it is hardly surprising that few Americans
learn other languages besides English.

writes:

On Wed, 30 Nov 2011 02:15:44 +0000 (UTC), David Hatunen wrote:

Here in the Southwest a lot of native English-speakers can get by with
Spanish, but it doesn't seem like much of a choice for anywhere east of
the Rocky Mountains save, maybe for southern Florida....

Have you visited New York, Philly, or DC in recent years? 8

Yep. You can hear Russian, Spanish, Hebrew and various Chinese
languages in all those places. But that doesn't mean you need to know
any of these languages to get by in those places, and depending on
what you are doing and who you are meeting, it may be that all of
these languages would end up being useless to you in those places.

William Black wrote:

On 29/11/11 19:47, David Horne, _the_ chancellor (*) wrote:
William wrote:

On 29/11/11 16:21, Markku Grönroos wrote:
A recently published study tells that 64% of all the Britons can speak
only English.

Well about 10% of the population wasn't born here, so that means that
only 26% of the people born in the UK can speak a foreign language.

As every child who passes through the British school system receives
lessons in at least one foreign language I beg leave to doubt that survey.

I know it's a century since you've been to school, but even you should
know that learning a language at school doesn't mean you can speak it.


I have addressed this point in another post.

Poorly.

--
(*) of the royal duchy of city south and deansgate
www.davidhorne.net (email address on website)
"[Do you think the world learned anything from the first
world war?] No. They never learn." -Harry Patch (1898-2009)

On 30/11/11 07:17, David Horne, _the_ chancellor (*) wrote:
William wrote:

On 29/11/11 19:47, David Horne, _the_ chancellor (*) wrote:
William wrote:

On 29/11/11 16:21, Markku Grönroos wrote:
A recently published study tells that 64% of all the Britons can speak
only English.

Well about 10% of the population wasn't born here, so that means that
only 26% of the people born in the UK can speak a foreign language.

As every child who passes through the British school system receives
lessons in at least one foreign language I beg leave to doubt that survey.

I know it's a century since you've been to school, but even you should
know that learning a language at school doesn't mean you can speak it.


I have addressed this point in another post.

Poorly.


Interestingly nobody else has answered it so I imagine it stands by itself.

As your own position seems to be that learning languages in school is
useless I'm inclined to think that you're digging yourself into a hole.



--
William Black

Free men have open minds
If you want loyalty, buy a dog...

On Tue, 29 Nov 2011 22:39:26 +0100, Wolfgang Schwanke
wrote:
Years ago on a German newsgroup someone suggested: "Everyone in the
world should speak at least four languages: The regional language,

I have no idea what my regional language might be.

Wolfgang Schwanke:

Years ago on a German newsgroup someone suggested: "Everyone in the
world should speak at least four languages: The regional language,
the national language, one national language of a neighbouring
country, and English."

In Cologne, everyone speaks three languages:
deutsch, kölsch, und üvver-andere-Lück.