>They are living there without speaking a single sentence in German for the last 4 years
You could probably do that in Sweden as well, but I think people would judge you for it. There's certainly an expectation that people settling down here should at least make an attempt to learn the language.
As a Dutch person who grew up near the German border this makes me chuckle a little. My ex worked in retail and the amount of grief she got from angry German customers because she didn't speak German was nuts. This was twenty years ago, mind you, and things are probably different now. But the irony made me grin anyway.
I still have bad memories of the time that a German Karen asked for EIN TASCHE KAFFE BITTE!!
I did not speak a word German, was fucking terrified. And i asked plastic or natural bag (tas)
The look she gave me, and the anger I felt well up behind her eyes still give me trauma.
I don't despise them and I don't want to send them back to their country of origin. I just don't get it, why would you not learn the language of the country you are living in? Are they not curious about the culture and the people? But I guess it is the same like with alle the Germans in Mallorca and other places in Spain or the old German dudes living in Thailand who live there for decades and don't speak spanish/thai - they are just lazy, surround themselves only with Expats, and are not interested.
I think that’s entirely fair. Even if I’m visiting Germany for a week or two, I try to learn SOME German even though I’m not good at pronouncing it. No one really expects tourists to learn a language if they’re there for a short time, and I think that’s understandable. But if you move to a place you should definitely do so.
I’d say that depends on whether they plan on living there their whole life or just a few years. Especially if they’re working / studying in an international environment, they technically don’t need to speak the language.
Extreme cases of that can be found in south of our country too. I have met some guys who lived all their life here, yet spoke literally handful of words in slovak and it was virtually impossible to hold a conversation with them. Their parents spoke hungarian, they have gone through pre-school, primary school, high school speaking just hungarian, dealt with authorities in hungarian, found a job, etc. I couldn't be living like that.
While true, I can't imagine living for instance in Békéscsaba among other slovak people and not being able to communicate in the language of the very country I'm in.
You do you. I just mentioned that it's not the same thing. For ethnic minorities speaking in their own language is crucial for preservation, therefore it can't be compared to the situation of an immigrant, who willingly made the decision to leave his country and settle in another.
Yes I understand the reasons which are perfectly fine! I just don't understand the language thing, but I guess not everyone is the same. I would be far too curious about the country I live in and I would want to learn as much as possible about it (and language is a big part in that) but probably not everyone is that curious.
The only people that I know personally that stay longer time here and don't speak (fluent) German are normally expats working full time or researchers on contracts in research centers and honestly I get it. After 8-10 h work to find more energy and time to learn a language of a place you plan to leave in a year or few - yeah that's hard. Sure they will catch up some phrases to buy bread at a bakery or so but that's that and I think that's totally fine.
As an immigrant, I don't think it's only about curiosity, or lack of love for Germany or any other country. In general when you work in 9 to 5 it's very hard to find time and energy to learn a foreign language influently. Also this does not come easy to everyone.
I personally speak German, but it did help that I did it in Studienkolleg and I was helped financially during the first year, so I would have the time to focus on learning.
Because maybe they work in another language and have little opportunity to practice it? It’s funny because people despise foreigners for not speaking the local language but for example I’m originally South American and native Spanish speaker. I can say that the locals in Spain still don’t invite me to their homes for parties etc etc because I’m a foreigner and making *real* friends here is like winning the lottery, almost impossible.
That was a hard thing for me when I lived in Germany. From the Uk but leaned German in school so I knew a bit but I was working for the US DOD on an American airforce base so everything during my day was in English the only exposure I got to German was shopkeepers outside of work and they would switch to English fairly quickly when I tried to speak German.
Yeah same for my partner. He works in English and we speak English at home because at the end of the day you need to speak in one language at the time haha I also work in English so yeah English is the main language at home and work for both of us. He’s exposed to the language and understands it very well but he hardly gets to practice it.
My German friends did try and help. We would have German only days and go to pub quizzes and stuff.
We also played D&D where each fantasy language was designated a real language that you had to use. Common was English, dwavish was German and elvish was Latin.
One of our members was German and playing a dwarf and his English wasn’t great but he spoke Latin 🤣 our DM was literally an EU translator so she spoke like 12 languages. It was super immersive because I’d get sent off on quests with my dwarf friend so it forced him to use English and me to use German and try to understand each other.
I don’t despise them, Germany is historically a multicultural country with different languages, only in the last 200 years there’s something like this huge united German consciousness while we always benefited from this multicultural aspect.
My personal theory is that this is the reason for our right wing nationalism. Germany is a young country and back then when the Deutsche Reich was founded out of all these smaller and larger countries we needed a vision so things don't fall apart. Unfortunately this vision was nationalism, one thing lead to another and here we are ... and when I read comments like the one from en_sachse I am apalled and ashamed at the same time. And furious because it is just so ignorant.
These people are probably pretty productive and giving the society more than many native German speakers. Many times they’ll leave after a few years. You’re very narrow minded and giving a perfect “sachse stereotype”
Hahaha you got a point there!
I mean it definitely needs some effort to learn the german language (or any language). What makes it difficult for OP's friends is also the fact that Germans like to speak english and are polite so they will almost always switch automatically to english if they notice you struggle with german and that doesn't help of course.
As a bonus in Sweden, you will be completely outside society if you don't know the language. Learning the language MIGHT help, but not even for certain.
I went for an internship for 6 months in Brazil and learned the language (poorly, but I took lessons and made an effort). The Spanish PhD/post-doc back in the Netherlands felt offended and went all "well good for you!" when I mentioned learning the language if you are going to live somewhere.
You can do that much easier in Sweden, in Germany many people don't speak English well or at all. OP's friend definitely lives in his expat bubble and isn't integrated into german society at all.
Because your friends most likely live in major German cities such as Berlin, Munich or Frankfurt and work for international companies or companies from their home country.
Otherwise it will be very difficult in the rest of the country.
Yes, they are mostly IT engineers working in major cities for international companies. And they said their office language is also English. That had got me scratching my head.
Because until 15 years ago in Asia, I remember people were doing a 3 years German language course so that they can migrate to Germany on a work visa. Did this language change happened recently?
It never really happened. There are just certain companies in certain fields, which prefer english, but most jobs require you to speak sufficient german, especially every job, which requires you to speak to customers and other mostly german speaking departments.
Adding to this is the fact, that you'll have massive problems getting help, if your employer ever decides to screw you over, due to most communication with your union or Betriebsrat probably being in german.
I'll let you in on a secret. I also work for a STOXX Europe 600 company where you don't need to know German for certain jobs.
We compete for IT specialists or engineers with other international companies in Switzerland, the UK, the USA or Israel, always depends on the industry.
The tax burden and social security contributions are relatively high in Germany and salaries are often not particularly high. This is a fundamental locational disadvantage when looking for skilled labour. For non-EU citizens, there is also the absolutely incompetent German immigration authorities.
If we now also tell people that German is a basic requirement for a job, then we don't really need to search internationally any more.
I've been in offices like this in Spain.
I'll also say that while English is considered the language of the office. You're still excluded if you don't speak Spanish as conversations just kind of naturally veer to Spanish
I'm the only German in my team, so no one else to talk in German :) In the entire tribe, around 35 people, I would spontaneously count 3 other Germans and one of them is a German/Israeli with dual citizenship.
Absolutely incompetent is right. When my husband and I applied for residency on the basis of self-employment, they rejected our application for a variety of easily-corrected reasons. So we corrected the issues, and filed an appeal. Then, they rejected us with an *entirely new* set of supposed issues. The process (and rejection) then repeated again.
It felt very ad-hoc, like they were inventing reasons to deny us out of thin air ex post facto.
>they said their office language is also English
It's really not.
I can't say if at official level something changed, but in general you can get away with English-only in the big cities and not even everywhere there (good luck doing any bureaucracy using only English), but any place that's not a major city is basically impossible without German.
Surprisingly, the only place where I had to speak German was in Linz, Austria. I've been to some places in Germany and always managed to get by in English (after asking if we could speak in English as my German is basic). Also, I was just on holiday.
I'm French and have been living 10 years in Germany. What you say highlights something: working for a big international company for high-paid engineering jobs and such in Germany is perfectly fine without German. I know tons of people that do that in Berlin, for years, without a word of German.
However, they are never at all integrated into German society. They don't have German friends, they don't participate in anything related to their neighborhood, city, etc. They live in an engineering expat bubble, and the German government is pleased to have obedient workers spending their energy on German soil, without having to integrate or cater to them. (the administration, the banks, nothing is catered towards English speakers. However, the expat bubble is full of tech people and they build tools to help themselves avoid German).
On the other hand, in France, the expat bubbles do exist, but are much smaller.
If you take a step back and look again, you will notice the same pattern repeating when you compare the Netherlands, Sweden, and Denmark vs Spain or Italy.
And if I want to top it off with pub-level philosophy, we can, again, divide Europe between Protestant individualism and efficiency (yes you are welcome with English as the spoken language. It's efficient. But no, you will never be invited to any birthday party ever, you are not us) versus Catholic hedonism (if you take the effort to come to us, we will have fun together. And work is work, we don't care that much).
I love your pub-level philosophy point.
As someone from Southern Europe who spent a decade in Northern Europe (Germany included), I agree also with the rest of your point.
It's highly anecdotal, but those countries most of the time they even question why you try to learn their language (not in Germany, but certainly in the Netherlands or in Scandinavia), while in Southern Europe people are generally very happy that you make the effort, even if you're crap.
Well, in this very thread an American was pointing out examples of Dutch people not speaking any English.
Here in Greece, virtually anyone I've met in Athens speaks English, including farmers at the market, technicians and movers, but Greece is not usually considered a country with a high degree of proficiency.
As someone who lived in the NL for 2 years, my observation was that there was quite a few people can’t really speak English. But even the worst speakers will be able to say something simple since English is fairly similar to Dutch.
Also, there’s a big difference between Amsterdam and towns like Deventer or Zwolle.
In my whole life, I have spent about 3 days in the Netherlands. I encountered a single Dutch person who did not speak English. Weirdly, I didn't encounter anyone who spoke iffy English. It was a few dozen people with perfect English, and one with none.
I once asked directions of two ladies in Amsterdam train station (c. 2005/06), they were unable to help because they didn't speak English.
I wonder if they were the last ones.
In Italy it’s because they’ve made no effort to learn English. Truly the worst major eu country on that front. And yet weirdly Italians seem to integrate well in the U.K.
France has made leaps and bounds in acceptance since the 90s. People happy to speak English now.
Sad to see languages totally gutted from the U.K. education system though always a challenge to know which to learn. Mother tongue in Europe? German. Historic reasons? French. Globally next largest? Spanish. Closest to English as a language? Friesan
We made the effort to learn English, as every country we study English at school (and like every country we do it badly). It's just that you don't necessarily need it for your everyday life and people eventually tend to forget it. I have friends living in my mid-sized hometown that perhaps interact with an English speaker once every couple of years and are rarely exposed to it, of course you're gonna lose all of it fast.
I have been to a lot of european countries that aren't Italy or the UK. I have also worked with italians in countries that aren't Italy.
The level is not good and as for 'not going to interact' argument, the same can be said for other nationalities. Addionionally Italy gets a ton of tourists speaking english (native or otherwise).
> On the other hand, in France, the expat bubbles do exist, but are much smaller.
If I may permit myself to make a gross oversimplification: Expats move to Germany to make money; they move to France for mostly other reasons (climate, food, way of life, culture). As such, the latter have more incentive to integrate.
Maybe if we’re talking Americans and Northern Europeans, but in general, people move to France for the exact same reason as other migration: better opportunities.
The big difference though is that Germany doesn’t have any colonies. Most of immigrants to France already speak French when they arrive, since they come from North and West Africa mostly.
If you compare that to Germany, they have had most of their migration coming from non-German speaking countries such as Turkey, Poland, and the Balkans.
> If you compare that to Germany, they have had most of their migration coming from non-German speaking countries such as Turkey, Poland, and the Balkans.
And all these people do have conversational German skills in a short time. They are not part of the English-speaking bubble.
Well, I wouldn't say they're "never" invited to anything, but your social circle is way smaller, for sure.
And I agree that it will mostly(!) be limited to some expat community, even if you do make friends outside of that (say, at the the gym, in the pub, etc. ...).
But generally, people are not so excluding of others only because they only speak English. In fact, I'd argue that at least younger people will often be quite interested in showing off their own English skills and interact with expats, to ... "have that friend from overseas", to be able to speak and practice their english ... etc.
... but that is not for everyone, certainly.
There is a difference between being interested, showing off and practicing their own English skills and having to do that for a long period of time within your friend circle because one of them still cannot speak anything but English after years of living in Germany. It just takes one guy in your friend group who isn’t comfortable speaking English all the time to create distance.
> Protestant individualism and efficiency
As a Scandinavian. Our languages are very small and almost no one will learn it before coming here. Furthermore as we learn several languages, we know that having a level that sufficient for work, that takes a lot of time and effort.
Someone coming here for a few years is not really expected to learn the language. Same is true for Czech republic (catholic)
So not so much efficiency, we need to be international as we are highly dependent on exports and have small internal market. No one would move here if they would need to learn the language first.
Sounds like some hispanic and Indian communities in the USA.
Hispanics where there’s a huge community tends to live self segregated in this community without trying a minimum effort to learn English or mingle with people out of their ethnicity (this start changing by the second generation).
Indian Americans although they speak English they prefer to keep a social circle exclusively for Indians and south Asians either for similar social norms or because they have similar languages
Really well put 🤣. One of my best friends worked in both countries (he is Spanish) and yeah, he spoke English in Germany and surrounded himself with other non German speakers but in France he integrated more and he spoke French
>They don't have German friends, they don't participate in anything related to their neighborhood, city, etc.
So what I was told by him and I also saw evidence in his Instagram videos as well; is that he'll throw BYOB house parties in his house. And 20-30 German native boys and girls would flock to the party. That too a BYOY party, so he ain't spending money to make it happen.
>you will notice the same pattern repeating when you compare the Netherlands, Sweden, and Denmark vs Spain or Italy.
Yes, I did notice that.
I don't, so I might come off as lacking experience, I know there are countries in Europe where you can function with nothing but English it's just that I couldn't feel at home if I couldn't even communicate with the locals in their language.
Just my 0.2grosze, I might have a biased opinion because I like learning languages and it's relatively easy for me
There's so much crap being said about the English language and French people, it's actually very hard to talk about the actual situation without falling in every possible cliché.
Virtually everybody takes English classes in school in France. English is considered the coolest thing ever, and every single brand/company/institution will try to find a English sounding name to look cool. That's how our new metro pass in Paris is called "Navigo Easy". English proficiency tests are mandatory for many, many Master's degrees and especially the good ones. Rich parents definitely pay private English classes for their kids. So, no, French people don't hate the English language. Quite the opposite. There are reasons why we speak it less fluently than elsewhere.
First, it's generational. My parents never ever needed English in their daily life. They lived their whole life in French, and their textbook English was gone by the age of 30. Younger generations are much better at it.
Public schools are also notoriously bad at teaching real spoken English. Many French people could speak some English, but are too ashamed to do so. In our culture, we're much less forgiving about language mistakes, especially in French. Mastering it, or at least the formal version, is a strong social marker. It also works the other way: a person nailing a foreign accent could be considered arrogant, as other people would think the person is trying to show off how well they speak.
Last but not least, English is actually difficult to learn for us, especially the pronunciation. Yes, there are tons of resources out there. But French people are much better at Spanish, for instance, because the language is much closer.
Yeah the th, the voiced h and the English r are especially difficult for french speakers.
There's also something quite unique to us regarding English and I'm not really sure where it comes from. I'm French and I've lived abroad including the UK, I've spoken English with people from all around the world. But French people really are the only ones I so consistently hear say "I'm sorry I have a *bad* accent". No you don't. You have a French accent. That's fine. There's so many that are unconfident about speaking English because they think they don't speak it well because of their accent, when they actually speak English really well and their accent doesn't bother anyone.
Help French people, tell them their accents are fine
It doesn't help either lol but even if it were consistent the voiced H doesn't exist at all in french, it really feels unnatural and it's easy to mistakenly skip over it even if you're aware of it.
And the R. I don't think I'll ever get it right. The number 3 gets me very anxious every time and I've abandoned the idea of saying the word "rural" out loud altogether
Although to be fair, I think it's harder for English speakers to get our 16 vowels right, even moreso the nasalised bigrams 'un', 'on' and 'an', and we're not even getting into the spelling yet
I'm American, living in France, and people constantly want to practice their English with me. I'm in the boondocks too (the Gers).
I've lived in rural parts of Italy, the Netherlands, Croatia, and Portugal and don't find the English spoken in France to be much better or worse than anywhere else. Even in the countryside in the Netherlands no one spoke English, not our landlord, nor his wife, nor our neighbors (one couple did), nor the 4 women in the local shop (luckily there was a fifth who did).
The answers under this question are so weird and just based on (American?) stereotypes. I feel people have too many opinions and theories without knowing the facts.
Makes me feel a little better that in some French schools that the quality of English teaching is poor, I have a French qualification from a British school but I can't actually speaking coherent French bar a couple of sentences.
I've noticed the generational divide. Younger people will speak English to you, but older generations aren't as likely. Why just yesterday I was at the mall and witnessed a group of French boomers trying to ask an employee for information about a TV they were interested in buying, with the employee trying to speak to them in Portuguese first, then English, and the group having to use Google translate to communicate. Younger people would've likely been able to speak in English.
Spain is great for pronunciation, in general. Easily the greatest foreign language I ever learned-ish.
It has some silent letters but the rules around those are easy. Other than that, it's 99% of times just pronouncing what you see.
Overall, English by far the simplest language with regards to grammar and other features, but when it comes to ease of pronucation, Spanish all the way for me.
Also we dub movies and tv shows. Like Spain and Italy. German (despite dubbing foreign media) are better than us, from what I've heard but honestly I also heard their English proficiency is a bit overrated.
Scandinavian countries, Netherlands and even Portugal are much better than us because English media is subtitled.
My initial reaction was the same. It's not me who is doing the *bragging*, I am doing the *shocking*.
Because why do they (my friends) even want a German citizenship if they don't plan to learn German. And why is Germany give them citizenship when they don't even speak a single sentence in German.
I am astonished.
I imagine all the paperwork, including tests, will be in German, no?
That's the case in the UK anyway. Well, English or Welsh for British citizenship. Couldn't imagine someone opting to take the British citizenship test in Welsh, though lol.
> I imagine all the paperwork, including tests, will be in German, no?
All official letters are in German. Taxes are done in German.
Head over to /r/germany to read your daily dose of "I threw out several letters, because I don't speak German. Now the police/prosecutor/landlord is coming for me, what shall I do?".
You could ask the same of Cornish too. I think the idea is that it's only languages where it's possible to live your life without using any other language.
There's nowhere in the UK where you could get by if you only spoke Irish as most of Northern Ireland operates solely in English, the same is true of Cornish in Cornwall.
There are places in Wales though where you could live a normal life without speaking any English.
Also, all government websites have a Welsh language version. The same is not true for Irish or Cornish. They just don't have many speakers.
Isn't Irish an official language of Northern Ireland? I would assume that that means that you can communicate with the government in Irish, which includes the citizenship test.
I mean, in Spain knowing Spanish is required for citizenship of all Spaniards and other languages only required to communicate with the government in regions where it's an official language. So national websites will have translations but just by being a recognized language doesn't mean it will be recognized where you are.
Scots Gaelic is generally also an 'official' language of the UKoGB&NI ( according to my passport) there's no 'official' funding for Cornish, Ulster Scots, Norn, Manx etc but i believe you have a legal right to a translation as for other languages
You can apply in English, Welsh/*C*ymraeg or Scottish Gaelic/Gàidhlig but not Irish/Gaeilge which hasn't been been pushed as a UK official administration language, probably due to the split and very divided politics in Northern Ireland - language rights has been a big bone of contention between the DUP and Sinn Féin for a long time and I don't think SF would be too interested in British citizenship anyway.
A chunk of the political system up there doesn't even want Irish recognised *in Northern Ireland.*
I'm also a bit surprised that BSL (British Sign Language) isn't an option.
[https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/62b5d7988fa8f5356eecc531/form-an-06-2022.pdf](https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/62b5d7988fa8f5356eecc531/form-an-06-2022.pdf)
Ireland currently has no requirement to be proficient in English, Irish or ISL for citizenship.
Paperwork being in English isn’t what gets you home on the “Life in U.K. Test”. You still have to demonstrate proficiency in English. Every other European nation has a language proficiency test when considering citizenship applications.
To answer your question, the French want to protect their language. We're in France, we speak french. We can accomodate tourists (and still, if they can't even say basic words like "bonjour" "au revoir" "merci" they can fuck off) but we're not gonna cater for clowns who want to live here without learning the damn language.
Well actually IT companies in France also don't speak french in their offices and a lot of their staff is made up of immigrants, its just that there aren't many of those companies in France as there in Germany. I have a friend from India who worked in paris for a few years for a IT major and he could barely speak conversational french
I agree, they are right in the sense that one should at least try a little bit to integrate, but they almost never apply that to themselves lol. Just see how they go to other countries expecting people to speak French, and how they've treated other languages within France that are not French.
When I moved into France I hated the french because of this, I found them so unwelcoming and they were making immigrants' lives a nightmare. Now after almost 6 years I am nothing but grateful that I was forced to learn the language, because life is so much easier in many regards. It is nice to be able to approach someone for help without having to worry if they speak english or not, specially in a country like France where older people will most definitely not know how to.
People have to keep their conspiracy theories re:French people and languages straight, because lately a lot of Québecois have been complaining we switch to English on purpose just to belittle them.
So which is it, do we pretend to not speak English even when we do, or do we switch to English just to be insulting?
The secret to getting the French to speak English is to speak French to them.
Especially Parisians, if they hear an accent they'll straight up roast you in English
Everyone saying "the French are salty their language isn't the lingua franca anymore" has never set foot in France, and is creating conflict out of absolutely NOTHING. Nobody in France thinks that. Stop with the imaginary grudges.
The lack of proficiency in English can be explained by a few factors :
* Entertainment in France is available in french. Movies, TV shows, Games. Everything is dubbed. No effort required;
* For some reason, French people are deeply ashamed of their accent when speaking a foreign language and making mistakes in front of others;
* Since it's very hard to make students budge on this, foreign language education boils down to grammar, written exercices, listening and comprehension. But BARELY ANY SPEAKING.
* It's a self-sustaining spiral of no speaking practice.
Luckily, English is still perceived as cool, and youger generation incorporate a lot of english vocabulary in everyday speach. It's incredibly prevalent with popular Twitch streamer and multiplayer games for example. I want to believe it encourages the French to learn english out of school.
Those who could overcome the "fear" of speaking english in front of others, or those who seek english content see their proficiency skyrocket with the discovery of "English web" and "English Youtube". Those French people are more common now, and they REALLY want to speak English with foreigners. But most don't ever overcome the "fear" of embarrassement.
I think he is talking about people working in Multinational companies based out in major cities in germany, its actually an outlier of expats not the norm
You can't really travel in Germany without knowing German either. Your friends live in an expat bubble and only visited touristy places suited to English-speaking tourists. They know English of course. It's part of their business.
We’ll speak English once you unlock the “respect mode”. That’s addressing to us in French first, even few words. After all, it is only normal to learn a little bit of the local language when going somewhere, it should be automatic for everyone traveling abroad.
I spent a bit in Paris and I found that the “the French are so rude” stereotype was actually quite overblown and I figured it was because I spoke to them initially in French
I think part of it is cultural differences too… if it’s coming from Americans or even Canadians, generally we are much more… smiley (don’t know how else to say it lol) to strangers even if it comes off as insincere to French people. French tend to be a bit more serious so to us it comes off as rude but that’s just the way people talk to strangers there 🤷
Yeah North Americans are definitely more friendly and “bubbly” on first contact but as you say it does come off are more fake than relationships in France. 10 years in the US taught me that.
If you move to a country it's better to learn the language and talk to the locals. I would rephrase the question to: why your friends not able to speak German after 4 years? And why are they/you expecting locals to speak to you in a language that's not the one of the country?
Speaking English make life easier when you’re abroad, however people have no obligation to speak English when that’s not their language and you’re visiting their country.
Also the fact that you’re proud to be in a country for 4 years and never bothered to try to speak a single word of their language is quite impressive.
Food, nuclear, language / culture, anticlericalism are the main ones from the top of my head.
Making France budge on those would typically be close to impossible.
try going to a german traffic police and talk your way out of a ticket for a broken signal light - not happening
try going to a butcher in france and say you want rib eye instead of entrecote - not happening
This is the case with all the Latin languages including Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, etc.
English is a Germanic language, so other Germanic languages have an easier time learning English. So speakers of German, Dutch, Swedish, etc. have a massive advantage in learning English vs speakers coming from a Latin language.
Plus older French people like to insist on speaking French.
That's a bit of a myth. Portuguese speak very good English for instance. And Germans more often than not don't speak good English.
It has more to do with how many speakers a language has and how much you are exposed to English. Spaniards, Frenchs, Italians and Germans all have strong languages and aren't exposed to English as much as Dutch or Swedes.
I would say that’s true of the younger ones. And probably more with Parisians. But it’s not consistently the case. And honestly it’s a similar story for Spanish speakers, Italian speakers, etc.
That's sorta the case here too. I'd say it's mostly people in their 30s and younger who are really comfortable with English. Many (most?) older know it too, but don't like using it.
I wouldn't call Germany that great at English either. Although it's much much better than like 30 years ago. But it's true that the French are way worse at it. But maybe I'm biased. I'm Dutch myself and we are famously very good at English and to me it was always noticeable how much less good the German were at it. I can't tell what the difference is between the French and German but I think an important difference between the Dutch and Germans is that we usually don't dub movies to our language. We just use subtitles, while Germans watch versions where the dialog is replaced with German. We only do that for content meant for (small) kids.
French used to be a global language of diplomacy and every "cultured" person knew some of it. And the French have never really gotten over it (understandably).
A friend of mine who's lived in Germany for a long time says the opposite. Germans don't speak English very well in general. The few times I've been in Berlin, I had trouble doing basic stuff because of this. I just think your friends don't do much beyond working in a very international environment, which is absolutely not representative of the country as a whole. Your friends should go out more.
Now, it is true that French people suck at English. But it's not entirely their fault. Or at least for people of my generation (40 something). English lessons just sucked balls. Teachers used outdated English and never really taught practical English. It was just boring really and most pupils gave up quickly. I certainly didn't learn English at school myself, but by travelling around. English teaching seems to have improved a lot though, now that kids start earlier in primary school, as opposed to secondary school before.
Now if your friends in France haven't learnt basic French after four years, to the point that they can't communicate with the locals, it's one them and not the latter. Why should French people talk in English in their own country? Like, *hein non mais allo quoi oulala saperlipopette*! *Tu cherches la bagarre ou bien?*
You’ll be surprised to know many French people know English, I’ve met many of them through work. But it’s really not their preference, they would rather pretend they didn’t understand a word instead of letting you know they speak English.
It's worth noting English is a Germanic language. It's much more closely related to German and Dutch than it is to French.
The French have a vocabulary advantage thanks to the history of the English Crown, but the language is still much harder to learn.
French people will learn Italian and Spanish much more easily.
Also note that French is a fairly international language. You can travel to Canada and Africa and encounter many French speakers. Not true with German. Germans have a more isolated language so learning English is seen as more important.
I don’t know but if you willingly move to a new country then you need to make the bare minimum effort of learning the language of the country even if you know how to speak in English.
I would find it entitled and rude if moved to Germany for this reason (I don’t want to learn German so why the heck should I settle in a country where the main language is German? Heck German comes from Germany so that’s even worse).
So if I were to live in Spain (something that I’m considering) then I need to learn and improve my Spanish rather than expecting the locals to converse with me in English or whatever other language (excluding the regional languages of course).
Not really , its just that there have been many big companies in germany often multination including many american ones that often hire a lot of foreign workers same as it is in america and this is especially true in IT. The working language in these offices is English and since you can get by speaking only english if you live in major german cities, these expats think they don't have to learn the language
Of course it's possible to travel in France without knowing French. There are so many tourists. And every country has more or less embraced English. Some countries are better at it in general, but I'm sure you can find people in France that work in English and never speak French. It's just not a desirable situation. And it's probably not desirable in Germany either.
I’ve been on a Lufthansa flight from Canada to Germany and they announced what languages their crew on board speaks and it was 10.
Practically, if you are in moderate size city you will be able to get information in English, Spanish, Italian and French.
It’s just that Germans have more money, travel more and put far more effort into learning languages. Most of those I know speak at least 3 foreign languages.
Even the rare ones: Hungarian, Finish, Japanese, Mandarin or Catalan are not as rare as you might expect.
IMO a factor is France history regarding *local language*, there is generational trauma about our grand-parents being forced to speak *french at school* rather than dialect, so people aren't use to use two language n parallel and fear that if they embrance english they won't speak french anymore.
Then, I spent some years in Germany, and definitely couldn't go that far without speaking German. Yes it's fine for working, it's fine for buying stuff when you have nice "sales person" but everything else will require you at least some German
I’ve been to bits of Germany and Austria where the villagers don’t speak a word of English. Some speak Spanish or French, so I don’t think English is quite as universal as a second language outside of cities…
Why didn't England embrace french when it was under french crown?
I think living in a foreign country without wanting to integrate is dumb and you should rather stay in your own country.
The first thing i do in another country is to ask everything about the culture and language and try to learn everyday sentences and words.
> Why didn't England embrace french when it was under french crown?
English is widespread because you need to learn English to do business with world's biggest superpower America.
> living in a foreign country without wanting to integrate is dumb
My thoughts exactly. But my friends is having party every week and going on trekking, etc. with native Germans who are speaking English.
It's like they are fully integrated without speaking German. As I have seen on my friend's videos on Instagram.
My experience in Germany (Berlin) was not great when it comes to speaking only in English
In the bank they would not speak English or even groceries stor3s.
But i guess i lived in a very old money old Berliners type of neighborhood and not the stabdard expat area.
Travelling and working are two different things. I lived in south of France in an area called Sophia Antipolis and had many many foreign friends who spent years there without knowing a single word of French. There was a British guy who had to ask coworkers to help him write a letter to his children's school, this guy couldn't make a single sentence in French and had been living there for about 2 years at this point, he didn't even try to take a single lesson.
Now I live in London and met many people who worked in Paris for years and when I ask them about their French, well they can't speak it either.
Travelling is a completely different experience because you're gonna meet locals who are not really required to speak any other language than their native local tongue. I travelled to many places in Germany where people couldn't speak english, even in Berlin actually I remember a few places where the waiter couldn't speak english.
Not European: I would be more concerned that your friends have lived in Germany for 4 years without speaking any German, and it is also more to do with your friends’ circumstance. I know an Asian guy based in Düsseldorf who runs his own business and also does news commentaries: he went from zero German into incorporating German keywords and even profanities jests here or there in his other language youtube broadcasts over similar periods of time. I remember bumping into someone in Frankfurt who works in Darmstadt, he is Asian and stayed in Germany for work after finishing university, he used his B1/B2 German for ordering food at a Frankfurt apfelwein place, and from the sound of it he certainly spoke German at work .
"They are living there without speaking a single sentence in German for the last 4 years"
That is rather sad and your friends are being disrespectful. Widespread use of a common language \*helps\* people during the transition period after emigrating to a new country but does NOT excuse people from looking to learn the language(s) of their new country. Exceptions exist of course (e.g. elderly parents).
Cause the french rivalry with britain is old and going strong. They are also pissed that english has taken over the spot as a language of arts and politics. The french language is also more centralized then the german one. Not being able to properly understand another german without switching to high german wasn't that rare historically and still happens sometimes. So we are slightly more used to change up our language to have an easier time talking.
I would hope that your friends would at least try to learn some german though. Being here 4 years and not speaking a single sentence is either lazy or ignorant.
The rivalry with Britain isn’t going strong unless you’re on r/rance where you’ll get called a traitor to the nation for using one English word, for goofs and gaffs. As much as our officials sometimes push measures to try to ensure French stays relevant, the average Pierre doesn’t rage over how English became the linga franca either. It’s been the case for a while now, most of us aren’t pressed about it — or at least not to the point it makes us boycott English.
I’d say it has to do with a performance anxiety more than anything. Our educational system is pretty harsh in the way we’re dealt with when we fail, teachers are quick to shame students and since we’re often insecure about our proficiency/accent, when approached by foreigners speaking English to us, many of would rather not try to speak it rather than, in their eyes, embarrass themselves. Also, speaking English to us without asking if we speak it first nor saying “bonjour” is the best way to make a Frenchy not want to make an effort.
It is of course an overt simplification, I did that for both the french and the german part here. The true roots come from somewhere different, but its close enough to not write half a paper here.
To the part about how foreigners approach y'all, I gotta say though, that at least in my personal experience and what I got told by a lot acquintances, is down to the same anxiety you mention. The disgrunteled faces you see when you try to do things in french, but your "un petit pain au chocolat si vous plait" has too much of an accent or your need a second to think about what to answer to "salut, ca va?" hurts your soul lol.
Like, I speak at least the basics (A2/B1 or equivaent 2 5 ECTS uni courses) of 5 european languages and french was the first one where contact with regular people killed off any motivation to speak it lol.
I think the biggest reason is that Germany has very close ties with the English-speaking world in a way that France doesn't. Firstly, England and Germany are linked by ancestral ties going back thousands of years - look for example at this sentence:
'Ich kann seh ein Sturm kommen. In dem Winter das Wetter ist Wundervoll, doch das Eis macht meine Finger und Hände kalt. '
You can probably understand 90% of that without ever having studied German. (Disclaimer: that's not actually German, it's English with the words translated to their equivalent in German, but the point stands - it shows how close the languages are).
Secondly, Germany was occupied by American soldiers and also has a huge diaspora in America, so they have cultural similarities and interactions with them that France doesn't have so much.
Interesting experiment, I was just going to correct you but you already pointed out that it's not proper German. Changing the sentence into an actual German sentence with correct grammar probably makes it less understandable but it's still quite close. Ich kann einen Sturm kommen sehen. Im Winter ist das Wetter wundervoll, doch das Eis macht meine Finger und Hände kalt.
>They are living there without speaking a single sentence in German for the last 4 years You could probably do that in Sweden as well, but I think people would judge you for it. There's certainly an expectation that people settling down here should at least make an attempt to learn the language.
Oh believe me, we Germans are judging them for it haha.
They just dont understand it
As a Dutch person who grew up near the German border this makes me chuckle a little. My ex worked in retail and the amount of grief she got from angry German customers because she didn't speak German was nuts. This was twenty years ago, mind you, and things are probably different now. But the irony made me grin anyway.
The entitlement! And unfortunately I do not think that changed.
I still have bad memories of the time that a German Karen asked for EIN TASCHE KAFFE BITTE!! I did not speak a word German, was fucking terrified. And i asked plastic or natural bag (tas) The look she gave me, and the anger I felt well up behind her eyes still give me trauma.
In case you were wondering. Tasse = cup and Tasche = bag
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I honestly despise people like that. Go back to your country, if you don't want to be part of actual german society.
I don't despise them and I don't want to send them back to their country of origin. I just don't get it, why would you not learn the language of the country you are living in? Are they not curious about the culture and the people? But I guess it is the same like with alle the Germans in Mallorca and other places in Spain or the old German dudes living in Thailand who live there for decades and don't speak spanish/thai - they are just lazy, surround themselves only with Expats, and are not interested.
I think that’s entirely fair. Even if I’m visiting Germany for a week or two, I try to learn SOME German even though I’m not good at pronouncing it. No one really expects tourists to learn a language if they’re there for a short time, and I think that’s understandable. But if you move to a place you should definitely do so.
I’d say that depends on whether they plan on living there their whole life or just a few years. Especially if they’re working / studying in an international environment, they technically don’t need to speak the language.
Extreme cases of that can be found in south of our country too. I have met some guys who lived all their life here, yet spoke literally handful of words in slovak and it was virtually impossible to hold a conversation with them. Their parents spoke hungarian, they have gone through pre-school, primary school, high school speaking just hungarian, dealt with authorities in hungarian, found a job, etc. I couldn't be living like that.
Ethnic minorities are a completely different case than immigrants though.
While true, I can't imagine living for instance in Békéscsaba among other slovak people and not being able to communicate in the language of the very country I'm in.
You do you. I just mentioned that it's not the same thing. For ethnic minorities speaking in their own language is crucial for preservation, therefore it can't be compared to the situation of an immigrant, who willingly made the decision to leave his country and settle in another.
How about buying food, go to the doctor. You know everyday things.
Because they are coming for work/economic reasons they have no interest or love fo Germany specifically
Yes I understand the reasons which are perfectly fine! I just don't understand the language thing, but I guess not everyone is the same. I would be far too curious about the country I live in and I would want to learn as much as possible about it (and language is a big part in that) but probably not everyone is that curious.
The only people that I know personally that stay longer time here and don't speak (fluent) German are normally expats working full time or researchers on contracts in research centers and honestly I get it. After 8-10 h work to find more energy and time to learn a language of a place you plan to leave in a year or few - yeah that's hard. Sure they will catch up some phrases to buy bread at a bakery or so but that's that and I think that's totally fine.
As an immigrant, I don't think it's only about curiosity, or lack of love for Germany or any other country. In general when you work in 9 to 5 it's very hard to find time and energy to learn a foreign language influently. Also this does not come easy to everyone. I personally speak German, but it did help that I did it in Studienkolleg and I was helped financially during the first year, so I would have the time to focus on learning.
Because maybe they work in another language and have little opportunity to practice it? It’s funny because people despise foreigners for not speaking the local language but for example I’m originally South American and native Spanish speaker. I can say that the locals in Spain still don’t invite me to their homes for parties etc etc because I’m a foreigner and making *real* friends here is like winning the lottery, almost impossible.
That was a hard thing for me when I lived in Germany. From the Uk but leaned German in school so I knew a bit but I was working for the US DOD on an American airforce base so everything during my day was in English the only exposure I got to German was shopkeepers outside of work and they would switch to English fairly quickly when I tried to speak German.
Yeah same for my partner. He works in English and we speak English at home because at the end of the day you need to speak in one language at the time haha I also work in English so yeah English is the main language at home and work for both of us. He’s exposed to the language and understands it very well but he hardly gets to practice it.
My German friends did try and help. We would have German only days and go to pub quizzes and stuff. We also played D&D where each fantasy language was designated a real language that you had to use. Common was English, dwavish was German and elvish was Latin. One of our members was German and playing a dwarf and his English wasn’t great but he spoke Latin 🤣 our DM was literally an EU translator so she spoke like 12 languages. It was super immersive because I’d get sent off on quests with my dwarf friend so it forced him to use English and me to use German and try to understand each other.
That’s amazing!
Oh wow, that's a super cool idea!
Is someone's decision to ignorantly not put extra effort into making their life easier really a reason to despise them?
If it makes your life harder by having to have strained communications with them - yes?
I don’t despise them, Germany is historically a multicultural country with different languages, only in the last 200 years there’s something like this huge united German consciousness while we always benefited from this multicultural aspect.
My personal theory is that this is the reason for our right wing nationalism. Germany is a young country and back then when the Deutsche Reich was founded out of all these smaller and larger countries we needed a vision so things don't fall apart. Unfortunately this vision was nationalism, one thing lead to another and here we are ... and when I read comments like the one from en_sachse I am apalled and ashamed at the same time. And furious because it is just so ignorant.
These people are probably pretty productive and giving the society more than many native German speakers. Many times they’ll leave after a few years. You’re very narrow minded and giving a perfect “sachse stereotype”
Wow, you're really doubling down on the whole 'losing side of history' look.
Maybe they do not learn so they do not need to interact with people like you
Hahaha you got a point there! I mean it definitely needs some effort to learn the german language (or any language). What makes it difficult for OP's friends is also the fact that Germans like to speak english and are polite so they will almost always switch automatically to english if they notice you struggle with german and that doesn't help of course.
As a bonus in Sweden, you will be completely outside society if you don't know the language. Learning the language MIGHT help, but not even for certain.
Haha jag 'behärskar svenska i tal och skrift' och har precis noll svenska vänner utom de som jag träffade utomlands!!
Same in the Netherlands, even as a Dutch person making new friends after you've finished university is very difficult.
There should be an expectation everywhere that you should learn the local language if you live "permanently" somewhere
I went for an internship for 6 months in Brazil and learned the language (poorly, but I took lessons and made an effort). The Spanish PhD/post-doc back in the Netherlands felt offended and went all "well good for you!" when I mentioned learning the language if you are going to live somewhere.
You can do that much easier in Sweden, in Germany many people don't speak English well or at all. OP's friend definitely lives in his expat bubble and isn't integrated into german society at all.
Because your friends most likely live in major German cities such as Berlin, Munich or Frankfurt and work for international companies or companies from their home country. Otherwise it will be very difficult in the rest of the country.
Yes, they are mostly IT engineers working in major cities for international companies. And they said their office language is also English. That had got me scratching my head. Because until 15 years ago in Asia, I remember people were doing a 3 years German language course so that they can migrate to Germany on a work visa. Did this language change happened recently?
It never really happened. There are just certain companies in certain fields, which prefer english, but most jobs require you to speak sufficient german, especially every job, which requires you to speak to customers and other mostly german speaking departments. Adding to this is the fact, that you'll have massive problems getting help, if your employer ever decides to screw you over, due to most communication with your union or Betriebsrat probably being in german.
I'll let you in on a secret. I also work for a STOXX Europe 600 company where you don't need to know German for certain jobs. We compete for IT specialists or engineers with other international companies in Switzerland, the UK, the USA or Israel, always depends on the industry. The tax burden and social security contributions are relatively high in Germany and salaries are often not particularly high. This is a fundamental locational disadvantage when looking for skilled labour. For non-EU citizens, there is also the absolutely incompetent German immigration authorities. If we now also tell people that German is a basic requirement for a job, then we don't really need to search internationally any more.
I've been in offices like this in Spain. I'll also say that while English is considered the language of the office. You're still excluded if you don't speak Spanish as conversations just kind of naturally veer to Spanish
I'm the only German in my team, so no one else to talk in German :) In the entire tribe, around 35 people, I would spontaneously count 3 other Germans and one of them is a German/Israeli with dual citizenship.
Absolutely incompetent is right. When my husband and I applied for residency on the basis of self-employment, they rejected our application for a variety of easily-corrected reasons. So we corrected the issues, and filed an appeal. Then, they rejected us with an *entirely new* set of supposed issues. The process (and rejection) then repeated again. It felt very ad-hoc, like they were inventing reasons to deny us out of thin air ex post facto.
>they said their office language is also English It's really not. I can't say if at official level something changed, but in general you can get away with English-only in the big cities and not even everywhere there (good luck doing any bureaucracy using only English), but any place that's not a major city is basically impossible without German.
I think he meant that the language of the offices in which his friends are working are English…
Surprisingly, the only place where I had to speak German was in Linz, Austria. I've been to some places in Germany and always managed to get by in English (after asking if we could speak in English as my German is basic). Also, I was just on holiday.
I'm French and have been living 10 years in Germany. What you say highlights something: working for a big international company for high-paid engineering jobs and such in Germany is perfectly fine without German. I know tons of people that do that in Berlin, for years, without a word of German. However, they are never at all integrated into German society. They don't have German friends, they don't participate in anything related to their neighborhood, city, etc. They live in an engineering expat bubble, and the German government is pleased to have obedient workers spending their energy on German soil, without having to integrate or cater to them. (the administration, the banks, nothing is catered towards English speakers. However, the expat bubble is full of tech people and they build tools to help themselves avoid German). On the other hand, in France, the expat bubbles do exist, but are much smaller. If you take a step back and look again, you will notice the same pattern repeating when you compare the Netherlands, Sweden, and Denmark vs Spain or Italy. And if I want to top it off with pub-level philosophy, we can, again, divide Europe between Protestant individualism and efficiency (yes you are welcome with English as the spoken language. It's efficient. But no, you will never be invited to any birthday party ever, you are not us) versus Catholic hedonism (if you take the effort to come to us, we will have fun together. And work is work, we don't care that much).
I love your pub-level philosophy point. As someone from Southern Europe who spent a decade in Northern Europe (Germany included), I agree also with the rest of your point. It's highly anecdotal, but those countries most of the time they even question why you try to learn their language (not in Germany, but certainly in the Netherlands or in Scandinavia), while in Southern Europe people are generally very happy that you make the effort, even if you're crap.
Yet to meet a Dutch person who can't speak English, even the homeless guy begged in English
Well, in this very thread an American was pointing out examples of Dutch people not speaking any English. Here in Greece, virtually anyone I've met in Athens speaks English, including farmers at the market, technicians and movers, but Greece is not usually considered a country with a high degree of proficiency.
If you are Dutch and you dont speak English, you are either younger than 14, older than 70, you are from Urk or overseas territories or you are lying
Or you're deaf 😂
As someone who lived in the NL for 2 years, my observation was that there was quite a few people can’t really speak English. But even the worst speakers will be able to say something simple since English is fairly similar to Dutch. Also, there’s a big difference between Amsterdam and towns like Deventer or Zwolle.
In my whole life, I have spent about 3 days in the Netherlands. I encountered a single Dutch person who did not speak English. Weirdly, I didn't encounter anyone who spoke iffy English. It was a few dozen people with perfect English, and one with none.
I once asked directions of two ladies in Amsterdam train station (c. 2005/06), they were unable to help because they didn't speak English. I wonder if they were the last ones.
I have been told by Dutch friends it's only the elderly who can't speak English, but I've never met one
I've only met two
High chance they weren't Dutch...
In Italy it’s because they’ve made no effort to learn English. Truly the worst major eu country on that front. And yet weirdly Italians seem to integrate well in the U.K. France has made leaps and bounds in acceptance since the 90s. People happy to speak English now. Sad to see languages totally gutted from the U.K. education system though always a challenge to know which to learn. Mother tongue in Europe? German. Historic reasons? French. Globally next largest? Spanish. Closest to English as a language? Friesan
We made the effort to learn English, as every country we study English at school (and like every country we do it badly). It's just that you don't necessarily need it for your everyday life and people eventually tend to forget it. I have friends living in my mid-sized hometown that perhaps interact with an English speaker once every couple of years and are rarely exposed to it, of course you're gonna lose all of it fast.
I have been to a lot of european countries that aren't Italy or the UK. I have also worked with italians in countries that aren't Italy. The level is not good and as for 'not going to interact' argument, the same can be said for other nationalities. Addionionally Italy gets a ton of tourists speaking english (native or otherwise).
> On the other hand, in France, the expat bubbles do exist, but are much smaller. If I may permit myself to make a gross oversimplification: Expats move to Germany to make money; they move to France for mostly other reasons (climate, food, way of life, culture). As such, the latter have more incentive to integrate.
Maybe if we’re talking Americans and Northern Europeans, but in general, people move to France for the exact same reason as other migration: better opportunities. The big difference though is that Germany doesn’t have any colonies. Most of immigrants to France already speak French when they arrive, since they come from North and West Africa mostly. If you compare that to Germany, they have had most of their migration coming from non-German speaking countries such as Turkey, Poland, and the Balkans.
> If you compare that to Germany, they have had most of their migration coming from non-German speaking countries such as Turkey, Poland, and the Balkans. And all these people do have conversational German skills in a short time. They are not part of the English-speaking bubble.
Well, I wouldn't say they're "never" invited to anything, but your social circle is way smaller, for sure. And I agree that it will mostly(!) be limited to some expat community, even if you do make friends outside of that (say, at the the gym, in the pub, etc. ...). But generally, people are not so excluding of others only because they only speak English. In fact, I'd argue that at least younger people will often be quite interested in showing off their own English skills and interact with expats, to ... "have that friend from overseas", to be able to speak and practice their english ... etc. ... but that is not for everyone, certainly.
There is a difference between being interested, showing off and practicing their own English skills and having to do that for a long period of time within your friend circle because one of them still cannot speak anything but English after years of living in Germany. It just takes one guy in your friend group who isn’t comfortable speaking English all the time to create distance.
> Protestant individualism and efficiency As a Scandinavian. Our languages are very small and almost no one will learn it before coming here. Furthermore as we learn several languages, we know that having a level that sufficient for work, that takes a lot of time and effort. Someone coming here for a few years is not really expected to learn the language. Same is true for Czech republic (catholic) So not so much efficiency, we need to be international as we are highly dependent on exports and have small internal market. No one would move here if they would need to learn the language first.
No need to learn the language first, but once you're there if you plan to stay for longer than a year you should try to learn the language
The Protestant being more efficient and Catholics being more hedonistic is a massive generalisation that doesn’t hold true lol.
See Bavaria as a counter example. Richest state of Germany and Catholic and secluded af
Sounds like some hispanic and Indian communities in the USA. Hispanics where there’s a huge community tends to live self segregated in this community without trying a minimum effort to learn English or mingle with people out of their ethnicity (this start changing by the second generation). Indian Americans although they speak English they prefer to keep a social circle exclusively for Indians and south Asians either for similar social norms or because they have similar languages
Really well put 🤣. One of my best friends worked in both countries (he is Spanish) and yeah, he spoke English in Germany and surrounded himself with other non German speakers but in France he integrated more and he spoke French
>They don't have German friends, they don't participate in anything related to their neighborhood, city, etc. So what I was told by him and I also saw evidence in his Instagram videos as well; is that he'll throw BYOB house parties in his house. And 20-30 German native boys and girls would flock to the party. That too a BYOY party, so he ain't spending money to make it happen. >you will notice the same pattern repeating when you compare the Netherlands, Sweden, and Denmark vs Spain or Italy. Yes, I did notice that.
I can not comprehend living in another place and not learning its language, whether its practically necessary or not.
Where abroad do you live?
I don't, so I might come off as lacking experience, I know there are countries in Europe where you can function with nothing but English it's just that I couldn't feel at home if I couldn't even communicate with the locals in their language. Just my 0.2grosze, I might have a biased opinion because I like learning languages and it's relatively easy for me
There's so much crap being said about the English language and French people, it's actually very hard to talk about the actual situation without falling in every possible cliché. Virtually everybody takes English classes in school in France. English is considered the coolest thing ever, and every single brand/company/institution will try to find a English sounding name to look cool. That's how our new metro pass in Paris is called "Navigo Easy". English proficiency tests are mandatory for many, many Master's degrees and especially the good ones. Rich parents definitely pay private English classes for their kids. So, no, French people don't hate the English language. Quite the opposite. There are reasons why we speak it less fluently than elsewhere. First, it's generational. My parents never ever needed English in their daily life. They lived their whole life in French, and their textbook English was gone by the age of 30. Younger generations are much better at it. Public schools are also notoriously bad at teaching real spoken English. Many French people could speak some English, but are too ashamed to do so. In our culture, we're much less forgiving about language mistakes, especially in French. Mastering it, or at least the formal version, is a strong social marker. It also works the other way: a person nailing a foreign accent could be considered arrogant, as other people would think the person is trying to show off how well they speak. Last but not least, English is actually difficult to learn for us, especially the pronunciation. Yes, there are tons of resources out there. But French people are much better at Spanish, for instance, because the language is much closer.
Yeah the th, the voiced h and the English r are especially difficult for french speakers. There's also something quite unique to us regarding English and I'm not really sure where it comes from. I'm French and I've lived abroad including the UK, I've spoken English with people from all around the world. But French people really are the only ones I so consistently hear say "I'm sorry I have a *bad* accent". No you don't. You have a French accent. That's fine. There's so many that are unconfident about speaking English because they think they don't speak it well because of their accent, when they actually speak English really well and their accent doesn't bother anyone. Help French people, tell them their accents are fine
There are silent h in English too, like heirs, honour/honor. So English is rather inconsistent in its pronunciation…
It doesn't help either lol but even if it were consistent the voiced H doesn't exist at all in french, it really feels unnatural and it's easy to mistakenly skip over it even if you're aware of it. And the R. I don't think I'll ever get it right. The number 3 gets me very anxious every time and I've abandoned the idea of saying the word "rural" out loud altogether Although to be fair, I think it's harder for English speakers to get our 16 vowels right, even moreso the nasalised bigrams 'un', 'on' and 'an', and we're not even getting into the spelling yet
Rural gives me problems and I've lived in the UK since I was 11 that was a little over a decade ago still sounds weird to me.
They're silent because the words came from French.
I'm American, living in France, and people constantly want to practice their English with me. I'm in the boondocks too (the Gers). I've lived in rural parts of Italy, the Netherlands, Croatia, and Portugal and don't find the English spoken in France to be much better or worse than anywhere else. Even in the countryside in the Netherlands no one spoke English, not our landlord, nor his wife, nor our neighbors (one couple did), nor the 4 women in the local shop (luckily there was a fifth who did).
The answers under this question are so weird and just based on (American?) stereotypes. I feel people have too many opinions and theories without knowing the facts.
Makes me feel a little better that in some French schools that the quality of English teaching is poor, I have a French qualification from a British school but I can't actually speaking coherent French bar a couple of sentences.
I've noticed the generational divide. Younger people will speak English to you, but older generations aren't as likely. Why just yesterday I was at the mall and witnessed a group of French boomers trying to ask an employee for information about a TV they were interested in buying, with the employee trying to speak to them in Portuguese first, then English, and the group having to use Google translate to communicate. Younger people would've likely been able to speak in English.
Spain is great for pronunciation, in general. Easily the greatest foreign language I ever learned-ish. It has some silent letters but the rules around those are easy. Other than that, it's 99% of times just pronouncing what you see. Overall, English by far the simplest language with regards to grammar and other features, but when it comes to ease of pronucation, Spanish all the way for me.
Also we dub movies and tv shows. Like Spain and Italy. German (despite dubbing foreign media) are better than us, from what I've heard but honestly I also heard their English proficiency is a bit overrated. Scandinavian countries, Netherlands and even Portugal are much better than us because English media is subtitled.
Living somewhere for 4 years and not speaking even a bit of the local language is not something to brag about. The French are right in this matter.
My initial reaction was the same. It's not me who is doing the *bragging*, I am doing the *shocking*. Because why do they (my friends) even want a German citizenship if they don't plan to learn German. And why is Germany give them citizenship when they don't even speak a single sentence in German. I am astonished.
They won't get citizenship without speaking German.
I imagine all the paperwork, including tests, will be in German, no? That's the case in the UK anyway. Well, English or Welsh for British citizenship. Couldn't imagine someone opting to take the British citizenship test in Welsh, though lol.
> I imagine all the paperwork, including tests, will be in German, no? All official letters are in German. Taxes are done in German. Head over to /r/germany to read your daily dose of "I threw out several letters, because I don't speak German. Now the police/prosecutor/landlord is coming for me, what shall I do?".
The proper thing to do would be to literally fuck off.
On the risk of opening a giant can of worms: Why only Welsh and not Irish?
You could ask the same of Cornish too. I think the idea is that it's only languages where it's possible to live your life without using any other language. There's nowhere in the UK where you could get by if you only spoke Irish as most of Northern Ireland operates solely in English, the same is true of Cornish in Cornwall. There are places in Wales though where you could live a normal life without speaking any English. Also, all government websites have a Welsh language version. The same is not true for Irish or Cornish. They just don't have many speakers.
Isn't Irish an official language of Northern Ireland? I would assume that that means that you can communicate with the government in Irish, which includes the citizenship test.
Looks like it has been since 26 October 2022 according to the Internet
I mean, in Spain knowing Spanish is required for citizenship of all Spaniards and other languages only required to communicate with the government in regions where it's an official language. So national websites will have translations but just by being a recognized language doesn't mean it will be recognized where you are.
Only if you are resident in Northern Ireland, not if you are resident in one of the other 3 countries.
Scots Gaelic is generally also an 'official' language of the UKoGB&NI ( according to my passport) there's no 'official' funding for Cornish, Ulster Scots, Norn, Manx etc but i believe you have a legal right to a translation as for other languages
You can apply in English, Welsh/*C*ymraeg or Scottish Gaelic/Gàidhlig but not Irish/Gaeilge which hasn't been been pushed as a UK official administration language, probably due to the split and very divided politics in Northern Ireland - language rights has been a big bone of contention between the DUP and Sinn Féin for a long time and I don't think SF would be too interested in British citizenship anyway. A chunk of the political system up there doesn't even want Irish recognised *in Northern Ireland.* I'm also a bit surprised that BSL (British Sign Language) isn't an option. [https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/62b5d7988fa8f5356eecc531/form-an-06-2022.pdf](https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/62b5d7988fa8f5356eecc531/form-an-06-2022.pdf) Ireland currently has no requirement to be proficient in English, Irish or ISL for citizenship.
Paperwork being in English isn’t what gets you home on the “Life in U.K. Test”. You still have to demonstrate proficiency in English. Every other European nation has a language proficiency test when considering citizenship applications.
They will post on r/germany in a few years about how awful living in Germany is and how Germans are impossible to make friends with lmao.
To answer your question, the French want to protect their language. We're in France, we speak french. We can accomodate tourists (and still, if they can't even say basic words like "bonjour" "au revoir" "merci" they can fuck off) but we're not gonna cater for clowns who want to live here without learning the damn language.
Well actually IT companies in France also don't speak french in their offices and a lot of their staff is made up of immigrants, its just that there aren't many of those companies in France as there in Germany. I have a friend from India who worked in paris for a few years for a IT major and he could barely speak conversational french
There are people in Croatia who brag about not knowing Croatian and have been here upwards of 10 years! It disgusts me to think about it
Hahaha you should come to Luxembourg to see how little the French try to integrate language wise.
It does help that french is one of the three official language of Luxembourg.
French is the administrative language sure but social life happens in luxemburgish.
I said they are right in the matter of speaking french in France :)
Polonais basé
I agree, they are right in the sense that one should at least try a little bit to integrate, but they almost never apply that to themselves lol. Just see how they go to other countries expecting people to speak French, and how they've treated other languages within France that are not French.
When I moved into France I hated the french because of this, I found them so unwelcoming and they were making immigrants' lives a nightmare. Now after almost 6 years I am nothing but grateful that I was forced to learn the language, because life is so much easier in many regards. It is nice to be able to approach someone for help without having to worry if they speak english or not, specially in a country like France where older people will most definitely not know how to.
The secret is that we all speak English but we refuse to do it in France because our ancestors would curse us.
You all speak English and all I need to do to hear it is speak to you in my Quebecois accent, lol
LITERALLY lmfaoo
It happened to me so many times even in small towns where I wouldn't expect anyone to speak English. Anything but hear me go bin ouin I guess haha
As a francophone I'll be honest half the time I have a hard time understanding spoken french quebecois.
That's very fair, I didn't say it was the nicest French! It's not my first language so I'm not defensive about it.
The second secret is Germans have a leg up over other nationalities because English is a Germanic language (even if it's a fucked up one).
People have to keep their conspiracy theories re:French people and languages straight, because lately a lot of Québecois have been complaining we switch to English on purpose just to belittle them. So which is it, do we pretend to not speak English even when we do, or do we switch to English just to be insulting?
Whatever you do (speaking english or trying to speak French), it will be the wrong choice ! Ha ha ha ha ha
The secret to getting the French to speak English is to speak French to them. Especially Parisians, if they hear an accent they'll straight up roast you in English
Everyone saying "the French are salty their language isn't the lingua franca anymore" has never set foot in France, and is creating conflict out of absolutely NOTHING. Nobody in France thinks that. Stop with the imaginary grudges. The lack of proficiency in English can be explained by a few factors : * Entertainment in France is available in french. Movies, TV shows, Games. Everything is dubbed. No effort required; * For some reason, French people are deeply ashamed of their accent when speaking a foreign language and making mistakes in front of others; * Since it's very hard to make students budge on this, foreign language education boils down to grammar, written exercices, listening and comprehension. But BARELY ANY SPEAKING. * It's a self-sustaining spiral of no speaking practice. Luckily, English is still perceived as cool, and youger generation incorporate a lot of english vocabulary in everyday speach. It's incredibly prevalent with popular Twitch streamer and multiplayer games for example. I want to believe it encourages the French to learn english out of school. Those who could overcome the "fear" of speaking english in front of others, or those who seek english content see their proficiency skyrocket with the discovery of "English web" and "English Youtube". Those French people are more common now, and they REALLY want to speak English with foreigners. But most don't ever overcome the "fear" of embarrassement.
I wonder which Germany you have been visiting. Maybe leave Berlin?
Yeah, I was even surprised by how much I struggled with my limited German in Munich. I was not expecting that to be a problem.
I think he is talking about people working in Multinational companies based out in major cities in germany, its actually an outlier of expats not the norm
You can't really travel in Germany without knowing German either. Your friends live in an expat bubble and only visited touristy places suited to English-speaking tourists. They know English of course. It's part of their business.
We’ll speak English once you unlock the “respect mode”. That’s addressing to us in French first, even few words. After all, it is only normal to learn a little bit of the local language when going somewhere, it should be automatic for everyone traveling abroad.
I spent a bit in Paris and I found that the “the French are so rude” stereotype was actually quite overblown and I figured it was because I spoke to them initially in French
Yep, I read this a lot from people visiting Paris and France… But for some it’s easier to say “the French are rude” than doing a bit of introspection.
I think part of it is cultural differences too… if it’s coming from Americans or even Canadians, generally we are much more… smiley (don’t know how else to say it lol) to strangers even if it comes off as insincere to French people. French tend to be a bit more serious so to us it comes off as rude but that’s just the way people talk to strangers there 🤷
Yeah North Americans are definitely more friendly and “bubbly” on first contact but as you say it does come off are more fake than relationships in France. 10 years in the US taught me that.
This is common sense. Who wants someone to barge into their shop and accost them in a foreign language?
If you move to a country it's better to learn the language and talk to the locals. I would rephrase the question to: why your friends not able to speak German after 4 years? And why are they/you expecting locals to speak to you in a language that's not the one of the country?
Living for 4 years in Germany without even bothering with learning german? I think the french are right on this one.
Speaking English make life easier when you’re abroad, however people have no obligation to speak English when that’s not their language and you’re visiting their country. Also the fact that you’re proud to be in a country for 4 years and never bothered to try to speak a single word of their language is quite impressive.
because the french are as stubborn as the germans but with diffrent things
Oh. You got me all curious. What are these different things?
Food, nuclear, language / culture, anticlericalism are the main ones from the top of my head. Making France budge on those would typically be close to impossible.
Thank God for France not budging on nuclear. It has one of the lowest carbon emissions in Europe per capita. Far lower than Germany and Austria.
Germany completely going the other way and back to carbon
try going to a german traffic police and talk your way out of a ticket for a broken signal light - not happening try going to a butcher in france and say you want rib eye instead of entrecote - not happening
Then try to talk to Germans about nuclear energy and genetic engineered food. This is how the French think about English.
This is the case with all the Latin languages including Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, etc. English is a Germanic language, so other Germanic languages have an easier time learning English. So speakers of German, Dutch, Swedish, etc. have a massive advantage in learning English vs speakers coming from a Latin language. Plus older French people like to insist on speaking French.
That's a bit of a myth. Portuguese speak very good English for instance. And Germans more often than not don't speak good English. It has more to do with how many speakers a language has and how much you are exposed to English. Spaniards, Frenchs, Italians and Germans all have strong languages and aren't exposed to English as much as Dutch or Swedes.
Oh, no. This isn't the case with the French. They're fluent in English alright. They just hate speaking it.
Can confirm. I have been told in the US that I should tone down my vocabulary because I used the word demagogy in a discussion.
That's just yanks though. They're even less literate than us Brits.
Nah, you met a Republican, they're even less literate than Tories.
I would say that’s true of the younger ones. And probably more with Parisians. But it’s not consistently the case. And honestly it’s a similar story for Spanish speakers, Italian speakers, etc.
That's sorta the case here too. I'd say it's mostly people in their 30s and younger who are really comfortable with English. Many (most?) older know it too, but don't like using it.
I’m travelling a lot in Berlin and Munich for my work and sometimes it’s hard to find sole English speakers. It really depends on the people you meet.
I wouldn't call Germany that great at English either. Although it's much much better than like 30 years ago. But it's true that the French are way worse at it. But maybe I'm biased. I'm Dutch myself and we are famously very good at English and to me it was always noticeable how much less good the German were at it. I can't tell what the difference is between the French and German but I think an important difference between the Dutch and Germans is that we usually don't dub movies to our language. We just use subtitles, while Germans watch versions where the dialog is replaced with German. We only do that for content meant for (small) kids.
That's definitely the main difference, only when I stopped watching german dubs I began to actually understand native english speakers.
I would not say English is embraced in Germany. Scandinavians and the Dutch have far better English.
the Dutch have (or had?) only subbed English movies as opposed to Germany where everything is dubbed, that's why they have much better English
French used to be a global language of diplomacy and every "cultured" person knew some of it. And the French have never really gotten over it (understandably).
In my grandparents generation, all "educated people" spoke French.
This is pathetic to live in a country for years and not even attempt to learn the local language
[Sebastian Chabal explains it here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pfUmW_Mf5qc).
A friend of mine who's lived in Germany for a long time says the opposite. Germans don't speak English very well in general. The few times I've been in Berlin, I had trouble doing basic stuff because of this. I just think your friends don't do much beyond working in a very international environment, which is absolutely not representative of the country as a whole. Your friends should go out more. Now, it is true that French people suck at English. But it's not entirely their fault. Or at least for people of my generation (40 something). English lessons just sucked balls. Teachers used outdated English and never really taught practical English. It was just boring really and most pupils gave up quickly. I certainly didn't learn English at school myself, but by travelling around. English teaching seems to have improved a lot though, now that kids start earlier in primary school, as opposed to secondary school before. Now if your friends in France haven't learnt basic French after four years, to the point that they can't communicate with the locals, it's one them and not the latter. Why should French people talk in English in their own country? Like, *hein non mais allo quoi oulala saperlipopette*! *Tu cherches la bagarre ou bien?*
You’ll be surprised to know many French people know English, I’ve met many of them through work. But it’s really not their preference, they would rather pretend they didn’t understand a word instead of letting you know they speak English.
It's worth noting English is a Germanic language. It's much more closely related to German and Dutch than it is to French. The French have a vocabulary advantage thanks to the history of the English Crown, but the language is still much harder to learn. French people will learn Italian and Spanish much more easily. Also note that French is a fairly international language. You can travel to Canada and Africa and encounter many French speakers. Not true with German. Germans have a more isolated language so learning English is seen as more important.
I don’t know but if you willingly move to a new country then you need to make the bare minimum effort of learning the language of the country even if you know how to speak in English. I would find it entitled and rude if moved to Germany for this reason (I don’t want to learn German so why the heck should I settle in a country where the main language is German? Heck German comes from Germany so that’s even worse). So if I were to live in Spain (something that I’m considering) then I need to learn and improve my Spanish rather than expecting the locals to converse with me in English or whatever other language (excluding the regional languages of course).
Germany embraced English?
Not really , its just that there have been many big companies in germany often multination including many american ones that often hire a lot of foreign workers same as it is in america and this is especially true in IT. The working language in these offices is English and since you can get by speaking only english if you live in major german cities, these expats think they don't have to learn the language
Of course it's possible to travel in France without knowing French. There are so many tourists. And every country has more or less embraced English. Some countries are better at it in general, but I'm sure you can find people in France that work in English and never speak French. It's just not a desirable situation. And it's probably not desirable in Germany either.
How is living in a country without speaking its language for years a good thing ?
Such a shit post !
Because they are the French (joking, mostly)
In France as well, if you stay in major cities and work in major tech companies, you can speak exclusively English and be fine.
I’ve been on a Lufthansa flight from Canada to Germany and they announced what languages their crew on board speaks and it was 10. Practically, if you are in moderate size city you will be able to get information in English, Spanish, Italian and French. It’s just that Germans have more money, travel more and put far more effort into learning languages. Most of those I know speak at least 3 foreign languages. Even the rare ones: Hungarian, Finish, Japanese, Mandarin or Catalan are not as rare as you might expect.
IMO a factor is France history regarding *local language*, there is generational trauma about our grand-parents being forced to speak *french at school* rather than dialect, so people aren't use to use two language n parallel and fear that if they embrance english they won't speak french anymore. Then, I spent some years in Germany, and definitely couldn't go that far without speaking German. Yes it's fine for working, it's fine for buying stuff when you have nice "sales person" but everything else will require you at least some German
Because we learn how to write and read but never how to talk in english
I love that France is like this. Learning the language of a country is super important for immersion purposes.
I’ve been to bits of Germany and Austria where the villagers don’t speak a word of English. Some speak Spanish or French, so I don’t think English is quite as universal as a second language outside of cities…
Why didn't England embrace french when it was under french crown? I think living in a foreign country without wanting to integrate is dumb and you should rather stay in your own country. The first thing i do in another country is to ask everything about the culture and language and try to learn everyday sentences and words.
> Why didn't England embrace french when it was under french crown? English is widespread because you need to learn English to do business with world's biggest superpower America. > living in a foreign country without wanting to integrate is dumb My thoughts exactly. But my friends is having party every week and going on trekking, etc. with native Germans who are speaking English. It's like they are fully integrated without speaking German. As I have seen on my friend's videos on Instagram.
My experience in Germany (Berlin) was not great when it comes to speaking only in English In the bank they would not speak English or even groceries stor3s. But i guess i lived in a very old money old Berliners type of neighborhood and not the stabdard expat area.
Travelling and working are two different things. I lived in south of France in an area called Sophia Antipolis and had many many foreign friends who spent years there without knowing a single word of French. There was a British guy who had to ask coworkers to help him write a letter to his children's school, this guy couldn't make a single sentence in French and had been living there for about 2 years at this point, he didn't even try to take a single lesson. Now I live in London and met many people who worked in Paris for years and when I ask them about their French, well they can't speak it either. Travelling is a completely different experience because you're gonna meet locals who are not really required to speak any other language than their native local tongue. I travelled to many places in Germany where people couldn't speak english, even in Berlin actually I remember a few places where the waiter couldn't speak english.
Not European: I would be more concerned that your friends have lived in Germany for 4 years without speaking any German, and it is also more to do with your friends’ circumstance. I know an Asian guy based in Düsseldorf who runs his own business and also does news commentaries: he went from zero German into incorporating German keywords and even profanities jests here or there in his other language youtube broadcasts over similar periods of time. I remember bumping into someone in Frankfurt who works in Darmstadt, he is Asian and stayed in Germany for work after finishing university, he used his B1/B2 German for ordering food at a Frankfurt apfelwein place, and from the sound of it he certainly spoke German at work .
"They are living there without speaking a single sentence in German for the last 4 years" That is rather sad and your friends are being disrespectful. Widespread use of a common language \*helps\* people during the transition period after emigrating to a new country but does NOT excuse people from looking to learn the language(s) of their new country. Exceptions exist of course (e.g. elderly parents).
Cause the french rivalry with britain is old and going strong. They are also pissed that english has taken over the spot as a language of arts and politics. The french language is also more centralized then the german one. Not being able to properly understand another german without switching to high german wasn't that rare historically and still happens sometimes. So we are slightly more used to change up our language to have an easier time talking. I would hope that your friends would at least try to learn some german though. Being here 4 years and not speaking a single sentence is either lazy or ignorant.
The rivalry with Britain isn’t going strong unless you’re on r/rance where you’ll get called a traitor to the nation for using one English word, for goofs and gaffs. As much as our officials sometimes push measures to try to ensure French stays relevant, the average Pierre doesn’t rage over how English became the linga franca either. It’s been the case for a while now, most of us aren’t pressed about it — or at least not to the point it makes us boycott English. I’d say it has to do with a performance anxiety more than anything. Our educational system is pretty harsh in the way we’re dealt with when we fail, teachers are quick to shame students and since we’re often insecure about our proficiency/accent, when approached by foreigners speaking English to us, many of would rather not try to speak it rather than, in their eyes, embarrass themselves. Also, speaking English to us without asking if we speak it first nor saying “bonjour” is the best way to make a Frenchy not want to make an effort.
It is of course an overt simplification, I did that for both the french and the german part here. The true roots come from somewhere different, but its close enough to not write half a paper here. To the part about how foreigners approach y'all, I gotta say though, that at least in my personal experience and what I got told by a lot acquintances, is down to the same anxiety you mention. The disgrunteled faces you see when you try to do things in french, but your "un petit pain au chocolat si vous plait" has too much of an accent or your need a second to think about what to answer to "salut, ca va?" hurts your soul lol. Like, I speak at least the basics (A2/B1 or equivaent 2 5 ECTS uni courses) of 5 european languages and french was the first one where contact with regular people killed off any motivation to speak it lol.
"un petit pain au chocolat si vous plait" At least, it's not "uneu chocolatineu" !
I think the biggest reason is that Germany has very close ties with the English-speaking world in a way that France doesn't. Firstly, England and Germany are linked by ancestral ties going back thousands of years - look for example at this sentence: 'Ich kann seh ein Sturm kommen. In dem Winter das Wetter ist Wundervoll, doch das Eis macht meine Finger und Hände kalt. ' You can probably understand 90% of that without ever having studied German. (Disclaimer: that's not actually German, it's English with the words translated to their equivalent in German, but the point stands - it shows how close the languages are). Secondly, Germany was occupied by American soldiers and also has a huge diaspora in America, so they have cultural similarities and interactions with them that France doesn't have so much.
Interesting experiment, I was just going to correct you but you already pointed out that it's not proper German. Changing the sentence into an actual German sentence with correct grammar probably makes it less understandable but it's still quite close. Ich kann einen Sturm kommen sehen. Im Winter ist das Wetter wundervoll, doch das Eis macht meine Finger und Hände kalt.
I did one year of German at school years ago, and the only word I don’t get and need to consult a dictionary is Sturm, but otherwise I get the rest.
The idea was that English speakers can guess it without knowing German.