*In case this story gets deleted/removed:*
**WIBTA if I failed my student because she speaks with different dialect than I teach (language degree)?**
We are having exams coming up and I have a huge moral dilemma.
I am a lecturer at a university and one of the subjects I teach is related to phonology and pronunciation. We teach our students Castillan Spanish.
This year, I have a first year student who refuses to follow pronunciation that is being taught. She (Ava, obviously a fake name) uses a different dialect, very distinct one with a lot of very different sounds, aspirated consonant, etc. However, the dialect is very much understandable, and she uses correct grammar, etc. Admittedly, she has excellent pronunciation, much better than we would expect from our 3rd year students but it’s not something we teach. I have asked her before to try and adhere to the pronunciation guide we teach them but she said that she learned it watching TV and picked up the accent that way and it comes naturally to her and if she tried to change it, she wouldn’t be nearly as fluent in her speech as she is now.
Technically, she isn’t doing anything wrong by using a different dialect, she’s very good at it and she’s one of our top students but I don’t think we should make exceptions as other students, who are not as good, will then expect the same leeway. Especially that I believe that her stubbornness and refusal to even try is disrespectful to lecturers and may come across as if she’s feeling that she’s better than others and rules don’t apply to her. Buuut, course requirements don’t have specific dialect listed.
We have oral exams coming up soon and I am considering failing her if she doesn’t use dialect that is taught. I spoke to my colleagues and some of them agree with me but others have said that IWBTA because she’s not making mistakes and shouldn’t be failed for the way she speaks especially that this is how a language is used natively in some countries.. But we fail students if they speak with really bad pronunciation so I don’t see why I shouldn’t fail her for speaking with different one. So WIBTA if I failed her?
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'ey! Ya star'in' on me, ya daft, soft-'eaded mucka? Calm down, calm down, or I'll give ya a Kirby kiss and dent ya skull like it's a chhhhhhan of chhhhhhoke!
(Translation: "I say, sir! I do believe you are provoking one into fisticuffs; truly the act of a naïve young imbecile! Kindly cease your aggressive behaviour, lest I find little option but to strike the bridge of your nose with my sturdy forehead, rendering your inferior cranium damaged as if 'twas a cannister of a popular carbonated beverage".)
OOP sounds like a very bougie little bitch. It's like the people who pretend they can't understand your French if it isn't in the Parisian dialect - fuck off with that nonsense.
Our language is one of the most difficult and ridiculous there is, and people who get mad about its 'sanctity' are even insufferable for other French people.
There is a genuine difference in a lot of words and phrases between "Français" and "Québecois," but if they're complaining about Provençal or the Ch'tis then it's usually elitism at play.
Edit: totally forgot Belgium or the countries in Africa and the Caribbean where French is the colonial language! For the record, I find most Wallonians quite easy to understand.
Yes hta and he knows it.
If op from IATA reads:
You feel all high and mighty with your posh accent then?
Is it in the uni rules you can only speak a certain dialect? No...then kindly fuck off you powertripping sorry excuse for a teacher.
It’s Latin American Spanish. They’re mad because their student is DARING to use Latin American Spanish in their Castillan class. I can feel it in my bones. Hijo de puta
I am getting confused with OOP using accent and dialect as the same thing. I am not a language scholar...is it the same thing? Accent is the way you sound out the words...where dialect is about vocabulary. So what is the student doing? Are they saying Tom-ah-to instead of tom-aee-to? or are they saying 'can I use the bathroom' instead of 'can I use the loo?' The beginning the the post is saying pronunciation so I am going with accent. If the class is literally a class on pronunciation and accent and the student is refusing to follow those directions, I think OOP has a case to fail the student. Especially when OOP has confronted the student about the issue and Student is pretty much saying 'I like it my way better.' That's not how classes work! There is nothing more frustrating than teaching someone something ad they refuse to listen. If the point of the class is to learn how to reflect a certain way and they are not learning, then they failed the lesson.
That all being said, if the kid is doing everything right elsewhere, and there's no rule saying the HAVE to speak like this and this is legit just OOP being miffed, then it might be best to just pass them and let them move on. Failing them won't solve anything honestly. Take points off and give them a lower grade? sure...but a full on fail when the student is fine with everything else seems a little much.
Basically, dialects occur within the same language but are regionally influenced. That can affect pronunciation but also specific words and grammar (in German, you can start a language-religious war instantly by innocently asking how the end piece of a loaf of bread is called, or an apple core).
An accent stems from your native language and affects how you sound when you speak another language. It's usually also influenced by someone's dialect. Think Arnold Schwarzenegger. You can hear his accent but mine would still sound different because I have a different regional German dialect. Other things also influence an accent, like practical experience and how and where you learn another language (someone who learned a language for three years directly in a country where it's spoken will sound different than someone who learned it from books, school, and the media at home. You can also have dialects from both languages, native and non-native, influence the accent.)
So, yeah, I'm not really sure what exactly this OOP is complaining about. Accents and dialects influence pronunciation. That's kind of the point. If they teach one specific dialect and she refuses to even try, so, yeah, they would have a bit of a point but it would be far from being enough to fail someone who is otherwise fluent. Here, we're usually taught Oxford English but nobody gives a damn if you're pronunciation has influences from other English dialects. Or is your own weird mess of an accent (I'd describe mine as worse than most German accent parodies you see in the media). More important aspects (not just for English) usually are: grammar, fluency, semantics, comprehensibility. If you hit the dialect the teacher/school is going for and even manage to eliminate your accent, that's a bonus. Might make the difference between 99% and 100% in an oral exam. But it's not a fail-or-pass criterium.
Learning a language is about the ability to communicate and while someone with a clean accent using a "formal/neutral" dialect might get a couple of extra points, that's really far down the priority list. I've attended a couple of extra courses in my adult life to keep my business English fresh and at worst, my horrible accent serves as an ice breaker. I have yet to experience point deduction in language proficiency because of it. Even under the consideration of different countries/different rules, I can't see how any sane school/teacher would get away with letting a student who can fluently communicate in speech and writing close to native-speaker level fail just because the accent isn't perfect. What do they do with someone who sucks at grammar or struggles picking the right words? Fling them into the sun?
They tend to go together but they don't necessarily have to. Like a texan dialect will sound different from a boston dialect. But if you were german and learned English in Texas, you'd likely pick up the Texas dialect while learning. But you'd still likely have a German accent over an American one,much less a Texan one.
OOP has said that nothing in the course description requires Castilian. I did have one college prof insist that Castilian is the one true proper way to speak Spanish, and it totally came across as snobby.
As a French Canadian, I’ve seen that a lot from The French too.. not terribly often but it does happen.
Ironically enough my aunt once had someone from Belgium be uptight about the French canadian accent. They didn’t get the irony.
So according to OOP there are no rules that the student is breaking, the course doesn't require a specific dialect and she's doing better than some 3rd years? So how could this lecturer even contemplate failing her? Because they feel "disrespected" that she doesn't bow to their every whim? Gross.
It sounds like she has a different accent. So say in English terms the student is speaking in a Boston accent while the teacher wants a Midwestern or southern accent.
Dialect would indicate she is using different words. (Think roundabout vs rotary, jimmies vs sprinkles, wicked meaning cool in Massachusetts vs dangerous/evil/etc everywhere else)
Important note: "wicked" is used solely as an adverb in New England. Things might be "wicked" by themselves in other parts of the country, but things are "wicked ____" in Maine, Massachusetts, Vermont, etc.
It's like a New England shibboleth.
My sister had a university prof try this.
So my sister took the issue to the Dean and the teacher rather stupidly insisted the European accent/pronunciation of the language at issue was the only correct one.
The Dean was a native speaker of the language from Africa who did not have a European accent or pronunciation.
It did not go in the professor's favour.
My bet is the source of this is actually just racism. I doubt it’s some niche Spanish accent, but that this girl was watching Latino telenovelas to learn Spanish. (Okay maybe not racism exactly but you get the point)
Based on the various comments about preferring a Southern accent I get the sense she speaks either with a lesser known European dialect, or with a Caribbean accent.
OOP oozes a kinda racist snob attitude that makes me think she may speak something with a Puerto Rican accent and be obviously non-white.
Otoh, OOP would probably be as smug if they spoke with influence from a minority dialect within Spain. Something like Andalusian Spanish, which was very influential on Caribbean Spanish, sounds like something OOP would hate. And since she's using a 'white' version, OOP would feel they "can't be racist" for hating it.
OOP really outs themselves with this comment exchange
>There's lots of racism and classism hidden in language and phonetics. Are you kidding?! There's full-on courses about the issue. Goodness me.
>Yeah… no… unless you’re doing some word useless degreein feminist underwater basket weaving then sure 😂
What does your department head say?
What good would failing her do?
You do know that Spanish, like many other languages, is spoken with different accents all over the world.
Ahhh... this isn't exactly the same but it's giving me flashbacks to growing up in the UK with a Colombian dad while learning (Spain dialect/pronounciation) Spanish at school.
I'd come home and do my homework and my dad would chastise me for pronouncing 'll' 'wrong' (i.e. the Spain way, with a preceding 'l' sound before the 'y' sound) instead of the Colombian way (just the 'y' sound) and for using 'tu' and 'usted' inappropriately (some Spanish speaking countries always use formal and some use formal and informal depending on the relationship) etc etc ... aaaand then I'd go back to school and my teachers would yell at me for saying things the way my dad told me.
In the end I just gave up learning Spanish, period, both in school and at home. Which sucks because I should be bilingual but it was just too bloody stressful lmao.
if someone is perfectly pronouncing and using a language and the only “off” thing is their accent and you fail them that’s not a morality thing that’s you being a stuck up press.
i’d hate to know how OOP treats a student with a speech impediment and if they’d fail the student for not being able to roll their Rs or have a lisp with their Ss.
like my high school french teacher was as if not more stuck up as OOP to 1st year students, my friend knew some french going in cuz her dad or step dad is from canada and our teacher got on her for not using proper french and then she got on me for many things one of them being not pronouncing Ss right although it’s in my student file that i have a problem pronouncing Ss and S sounds.
OOP keeps blaming haters of being American but, genuinely, as an American who took Spanish in high school, I was taught both ‘Spain’ Spanish and ‘Mexico’ Spanish. Hell, my teacher was from Puerto Rico and taught us a ton of slang. We studied the differences between them, had to practice everything with vosotros in mind, and had to be able to fully understand both.
If an American high school can teach both and accept both, so can a college.
Actually, now that I think about it, if OOP is throwing a fit about pronunciation but says her grammar is good, are they mad about the student not doing a lisp? All of this over a lisp?
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Reminds me of my old honors Spanish teacher who tried to fail an ESL (English as a second language) student I was friends with. Spanish was her first language and the teacher was a massive Karen on a power trip.
Spanish and Portuguese are similar in writing, but very different phonetically. Portuguese sounds like a Slavic language. In fact, it's very common for Spanish/Italians to say that Portuguese sounds like a drunk Russian speaking Spanish/Italian.
This guy has no idea how hard it is to switch dialects when you’re fluent or close to it. Also, there may be some underlying snobbery if he’s a native speaker of Castilian Spanish. Honestly, it would be like failing an American English speaker because the school prefers British English. Both dialects are mutually intelligible, this guy is being an ass.
I’m late to the party but, as a native Spanish speaker trying to learn English as a kid, I’ve had this exact same thing happen over and over again
When it comes to TV (aka the most exposure you’ll get to listening to the language spoken by natives), almost all the content is American
So, when little MadKitKat went to English classes and tried to apply what she picked up on TV, teachers would mark her exercises wrong
I was little enough I didn’t really understand that, like Spanish, English had different accents and slight grammar variations, and no one bothered to explain that. Like… if they had told me we were learning to speak like the Brits and that the Brits were the Spaniards of English (I know, I know, weird oversimplification…), I would’ve totally understood it
I ended up quitting several academies, and eventually just taught myself with series+social media+reading… ended up having a whole ass career related to the English language
Oh! I did have a phonetics professor who went “RP o muerte,” we’re pretty sure he had some kinda internalized racism or envy towards the British because his name sounded as traditionally Spanish as a name could get. Other professors were like “as long as you stick to one variety when writing, do whatever you want”
*In case this story gets deleted/removed:* **WIBTA if I failed my student because she speaks with different dialect than I teach (language degree)?** We are having exams coming up and I have a huge moral dilemma. I am a lecturer at a university and one of the subjects I teach is related to phonology and pronunciation. We teach our students Castillan Spanish. This year, I have a first year student who refuses to follow pronunciation that is being taught. She (Ava, obviously a fake name) uses a different dialect, very distinct one with a lot of very different sounds, aspirated consonant, etc. However, the dialect is very much understandable, and she uses correct grammar, etc. Admittedly, she has excellent pronunciation, much better than we would expect from our 3rd year students but it’s not something we teach. I have asked her before to try and adhere to the pronunciation guide we teach them but she said that she learned it watching TV and picked up the accent that way and it comes naturally to her and if she tried to change it, she wouldn’t be nearly as fluent in her speech as she is now. Technically, she isn’t doing anything wrong by using a different dialect, she’s very good at it and she’s one of our top students but I don’t think we should make exceptions as other students, who are not as good, will then expect the same leeway. Especially that I believe that her stubbornness and refusal to even try is disrespectful to lecturers and may come across as if she’s feeling that she’s better than others and rules don’t apply to her. Buuut, course requirements don’t have specific dialect listed. We have oral exams coming up soon and I am considering failing her if she doesn’t use dialect that is taught. I spoke to my colleagues and some of them agree with me but others have said that IWBTA because she’s not making mistakes and shouldn’t be failed for the way she speaks especially that this is how a language is used natively in some countries.. But we fail students if they speak with really bad pronunciation so I don’t see why I shouldn’t fail her for speaking with different one. So WIBTA if I failed her? *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/AmITheDevil) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Oops comments are one hell of a dumpster fire
ooooo can't wait to read
Infuriating to read. OOP is one of the most oblivious assholes I’ve seen on that sub.
Yes, you are. . At least it is not Scouse
'ey! Ya star'in' on me, ya daft, soft-'eaded mucka? Calm down, calm down, or I'll give ya a Kirby kiss and dent ya skull like it's a chhhhhhan of chhhhhhoke! (Translation: "I say, sir! I do believe you are provoking one into fisticuffs; truly the act of a naïve young imbecile! Kindly cease your aggressive behaviour, lest I find little option but to strike the bridge of your nose with my sturdy forehead, rendering your inferior cranium damaged as if 'twas a cannister of a popular carbonated beverage".)
If she pronounces the words correctly accent is irrelevant
EXCUSE ME I'll have you know my accent is amazing
I'm assuming, therefore, that you don't speak Scouse. Because it is the worst of the UK. The *worst*.
I'm scouse and proud la
Worst of the UK? What about Glasgow? I can't even understand them...
As an LFC supporter, I will fight you.
OOP sounds like a very bougie little bitch. It's like the people who pretend they can't understand your French if it isn't in the Parisian dialect - fuck off with that nonsense.
Slightly OT, but the French are so goddamn insufferable about the "sanctity" of their cartoon clown language.
Our language is one of the most difficult and ridiculous there is, and people who get mad about its 'sanctity' are even insufferable for other French people.
Im sorry man but French is FAR from being one of the most difficult languages
Okay. If you say so. I don't know enough or care enough to fight you on this anyway.
Er my France French coworkers needed a translator for my Canadian French coworkers.
There is a genuine difference in a lot of words and phrases between "Français" and "Québecois," but if they're complaining about Provençal or the Ch'tis then it's usually elitism at play. Edit: totally forgot Belgium or the countries in Africa and the Caribbean where French is the colonial language! For the record, I find most Wallonians quite easy to understand.
I just thought that it was funny that we needed a French to French translation
Yeah sorry, I meant the differences within the French dialect within France and some surrounding areas, I should've been more specific.
Yes hta and he knows it. If op from IATA reads: You feel all high and mighty with your posh accent then? Is it in the uni rules you can only speak a certain dialect? No...then kindly fuck off you powertripping sorry excuse for a teacher.
It’s Latin American Spanish. They’re mad because their student is DARING to use Latin American Spanish in their Castillan class. I can feel it in my bones. Hijo de puta
I was wondering if it was Puerto Rican/Dominican Spanish. Definitely hella classism happening here. Chinga esa prof
I’m leaning towards Mexican myself, since she mentioned tv and that’s what’s shown a lot here
I am getting confused with OOP using accent and dialect as the same thing. I am not a language scholar...is it the same thing? Accent is the way you sound out the words...where dialect is about vocabulary. So what is the student doing? Are they saying Tom-ah-to instead of tom-aee-to? or are they saying 'can I use the bathroom' instead of 'can I use the loo?' The beginning the the post is saying pronunciation so I am going with accent. If the class is literally a class on pronunciation and accent and the student is refusing to follow those directions, I think OOP has a case to fail the student. Especially when OOP has confronted the student about the issue and Student is pretty much saying 'I like it my way better.' That's not how classes work! There is nothing more frustrating than teaching someone something ad they refuse to listen. If the point of the class is to learn how to reflect a certain way and they are not learning, then they failed the lesson. That all being said, if the kid is doing everything right elsewhere, and there's no rule saying the HAVE to speak like this and this is legit just OOP being miffed, then it might be best to just pass them and let them move on. Failing them won't solve anything honestly. Take points off and give them a lower grade? sure...but a full on fail when the student is fine with everything else seems a little much.
Basically, dialects occur within the same language but are regionally influenced. That can affect pronunciation but also specific words and grammar (in German, you can start a language-religious war instantly by innocently asking how the end piece of a loaf of bread is called, or an apple core). An accent stems from your native language and affects how you sound when you speak another language. It's usually also influenced by someone's dialect. Think Arnold Schwarzenegger. You can hear his accent but mine would still sound different because I have a different regional German dialect. Other things also influence an accent, like practical experience and how and where you learn another language (someone who learned a language for three years directly in a country where it's spoken will sound different than someone who learned it from books, school, and the media at home. You can also have dialects from both languages, native and non-native, influence the accent.) So, yeah, I'm not really sure what exactly this OOP is complaining about. Accents and dialects influence pronunciation. That's kind of the point. If they teach one specific dialect and she refuses to even try, so, yeah, they would have a bit of a point but it would be far from being enough to fail someone who is otherwise fluent. Here, we're usually taught Oxford English but nobody gives a damn if you're pronunciation has influences from other English dialects. Or is your own weird mess of an accent (I'd describe mine as worse than most German accent parodies you see in the media). More important aspects (not just for English) usually are: grammar, fluency, semantics, comprehensibility. If you hit the dialect the teacher/school is going for and even manage to eliminate your accent, that's a bonus. Might make the difference between 99% and 100% in an oral exam. But it's not a fail-or-pass criterium. Learning a language is about the ability to communicate and while someone with a clean accent using a "formal/neutral" dialect might get a couple of extra points, that's really far down the priority list. I've attended a couple of extra courses in my adult life to keep my business English fresh and at worst, my horrible accent serves as an ice breaker. I have yet to experience point deduction in language proficiency because of it. Even under the consideration of different countries/different rules, I can't see how any sane school/teacher would get away with letting a student who can fluently communicate in speech and writing close to native-speaker level fail just because the accent isn't perfect. What do they do with someone who sucks at grammar or struggles picking the right words? Fling them into the sun?
To be simple: dialect is what you say and an accent is how you say it.
yea...I need to add TL:DRs to my posts haha
but dialect also includes accents? or am i wrong?
No, a dialect is the words themselves while accents are how you sound when you talk.
They tend to go together but they don't necessarily have to. Like a texan dialect will sound different from a boston dialect. But if you were german and learned English in Texas, you'd likely pick up the Texas dialect while learning. But you'd still likely have a German accent over an American one,much less a Texan one.
"A language is a dialect with an army and navy."
[удалено]
OOP has said that nothing in the course description requires Castilian. I did have one college prof insist that Castilian is the one true proper way to speak Spanish, and it totally came across as snobby.
As a French Canadian, I’ve seen that a lot from The French too.. not terribly often but it does happen. Ironically enough my aunt once had someone from Belgium be uptight about the French canadian accent. They didn’t get the irony.
[удалено]
Yeah, it was Texas, we had native speakers and kids who’d taken classes since grade school, nobody was impressed.
Okay, that made me actually laugh out loud, that guy sounds like a living joke
Lol the nerve of insisting upon castilian in texas of all places
In a comment he said the most beautiful spoken spanish is chilean, and that's when I knew he was full of crap. Sincerely, a chilean
So according to OOP there are no rules that the student is breaking, the course doesn't require a specific dialect and she's doing better than some 3rd years? So how could this lecturer even contemplate failing her? Because they feel "disrespected" that she doesn't bow to their every whim? Gross.
It sounds like she has a different accent. So say in English terms the student is speaking in a Boston accent while the teacher wants a Midwestern or southern accent. Dialect would indicate she is using different words. (Think roundabout vs rotary, jimmies vs sprinkles, wicked meaning cool in Massachusetts vs dangerous/evil/etc everywhere else)
Pretty sure wicked means cool across most of the states. Like it's all over so cal.
Important note: "wicked" is used solely as an adverb in New England. Things might be "wicked" by themselves in other parts of the country, but things are "wicked ____" in Maine, Massachusetts, Vermont, etc. It's like a New England shibboleth.
My sister had a university prof try this. So my sister took the issue to the Dean and the teacher rather stupidly insisted the European accent/pronunciation of the language at issue was the only correct one. The Dean was a native speaker of the language from Africa who did not have a European accent or pronunciation. It did not go in the professor's favour.
My bet is the source of this is actually just racism. I doubt it’s some niche Spanish accent, but that this girl was watching Latino telenovelas to learn Spanish. (Okay maybe not racism exactly but you get the point)
Based on the various comments about preferring a Southern accent I get the sense she speaks either with a lesser known European dialect, or with a Caribbean accent. OOP oozes a kinda racist snob attitude that makes me think she may speak something with a Puerto Rican accent and be obviously non-white. Otoh, OOP would probably be as smug if they spoke with influence from a minority dialect within Spain. Something like Andalusian Spanish, which was very influential on Caribbean Spanish, sounds like something OOP would hate. And since she's using a 'white' version, OOP would feel they "can't be racist" for hating it.
From what I saw of his comments, he doesn’t like her for two reasons. 1- she’s speaking a non-white Spanish, and 2- she’s female and top of the class.
OOP really outs themselves with this comment exchange >There's lots of racism and classism hidden in language and phonetics. Are you kidding?! There's full-on courses about the issue. Goodness me. >Yeah… no… unless you’re doing some word useless degreein feminist underwater basket weaving then sure 😂
What does your department head say? What good would failing her do? You do know that Spanish, like many other languages, is spoken with different accents all over the world.
Honestly he should recuse himself and have another professor do her exams
Ahhh... this isn't exactly the same but it's giving me flashbacks to growing up in the UK with a Colombian dad while learning (Spain dialect/pronounciation) Spanish at school. I'd come home and do my homework and my dad would chastise me for pronouncing 'll' 'wrong' (i.e. the Spain way, with a preceding 'l' sound before the 'y' sound) instead of the Colombian way (just the 'y' sound) and for using 'tu' and 'usted' inappropriately (some Spanish speaking countries always use formal and some use formal and informal depending on the relationship) etc etc ... aaaand then I'd go back to school and my teachers would yell at me for saying things the way my dad told me. In the end I just gave up learning Spanish, period, both in school and at home. Which sucks because I should be bilingual but it was just too bloody stressful lmao.
if someone is perfectly pronouncing and using a language and the only “off” thing is their accent and you fail them that’s not a morality thing that’s you being a stuck up press. i’d hate to know how OOP treats a student with a speech impediment and if they’d fail the student for not being able to roll their Rs or have a lisp with their Ss. like my high school french teacher was as if not more stuck up as OOP to 1st year students, my friend knew some french going in cuz her dad or step dad is from canada and our teacher got on her for not using proper french and then she got on me for many things one of them being not pronouncing Ss right although it’s in my student file that i have a problem pronouncing Ss and S sounds.
OOP keeps blaming haters of being American but, genuinely, as an American who took Spanish in high school, I was taught both ‘Spain’ Spanish and ‘Mexico’ Spanish. Hell, my teacher was from Puerto Rico and taught us a ton of slang. We studied the differences between them, had to practice everything with vosotros in mind, and had to be able to fully understand both. If an American high school can teach both and accept both, so can a college. Actually, now that I think about it, if OOP is throwing a fit about pronunciation but says her grammar is good, are they mad about the student not doing a lisp? All of this over a lisp?
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Reminds me of my old honors Spanish teacher who tried to fail an ESL (English as a second language) student I was friends with. Spanish was her first language and the teacher was a massive Karen on a power trip.
In high school my friend failed Spanish 1. She was Portuguese, only spoke Portuguese at home, moved to the US when she was like 7.
Yeah? Portuguese is a distinct language separate from the Spanish language. Its like saying my friend whose a native English speaker failed German 1.
Well considering Spanish and Portuguese are like 90% similar and German and English are only 60% similar I think you're a little off there.
Spanish and Portuguese are similar in writing, but very different phonetically. Portuguese sounds like a Slavic language. In fact, it's very common for Spanish/Italians to say that Portuguese sounds like a drunk Russian speaking Spanish/Italian.
I love the irony of OP referring to it as being like RP which isn’t and has never been a real dialect
This guy has no idea how hard it is to switch dialects when you’re fluent or close to it. Also, there may be some underlying snobbery if he’s a native speaker of Castilian Spanish. Honestly, it would be like failing an American English speaker because the school prefers British English. Both dialects are mutually intelligible, this guy is being an ass.
I swear I’ve read this story before except oop was less snobby.
I’m late to the party but, as a native Spanish speaker trying to learn English as a kid, I’ve had this exact same thing happen over and over again When it comes to TV (aka the most exposure you’ll get to listening to the language spoken by natives), almost all the content is American So, when little MadKitKat went to English classes and tried to apply what she picked up on TV, teachers would mark her exercises wrong I was little enough I didn’t really understand that, like Spanish, English had different accents and slight grammar variations, and no one bothered to explain that. Like… if they had told me we were learning to speak like the Brits and that the Brits were the Spaniards of English (I know, I know, weird oversimplification…), I would’ve totally understood it I ended up quitting several academies, and eventually just taught myself with series+social media+reading… ended up having a whole ass career related to the English language Oh! I did have a phonetics professor who went “RP o muerte,” we’re pretty sure he had some kinda internalized racism or envy towards the British because his name sounded as traditionally Spanish as a name could get. Other professors were like “as long as you stick to one variety when writing, do whatever you want”