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 Language Learning Forum : Advice Center |  | |
| vogue Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 4253 days ago 109 posts - 181 votes  Speaks: English*, Italian, Spanish Studies: Ukrainian | Message 9 of 51 19 June 2013 at 9:25pm | IP Logged | ||
Perhaps, ironically, the person I referenced in the original post is over 50! Nonetheless, this is all good and interesting advice from you and everyone else. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Alanjazz Triglot Groupie United States Joined 4814 days ago 65 posts - 129 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, French Studies: Portuguese | Message 10 of 51 20 June 2013 at 4:39am | IP Logged | ||
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I see Itadakimasu's point, but I think that it depends heavily on the person having a low level of English. All of the
international students at the college where I studied (excepting very few) had such a high level of English that I had to scramble to get to at least a B1 level before I could even entertain talking with those who weren't willing to have basic conversations with me in broken Spanish. The native French speakers were a difficult group too, despite my having devoted myself to learning French 24/7 for about a year straight, they would still often respond to me or initiate conversations with me in English or insist on English after talking for about half an hour, despite my starting every interaction in French and trying to speak only French with them the whole time. I think it's just a perpetually hard situation, because so many people in other countries start learning English so much earlier. Also, having contact with English-language resources is in ways easier, with how much the US and the UK export to other countries. 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Cavesa Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 5008 days ago 3277 posts - 6779 votes Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1 Studies: Spanish, German, Italian | Message 11 of 51 20 June 2013 at 11:09am | IP Logged | ||
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I agree with Alanjazz. You cannot rely on their bad level of English. Especially when you are talking with intelligent, educated people. Basically most people of my generation worth talking to for extended amounts of time already know English to good level.
I have the trouble that even though I am not an English native, many people just do not believe a foreigner would speak better French than English. I dislike English, I use it as a tool and over the years, I accidentally got better at it than at any other language because of the easy exposure. But that doesn't mean my French totally sucks, it is usually better than English of the other person. But some French and Swiss people just switch to English even though they know I am not an English native (so I am less valuable for the practice) and despite me starting the conversation in French. It is actually quite offensive to just assume I am bad at something, isn't it? Perhaps it is already a reflex I see foreigner-I speak English for many. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6702 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 12 of 51 20 June 2013 at 11:29am | IP Logged | ||
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When I have decided that I am ready to speak language X I will speak that language even if the other person speaks English to me. It doesn't happen too often, but even with my best foreign languages I can't totally avoid it. And why? Probably because of the reaction mentioned by Cavesa ("I see foreigner-I speak English") and mostly with people who have to deal with tourists all the time as I have mentioned earlier. They have once and for all decided how to act in their professional life, and unless they really believe that somebody is a native they can't be bothered with individual exceptions for foreigners who actually do speak their language.
Such people are almost worthless from a language learning perspective (and mostly also irrelevant in other ways) so there is no need to have long discussions with them. On the other hand I still profit from the time I speak so it is not a total waste of time - which is good because it isn't cheap to be on holiday abroad. Actually I also have to wait for trains and buses and waiters and and and... No holiday is totally perfect, and my holidays are just about the only time I have to deal with obstinate English speakers. Edited by Iversen on 20 June 2013 at 11:34am 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Itadakimasu Diglot Newbie United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4188 days ago 31 posts - 82 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese | Message 13 of 51 20 June 2013 at 11:10pm | IP Logged | ||
Well yes, my methods only work if your language ability is better than their English, but honestly you guys have to make an effort to talk to people outside of your social circle who know no English and won't try to practice with you. Limiting yourself to "The International University" and then wondering why people keep wanting to speak to you in English is backwards. You should be hitting the streets, the shops, the stores, the parks. Not a college where people speak different languages. Also my 2nd point is has literally never failed. Speaking to older people will pretty much eliminate the problem, HOWEVER you have to have some decent conversational ability in the common language first. If you can't keep up, people will keep switching back to English to help you out. That's not the method's fault though. They just don't want you to be discouraged. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Itadakimasu Diglot Newbie United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4188 days ago 31 posts - 82 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese | Message 14 of 51 20 June 2013 at 11:14pm | IP Logged | ||
To this point, central Europe is probably the worst area when it comes to trying to speak the common language. Since pretty much everyone in those areas in billingual. I was unaware you guys were trying to do this in places like Czech, Germany, Swiss, etc.. It's much easier to do my approaches in Asia because English over there is on another level of bad. Heck even Mexico is better than Central Europe for practice. Sorry guys :( 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| prz_ Tetraglot Senior Member Poland last.fm/user/prz_rul Joined 4858 days ago 890 posts - 1190 votes Speaks: Polish*, English, Bulgarian, Croatian Studies: Slovenian, Macedonian, Persian, Russian, Turkish, Ukrainian, Dutch, Swedish, German, Italian, Armenian, Kurdish | Message 15 of 51 21 June 2013 at 12:19am | IP Logged | ||
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Pretty much is bilingual? Ekhm. Come to Poland and visit train ticket offices. Good luck.
Sometimes it's so painful that I'd better serve the clients than these women. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Cavesa Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 5008 days ago 3277 posts - 6779 votes Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1 Studies: Spanish, German, Italian | Message 16 of 51 21 June 2013 at 12:45am | IP Logged | ||
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Bilingual? I know only a handful of bilinguals and they all come from either mixed marriages or immigrant minorities (their second native language is usually Slovak, Vietnamese, Russian, English, Ukrainian or Polish with some Greek, French, Croatian and so on).
And the English level basically divides the population here into two big groups: those with already quite useful level of English (ranging from those who can get the meaning across no matter the mutilations of the language to those near nativelike), in which case they are better at it than 99,9% of the foreigners at Czech, or they know at most a few phrases (and often cannot even use them properly) at which you'll need to speak hands and legs with them, unless you know some Czech. Well, it is a bit hard to get the conversation practice with someone much older so that it wouldn't look weird. And many others as well. It is often not about me limiting myself to just other university students, there is a whole bunch of social conventions and my personal bugs limiting me :-D 1 person has voted this message useful |
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