English as second language *rant*

At least my wife grew up speaking English. But in the PI the pronunciation of English words is different. Sometimes I have to ask her to spell what she is trying to say to me. And then she gets mad at me when I repeat the words I think she is saying to me. It is like living in an old I Love Lucy rerun except the roles are reversed...
 
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I had a middle eastern prof for one class who would exclaim "For Exam!", turn around and begin writing feverishly on the white board with his right hand, and erasing the prior line just as quickly with his left. Took us weeks before someone figured out that with his accent (or perhaps just pronunciation) was dropping the "ple" from EXAM ... SMH ...
 
Micro economics prof, 1970s; unitelligible, except when explaining that transfer payments were terrible, and VA students would top out with a "B".

And half the students were veterans. School admin dug in, backing the moron. Vet students insisted he was out of the classroom, or we were. We added some political pressure (basically "bought" a state senator on the right commitee - didn't take that big a donation, actually). School admin pulled him, sent him to some language/enunciation training of some kind.
 
^the "smile and nod" is a common tactic.. not only employed by ESL but also by idiots
also by people who hear that elevator does not control the angle of attack
 
A few years ago my wife and I went on a trip that included Germany, Italy and Ireland. I speak enough German to get by. Before the trip we both took an Italian course at the local college, so we could converse with folks in the small towns in Italy.

Then we got to Ireland, and we couldn't understand anybody.

o_O
 
Quebecois - now they had some attitudes to non French speakers back in the ‘70s. Any better now?

One of my great joys, back in the middle 1960s, was flying into St. Hubert, going into town and speaking my totally fractured French. The Quebecois would lose their minds.
I was there a number of times in '66, '67, '68 and managed to get arrested at least once each year because my French was so bad. Stuff would come out of my mouth and I had no idea what I was actually saying. Once, I managed to announce that I had the black death, and another time, while trying to get directions I said "I just killed a cop."
Very limited sense of humor, those folks.
 
Years after I took a high school German course for a year, I made a ski trip to Austria. All the people employed by the lodge spoke impeccable English. One night, I took a toboggan run down the mountain, and when I got to the end, I asked where the hotel was in German, to a native. I got flustered, and started asking in English. The guy asked, "Why did you go to English, you were doing fine in Austrian."

There are a lot of Middle-Easterners in Silicon Valley. One time, I got a call from a Middle-Eastern technical recruiter. My wife was in the car, and she prides herself on understanding foreigners. But, she said she couldn't understand a word the recruiter was saying.

All my college professors were American, and spoke English well. However, the chemistry TA's were another story. I could catch, and translate, on a good day, about every 3rd word during his lecture.

My toughest class was Engineering Physics. It was taught by the department head. I seemed to understand his lectures, and turned in good homework, but I really struggled on the tests. I guess I wasn't the only one, we started with about 20 students and ended with 5. I only got a C because I went to talk to the professor about a test, and he gave me the benefit of the doubt and bumped the grade w/o me asking.
 
One of my great joys, back in the middle 1960s, was flying into St. Hubert, going into town and speaking my totally fractured French. The Quebecois would lose their minds.
I was there a number of times in '66, '67, '68 and managed to get arrested at least once each year because my French was so bad. Stuff would come out of my mouth and I had no idea what I was actually saying. Once, I managed to announce that I had the black death, and another time, while trying to get directions I said "I just killed a cop."
Very limited sense of humor, those folks.

Absolutely. In 2015, my wife and I took a 10 year anniversary trip to France and Belgium. I was expecting to be treated badly, but they were all really friendly. My wife taught me a few words of greeting in French to say upon seeing anyone, and I made sure to say them, even though I really didn't understand their reply. After that, I would switch to English, and they would follow right along.
 
Very limited sense of humor, those folks.

@Shepherd Amen to that one, Shep. Back in 1966 I was travelling with my brother and his wife, in a VW bug. We had criss-crossed the German - Swiss border about 4 times already and were doing it again. The Customs guy asked if we had any cigarettes. We each reported the truth that we had none. The Customs guy was so shocked I figured I had better tell the truth about alcohol or he was likely to tear the car apart looking. No cigs or booze, OK they are hiding something.

Of the three of us I was the only one speaking German, and poorly at that. I said yes we had some alcohol. OK, how much. I was stumped! My brother was in the US Army and the base PX sold booze in 40 ounce bottles... and I was struggling to come up with the german word for ounce. Liter came out! The border guard said you have 40 liters of booze! Pull over there! We did, and we got the big search anyway.

I should have said I had 1 liter. Close enough!

-Skip
 
Years after I took a high school German course for a year, I made a ski trip to Austria. All the people employed by the lodge spoke impeccable English. One night, I took a toboggan run down the mountain, and when I got to the end, I asked where the hotel was in German, to a native. I got flustered, and started asking in English. The guy asked, "Why did you go to English, you were doing fine in Austrian."

I was in line in a store in Rome, behind locals speaking to the clerk in Italian. When it was my turn I did my best to knit a few words together in passable Italian. The clerk interrupted in a Bronx dialect, "Look, dude, I really don't have time for this. Whaddya want?"

o_O

Then there was the time we were in the courtyard in front of the Basilica di Santa Chiara in Assisi. A little old gypsy lady was haranguing tourists for money. I brushed her off for the third time, and she stormed off muttering loudly, "Cattivo francese!" (loosely, "damn Frenchman").

I'll cop to the "cattivo" part -- but if she calls me "francese" one more time I'll get mad.

:confused:
 
I got pulled over at the Montreal airport for driving into a crosswalk just as a lady and her baby carriage rolled off the curb. Apparently I was the big criminal of the day; unfortunately, zero of the gendarmes spoke English. I could speak English well, or German poorly. Finally, the woman with the child shrugged her shoulders (she had been watching) and went on her way. Everyone else shrugged, so I just left as well.
 
What surprised me the most was Denmark. EVERYONE spoke English quite well. We were there a week, and encountered only one person who didn't speak English - a grocery store clerk. I asked someone about that. They start learning English in elementary school. "You see," she tells me, "There are only five million if us. Danish isn't spoken anywhere else. If we're going to have an economy, we need to be able to speak the language of business. So we speak English in addition to Danish, and a lot of us speak other languages, and now they're teaching Mandarin."

In Germany we could almost always find someone who spoke enough English to get us by, since my German is so marginal. Great accent, I'm told, I sound like a native, but very limited vocabulary. You forget stuff you learned in the 1970s. The hilarious part is, I took three years of German in high school -- but I learned the accent well before that, from watching Hogan's Heroes.
 
Did you only stick to touristy places? Most places in Europe that get a lot of tourists will speak English. We had no problems getting along in Paris last year. But when you have to talk to the plumber, the cashier at the grocery store or the cable guy, let me know how that goes. Most office type workers do fine with English. I speak English all day at work.

@German guy - Ja, ich verstehe das. Lauter bitte! Es sind die Verben dass ich mit abmühen. <---- and I am sure that sentence isn't even correct.


Actually, most of my visit was in Corsica - with a quick side trip to Brittany at the end. No time at all in Paris (except coming & going thru CDG). Had a good time - especially
driving on their fine road system.

Dave
 
I took a year of German in high school (that was over 50 years ago). So did my wife. We can speak German well enough that we can navigate, get a hotel room and we won't starve. Other than that, forget it.

I took Spanish (sort of) for 6 years growing up. It was over 30 years before I visited Mexico (we're there now). My Spanish is so poor that I remember a few key phrases. "Un cervesa, por favor." "Donde es el bano." In that order. :p

Thank goodness the English spoken in tourist areas around the world is adequate. I'd be lost, otherwise.
 
Heck, there are huge swaths of people here in the US where English is their primary language and can't seem to understand it most of the time!

I don't get it... ?
 
There are many Chinese where I live and sometimes people try to speak it to me, especially people on the street or on the bus. It's my impression that they are usually asking for directions. I felt silly saying "no Chinese" and shaking my head no, so I got someone who knows Chinese to teach me how to say, "I don't speak Chinese" in Chinese.
 
While in dental school I had several profs from Australia. In one class we were being taught occlusion. This particular Aussie was detailing how “you set the anterior taeth ehge to ehge”. Which after amplification and Echo in the classroom came out “H to H.” I’m looking around at my fellow students going, what the hell is H to H. Crickey!
 
There are many Chinese where I live and sometimes people try to speak it to me, especially people on the street or on the bus. It's my impression that they are usually asking for directions. I felt silly saying "no Chinese" and shaking my head no, so I got someone who knows Chinese to teach me how to say, "I don't speak Chinese" in Chinese.

One of my goals is to be able to say, in perfectly accented form, "I'm terribly sorry, but I don't speak a single word of _______" in the language of whatever country we visit. :)
 
I took a year of German in high school (that was over 50 years ago).

@Ghery Ditto, except my plunge into the German language was freshman year college.

Thank goodness the English spoken in tourist areas around the world is adequate. I'd be lost, otherwise.

Me, not so much. My wife is a native Croatian and in addition, holds a Doctorate in Slavic Languages from Yale. She speaks at least 6 languages fluently. English, Croatian, French, German, Italian and Russian. Spanish, she can more than hold her own. It makes travel in Europe a breeze. For lots of reasons I try not to lose sight of her!

-Skip
 
You know, the general tone here sounds like people have little understanding of linguistics. This isn't an issue of someone in Paris refusing to speak English with someone due to their oafish assumptions. When you hear pilots on frequency struggling with aviation English, it is nearly always because those pilots speak a native tongue that is tonal in nature and spoken completely differently to Indo-European languages. They have almost certainly passed the TOEFL test, which can be hard for native English speakers, and can read and write the language flawlessly. Throw in the sometimes rapid fire nature of ATC and it can become ugly. I actually really empathize with the pilots when I hear them on frequency, because I know they are trying their best to be able to speak as clearly as possible. Thankfully, SoCal TRACON are very good at noticing and slowing down their cadence to help them.

I mean, I hear Americans speak on frequency with terrible tone, cadence and phraseology all the time, skipping even basic readbacks like "cleared to land" in favor of "roger" or some other ridiculousness. Those are the folks I have no time for.

:):)
I thought that only happens in France. Actually, almost 4 years ago my wife and I went to France and Belgium for our 10 year wedding anniversary. I was completely expecting the French to be rude and overbearing, and was completely surprised about how polite and accommodating they were. My wife taught my a few words of French, mostly a polite greeting, and then they spoke English at least as well as I do.

Maybe its the younger generation. They don't resent Americans coming over and pulling their butts out of the fire after the Germans had occupied France in WWII.

We ended up getting a top floor room at the Madeline hotel, and the only room in the building that had a view of the Eiffel tower, and our first day their was Bastille day. I swear they had an hour's worth of fireworks; probably longer than the actual Battle of Bastille. And, it was my late mother's birthday, so it was nice of them to celebrate her birthday with so many fireworks. :)

The only issue the French have is with people who think they will automatically speak English to them. In France. It is a lot like the theme of the semi-misguided basis for this post. Once they know you're trying to not be an ugly American, they'll be happy to speak English to you.

Quebecois - now they had some attitudes to non French speakers back in the ‘70s. Any better now?

In Montreal, the city is totally bilingual and they switch pretty freely. In Quebec City, they tend to be more like the French in wanting people to make an effort. The real issue I have in Quebec, as someone who is fluent in French, is that their accent and slang can be impossible to penetrate.

Why do I bother pressing 1 for English when the person who finally answers doesn't speak it?

Except they always speak it, and often better than Americans. When you get a call center in India, you are talking to someone in the largest English speaking country in the world - don't forget that.

I wonder if phones in Mexico have......press 1 for English? lol :D

Yeah, probably. That's a free market capitalist way of appealing to a larger audience and doing business more efficiently.

What surprised me the most was Denmark. EVERYONE spoke English quite well. We were there a week, and encountered only one person who didn't speak English - a grocery store clerk. I asked someone about that. They start learning English in elementary school. "You see," she tells me, "There are only five million if us. Danish isn't spoken anywhere else. If we're going to have an economy, we need to be able to speak the language of business. So we speak English in addition to Danish, and a lot of us speak other languages, and now they're teaching Mandarin."

In Germany we could almost always find someone who spoke enough English to get us by, since my German is so marginal. Great accent, I'm told, I sound like a native, but very limited vocabulary. You forget stuff you learned in the 1970s. The hilarious part is, I took three years of German in high school -- but I learned the accent well before that, from watching Hogan's Heroes.

Danes are aided significantly by the fact that their language structure is essentially a blend of the various stages of Germanic language evolution. Danes can nearly flawlessly converse with Swedish, Norwegian, German and English speakers in their native languages, because Danish is quite close to each of those. It doesn't take much study for them to become strongly fluent. It is, however, quite difficult to understand them due to their tones.
 
Except they always speak it, and often better than Americans. When you get a call center in India
Some of the people in or from India speak and understand English well; many do so marginally; some very poorly; and a significant percentage at all levels speak with nearly impenetrable accents.
 
Some of the people in or from India speak and understand English well; many do so marginally; some very poorly; and a significant percentage at all levels speak with nearly impenetrable accents.

I've never in my life had a hard time understanding someone from India. It is certainly easier to understand them than it can be someone from Scotland.
 
I've never in my life had a hard time understanding someone from India. It is certainly easier to understand them than it can be someone from Scotland.
I am totally baffled by that, unless you are working with a very, very small sample size. You really need to listen in on some of my conference calls. I'm really good with accents... but some of these cats are almost completely unintelligible.
 
I am totally baffled by that, unless you are working with a very, very small sample size. You really need to listen in on some of my conference calls. I'm really good with accents... but some of these cats are almost completely unintelligible.

No, the sample size I've dealt with is very statistically significant.

Maybe they aren't the problem?
 
No, the sample size I've dealt with is very statistically significant.

Maybe they aren't the problem?
Oh, absolutely. You're completely right. It's just me, the guy who's been dealing with foreign accents since the 1970s. Totally my own racist incompetence, never mind that I hear the same exact thing from most of my native English speaking coworkers, or that I've had a few others listen in who can't make heads or tails of it either. I must just be a moron. Thanks for pointing that out.
 
Except they always speak it, and often better than Americans. When you get a call center in India, you are talking to someone in the largest English speaking country in the world - don't forget that.

Gimme a break, that’s Indian English... just like cockney it might as well be mandarin.
 
Oh, absolutely. You're completely right. It's just me, the guy who's been dealing with foreign accents since the 1970s. Totally my own racist incompetence, never mind that I hear the same exact thing from most of my native English speaking coworkers, or that I've had a few others listen in who can't make heads or tails of it either. I must just be a moron. Thanks for pointing that out.
Its always harder over the phone than in person. And its not homogeneous. Some scots are easy and some hard. Same with people everywhere.
 
Oh, absolutely. You're completely right. It's just me, the guy who's been dealing with foreign accents since the 1970s. Totally my own racist incompetence, never mind that I hear the same exact thing from most of my native English speaking coworkers, or that I've had a few others listen in who can't make heads or tails of it either. I must just be a moron. Thanks for pointing that out.

Hey, I wasn't the one who said that about you. Not to mention that I've only been dealing with "foreign" accents my entire life.

Gimme a break, that’s Indian English... just like cockney it might as well be mandarin.

Indian English is British English with a modified accent that is clear and easy to understand, with a lot less slang than used by many native English speakers.

Its always harder over the phone than in person. And its not homogeneous. Some scots are easy and some hard. Same with people everywhere.

Bingo.
 
I've never in my life had a hard time understanding someone from India. It is certainly easier to understand them than it can be someone from Scotland.

Having worked in India, I never had a problem understanding or being understood. The business I was in included people from all parts of India (and the world for that matter) -
and I found it amusing that they often conversed in English because they didn't speak each others' language. As for Scotsmen, I remember one guy with an accent so thick that
even the other Scotsmen complained about it. Almost unintelligible to me.

Dave
 
In Dublin I had a very nice conversation with Ned O'Shea, owner of the hotel where we were staying, and a well-known trad musician in the Temple Bar District. We chatted for about half an hour ... in English ... through an interpreter.
 
One of my goals is to be able to say, in perfectly accented form, "I'm terribly sorry, but I don't speak a single word of _______" in the language of whatever country we visit. :)
I learned everything I needed for an extended trip to Italy from this:

Nauga,
with beans n' franks
 
I worked with a fellow who was originally from Scotland. Each time we'd get together it would take about 5 minutes for me to tune the filters in my ears so I could understand him. And we worked in the same specialty in engineering. :D
 
Except they always speak it, and often better than Americans. When you get a call center in India, you are talking to someone in the largest English speaking country in the world - don't forget that..

Except this isn’t really true. Only a small percentage of India population speak English even as a second language. Something like 3-5% are fluent. Though that’s still a lot of people

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_English
 
I got pulled over at the Montreal airport for driving into a crosswalk just as a lady and her baby carriage rolled off the curb. Apparently I was the big criminal of the day; unfortunately, zero of the gendarmes spoke English. I could speak English well, or German poorly. Finally, the woman with the child shrugged her shoulders (she had been watching) and went on her way. Everyone else shrugged, so I just left as well.

Is that the Montreal in the german speaking corner of Quebec ?
 
Some years ago I had the opportunity to fly from the UK to France with a local UK pilot in his Cherokee. We flew across the Channel to a very popular small airport. Approaching land, my friend called in our position and intent to land. A few minutes later a call came in from another pilot, also reporting position and intent to land, but in French.

My friend growled, "Every time I come here, someone is speaking French! I don't know where he is!"

Innocently I asked, "Well, if you come here all the times, haven't you picked up a few words, like 'six ouest'?" which is what the pilot reported.

"ENGLISH IS THE LANGUAGE OF AVIATION!" was the reply.

We landed without incident and walked to a restaurant. "You'd better order," said the Englishman to the American. "They hate us here."
 
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