Just why are we so bad??

[bobleponge]

As we arent allowed to chat on the what makes you grumpy thread, I shall start it here.

Just why are we so bad at languages??
I dont get it. I live in France and speak pretty tolerable (trumpet blowing time) French, I also get by in Spanish, Japanese and Serbo Croat, and am in the process of learning Arabic.
I refuse to believe that just because I'm a Brit I cant speak foreign languages. I know there are many Grapes that speak at least 2 languages and a lot of people get by.

But the majority of Brits just dont. Why so?

There is the obvious "English is spoken the world over, so why should I bother" but I dont subscribe to that. Surely we arent so ignorant as a race?

I dont buy the "We're an island so only speak our language" either. There were many bi-lingual Brits, Welsh/English, Gallic/English etc etc. Almost every Cypriot I've ever met speaks English and Greek as well as a couple of other languages too.

Why is this so?

[Bigmallly]

To be honest Bob, I'm just too lazy to learn. I did French at school, got good grades & forgot the lot.

[ginger ninger]

I Agree with you Bob, I speak a little Greek and Spanish...just enough so not to appear ignorant when visiting the said country's, the Greek & Spanish people seem to really appreciate it when you have a go...I've had them in stitches laughing but I've had a go.

[Jeanied]

To learn new languages you need to have the chance to use them almost immediately so you have them in your short term memory. Otherwise the memory doesn't bother to store it.
Three things help here - recency (heard or seen the word a short while ago) and frequency (word appears several times) - and relevancy - the word is necessary for you to do something. All of which make learning languages in a classroom rather difficult as it is the most artificial environment.
I don't blame the Brits as, being an island race, they really don't have to make an effort to speak another language most of the time. So language learning is not really part of the culture.
Interestingly though, the English language is made up of so many words from many other languages - so much so that the English lexicon is the largest I think - so it would make learning a new language that bit easier since one would have some common words to hook one's new language onto.
On continental Europe - and many other parts of the world - travel between different countries and linguistic communities happens easily - across land - and the idea of being multilingual seems to be much more the cultural norm.

[Pumpkin Becki]

I can say 'The girl sits on the table' in Italian...

I think it has a lot to do with education. Its not 'cool' to achieve at school, well, not if you went to the Secondary School I went to anyway! I was the only person in my year to get and A for GCSE English Lit.

I also think we start teaching languages too late (bear in mind I don't have children, so don't really know what gets taught in schools and when), but to my mind, 11 is too late. Truely bi-lingual children start a second (or third) language much earlier than that, sometimes from birth if they have parents from different countries.

[bobleponge]

Jeannie in days of yore our little island had at least 5 working, living languages. I disagree that its not in our culture. Perhaps recently thats the case, but historically not at all.
I agree totally with the learning bit though, which is why living in France clearly has helped my French. That might sound obvious but there are many Brits living in France that just dont speak French. They simply dont and wont do so.

[Glutton4...]

We were taught French and German in secondary school. I wasn't too bad, but not really interested at the time (like most subjects, but that was just me and my hormones ). Now, however, I find I can get by, if I need to, and if I go abroad, I take a phrase book. Once you try, the locals usually help, or embarrass us by speaking fluent English!

We should be taught languages at an earlier age, not wait until we're in the middle of our own little hormonal hurricane. IMHO.

I once took delivery of an Artic-full of trees and shrubs, driven by a Polish chap who's only English was 'Hello' and 'Sorry' My only Polish is... erm... I'll think of sommat. We managed. A handshake and a smile goes a long way too!

[organic]

bob - I've got a similar view (though not as many languages).

Native speaker of English.
Conversational French (enough to get me by without speaking English in France - but I can't read or write it).
Very basic Gaelic (Irish) - though still learning.
Made a start on Hawaiian once (just because) but put it to one side when I got my copy of Buntús Cainte - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia .
Learned Spanish at high school, forgot plenty but can still kinda scrape by in Spanish as long as noone says anything much in return.
Next on the list is Swedish.

I too don't agree with the "everyone else speaks English" view - but the reality is that most people I've had this discussion with say exactly that.

I think "we" see foreign languages as something you do in school, hate every minute of it and then stop using it entirely after your exams (with the possible exception of a horny, drunk holidaymaker trying not to fall over while chatting up a local).

The "island" bit is baloney - but I think a combination of dry language-education, chronic laziness, a sprinkling of superiority and a pinch of xenophobia are some of the contributing factors.

The daft thing is - with the history of these islands being invaded time and time again - our language is already a complete mongrel and we (when we try) have a far easier time of learning other languages than thir native speakers have of learning ours.



Oh - I just remembered a huge one.

Pop culture.

Just about every other country laps up english language music and films. I've met several people who've honed their English language skills by watching movies and listening to the radio (worrying when you consider that the more explicit music played on the non-English language radio tends to be the uncensored edit).
In the UK we very rarely see non-English music and films get anywhere near the recognition or consumption they deserve - and some of it is at least as good as our own.
I guess this feeds off the view of foreign countries being there for little more than to provide holiday destinations... but it certainly contributes to the widespread lack of second languages.

[ginger ninger]

My OH's Nephew is half German, his mum was learning him German before he could speak English proper (they live in England) then on top of that French...now the poor lad has to go to a speech therapist because he had trouble separating the three, he's also been bullied because of it...poor lads only 10. His mum is flaunt in 6 language's...one being Russian. We're so glad she didn't through that one into the mix.

[scarey55]

I didn't learn French at school so I found it very difficult when I first came to live here but I am improving. I think as Jeanied said, it does help if you can use what you have learned every day. I did learn German at school and I speak a titchy bit of Greek and Spanish but only enough to get by on holidays.

... Almost every Cypriot I've ever met speaks English and Greek as well as a couple of other languages too.
Why is this so?

I often encounter Dutch and Belgian people here in the Auvergne and almost everyone says the same thing when I remark on their good English. They tell me that, as they are a small country no one speaks their language so they have to speak English. They also don't have dubbing on British and American TV programmes just subtitles so they tend to hear English on TV from an early age and after a while the subtitles become superfluous.

Gawd knows I could have done with the BBC putting programmes out in French with English subtitles because I am finding it quite hard to learn French at my great age!

[organic]

...there are many Brits living in France that just dont speak French. They simply dont and wont do so.

Oh that used to get RIGHT up my nose when I lived out there.

People who had been there for years couldn't even manage "bonjour, parlez vous anglais?" - they just rattled off in anglais and expected the person they were speaking to to keep up.
After 6 months there I had better French than a frightening number of Brits who'd been there much longer.

[Nicos]

I am rubbish at remembering new vocabulary

If I've heard the word before- and understood it's meaning- it'll stay put...but will my brain remember that word when I want to use it????

Once it's used/heard several times I'm OK- but the old brain is so reluctant to store things these days.

having said that- everyone says my French has dramatically improved since i've been here!
I'm clearly one of the peeps who needs to live in the environment- lerning a living language ( hence my wonderful vocabulary for all sorts of door hinges, types of copper pipes and roofing equipment!!!!

I have recently heard that my daughters school now don't insist on a second language for GCSE's!!! ( how inward thinking is THAT????)

My other languages consist of very basic Italian - 2 yrs at night school- a bit of Welsh ( from living in Cardiff for several years) some Greek -(from hols)- and Latin from schooldays.
Nope- none of them came naturally- but if I can do it, then there's no excuse for anyone else!

[HeyWayne]

I think Jeanied has hit the nail on the head.

On many occasion I have sat at meetings with my foreign peers in Germany, embarrassed by my lack of knowledge of other languages. I can say odd phrases in certain languages, but there the extent of my knowledge/skills cease.

When talking to my French colleague at one of these said meetings (who speaks French and English), I stated my embarrassment. She replied by asking which language would I choose and why?

For 'them' (the non-English) the choice is simple - as you say bob, 'everyone' speaks English the World over, so it makes sense for them to do so. English is also the standard international language, so they get to use it frequently. I have German ex-colleagues who I still keep in touch with, and they have gone on to work for companies without international representation/involvement, and their English soon deteriorates as they don't get the chance to use it.

One guy in Germany calls us up just to practise his English (amongst sorting out IT 'issues').

I attempted to learn Italian for when we visited a couple of years ago, and I could hold very basic conversation, and exchange pleasantries whilst we were there - but I haven't spoken any since, so I've forgotten most of it.

I also think PB has a very good point in that our children are taught languages rather late in the day. I'm sure we (LadyWayne and I) have read somewhere that to improve your baby's language skills use as many different words for the same thing as possible.

I don't think we're that bad, I do just think we have it made easy. We could be Chinese after all...

[northepaul]

I think its the way its taught at school, or at least when I was there. It was 'one of those lessons you HAD to do' but didnt neccessarily want because you were not encouraged.
I learnt French at school, got a CSE grade 1, but 90% of my French was learned on an exchange trip I did for 3 weeks when I was 14 - I was literally thrown in with a French family who didnt speak any English....
Now, of course I have not spoken French in years, and cant remember anything other than basics.
I also learned some German which I remember better than French and I started learning Italian.

Having said all that, my son seems to have a natural apptitude for languages - he speaks fluent German, good Italian (from a trip when he was ten) better French than I did by visiting his Gran for 5 days and even pigeon Bulgarian from a visit last year, including writing in their alphabet!!

I think if were immersed in other European cultures, we would naturally want to learn other languages - it would be considered cool.

[Nicos]

Oh that used to get RIGHT up my nose
After 6 months there I had better French than a frightening number of Brits who'd been there much longer.

hmm...now THAT rings a bell!..dreadful isn't it???...there's no excuse after 15 years or so is there???