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Getting people not to speak English | ||
Tags: Language Banditry | Convincing native speakers | Immersion | Swedish | Learning Technique/Method | Accent | English | German | French | Spanish | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| jimbo baby! Senior Member United States Joined 5977 days ago 202 posts - 208 votes  2 sounds Speaks: English* | Message 113 of 169 13 March 2009 at 6:23am | IP Logged | ||
Did you hear any Alsatian spoken among the locals? I hear that it's not as common with the younger generations. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6703 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 114 of 169 13 March 2009 at 10:18am | IP Logged | ||
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I didn't hear the true Alsatian dialect anywhere, but in my hotel I heard one member of the staff speak perfectly ordinary High German to another - and I suspect that there are many people in the region who are perfectly bilingual. But I have no idea about how many, and I don't know whether they then also know the Alsatian dialect, which to my best knowledge is as far from ordinary German as Platt and Swiss German (but close to Letzebürgisch).
By the way, many - if not most - place names and many personal names in Alsace and Lorraine are German, and some look distinctly weird in a French context (Riquewier, Molsheim, Haguenau..). In Strasbourg the streets in the historical center have both French and (old) German names. But people speak French. And if your French is passable I doubt that they will force you to speak English. Edited by Iversen on 13 March 2009 at 10:25am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| hoseline Newbie United Kingdom Joined 5689 days ago 10 posts - 11 votes | Message 115 of 169 28 April 2009 at 8:12pm | IP Logged | ||
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Well i think its just a natural sense that most people are speaking in English.. they cant speak German or french i mean look.. if youre in a foreign country and they notice youre not a native why would you expect them to speak thai if the language thought worldwide as a second language is English in majority so you kindo of have to expect English to be the default international medium for languages.
for language learning resource try http://www.econtrader.com http://www.elanguageschool.net http://www.bbc.com http://www.babbel.com 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| William Camden Hexaglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 6272 days ago 1936 posts - 2333 votes Speaks: English*, German, Spanish, Russian, Turkish, French | Message 116 of 169 25 May 2009 at 10:44pm | IP Logged | ||
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When studying German in the 1980s in Germany, I had trouble stopping people from speaking to me in English.
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| Martien Heptaglot Senior Member Netherlands martienvanwanrooij.n Joined 7105 days ago 134 posts - 148 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, German, Spanish, Turkish, Italian, French Studies: Portuguese, Serbo-Croatian, Latin, Swedish, Arabic (Written) | Message 117 of 169 26 May 2009 at 1:06pm | IP Logged | ||
Never tried just to ask them "warum sprechen Sie kein Deutsch mit mir?" And what kind of answer did you get? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Gray Parrot Diglot Groupie United Kingdom Joined 5596 days ago 41 posts - 44 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin Studies: Portuguese | Message 118 of 169 08 August 2009 at 1:44pm | IP Logged | ||
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I've had so many experiences similar to many of the above posts. I also had a refreshingly different one when I sat
by the river in Guangzhou. A father approached me with his young son. He asked me in Mandarin Chinese if his son could practice speaking with me. I said yes, and was surprised to find that he wanted his son to practice speaking Mandarin, as opposed to Cantonese; and not English at all. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| NicoleW Newbie United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5551 days ago 1 posts - 1 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Italian, Arabic (Written), Japanese | Message 119 of 169 03 October 2009 at 5:53pm | IP Logged | ||
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After explaining (in Italian) repeatedly that I came to Rome to learn and speak Italian, I finally stopped explaining.
Instead, some would speak to me in English and I would simply continue in Italian. Within a sentence or two they would simply switch back to Italian. But after one conversation that had gone on for about twenty minutes, the man stopped me, quite troubled, and asked if his English had been that bad. I quickly assured him that his English had been quite clear and correct and that I had simply come to Italy to speak Italian. From that point on a went back to letting them know that I was not ignoring their English but simply immersing in the Italian. I realized later that he was just wanting to practice his English. Everyone I met was wonderful and very helpful. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Languagelover Heptaglot Senior Member Switzerland Joined 7376 days ago 41 posts - 50 votes Speaks: French*, EnglishC2, German, Italian, Spanish, Latin, Ancient Greek Studies: Mandarin | Message 120 of 169 12 October 2009 at 8:38pm | IP Logged | ||
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In the film of Quentin Tarantino "Inglorious Bastards", one of the American character tries a very unconvincing "Buongiorno"which reminded me of the many Americans who try a "Bonjour" with an awful accent and a proud smile. In such case, I immediately switch to English. I have to say that English speakers are sometime shameless in trying to speak the local language in clumsy way expecter you to be amazed by their language abilities. All they deserve is to be answered in English in a rude way. I deal with many foreigners, and obviousely I speak much better English than they speak French, and I am sometimes exhausted by those who insist to use French in order to improve their French with me.
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