quote:

Originally posted by extulas Same with basically every other Euro country.

I strongly disagree there

Only people in Northern Europe know how to speak English well : almost everybody speaks fluent English in Belgium, The Netherlands and Scandinavia

Countries where English is pretty well spoken : Germany, Austria, Switzerland

Countries where English is almost not spoken at all : Southern Europe : France, Spain, Italy, Portugal...

I think the worst would definitely be France, hehe, it's like in the USA here, people only speak one language and all French are against learning English...they suck and are completely stubborn
why ? because they don't want to learn "the language of the fucking american imperialists" as they say

I know it's complete bullshit, the French are not aware yet that knowing how to speak English is an advantage in the European Union for exchanges, trade, and culture

thats true -- the French (especially outside of Paris) speak much less English than the Dutch, Swiss and Germans. Same seems to be the rule in Italy Ive found.

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I think there's just a culture clash between Northern Europe and Mediterranean countries in Europe.

The lifestyle is definitely different...

quote:

Originally posted by C-naptik I strongly disagree there Only people in Northern Europe know how to speak English well : almost everybody speaks fluent English in Belgium, The Netherlands and Scandinavia Countries where English is pretty well spoken : Germany, Austria, Switzerland Countries where English is almost not spoken at all : Southern Europe : France, Spain, Italy, Portugal... I think the worst would definitely be France, hehe, it's like in the USA here, people only speak one language and all French are against learning English...they suck and are completely stubborn why ? because they don't want to learn "the language of the fucking american imperialists" as they say I know it's complete bullshit, the French are not aware yet that knowing how to speak English is an advantage in the European Union for exchanges, trade, and culture

A culture clash => Fuckin' bullshit.

I'm not the kind of being told "well you know that cos' of IMPERIALISM that french do not learn english...."

It's total nonsense. Really so weird to heard something about that. Definitely stupid.( C-Naptik no personnal offence, but it's definitely not representative, it's a "cliché" )

Maybe ppl @ school have the choice of learning english or not ?

No, they don't.

Normal french, i mean, one guy that studies till high shool has learned English for 11 years and a second foreign langage for 9 years in France.

So everyone has the right to access to this culture of being able to talk or speak english.

However, YES, french ppl ain't that good as German, or Dutch and Belgium and would say they are even worse that NATIVE english. Yeah they're worse that NATIVE english.

Indeed, when you go to NL, Dutch is a mix beetween German and English and really some time sounds english. They have cos' of their merchant spirit and their small population had to make trade in english. Their langage is told nowhere else in the world, and they had to make this effort to get this first interntional langage : English. and they know it perfectly. No need to remember that even when they are goin to cinema, movies are not dubbed, but in english.

I guess this help for praticing.

Else, i'm sure that they are really and definitely the number I in the world to learn a foreign langage, they get almost German et many of them took french @ school and still have more than decent level in French.

So, yes, they are good, but their geographical situation as their small size did oblige them to be good.

Needless to precise that is prolly the same thing for belgium, with his flemmish area and the French one. and cos' it's by far the most international country of Europe, cos of institutions and financial immigration....

German are good also in learning, i had an student exchange program and yes i was astonished by their level. but at new, their langage originally came from anglosaxon countries....

And, now here comes France, Italy, and Spain, our langages are based on Latin and greek. F*****' way far different from anglosaxon one.

It's prolly the same that if i was changing the changing of alphabet for the russian one when you have always known the occidental one.

For all these countries, english is definitely different and not so easy to get, cos of this.

And more you go in the south, harder it's, cos' the langage sounds totally different, and english mixed with native culture is weaker. More you go in the south, more the word "quarter to pound' disappears as told in "Pulp fiction". You'll have "royal" et "un Royal con queso"...

May sound funny, but it's true. i went to south spain for six month and there they was some american students coming for two years to learn english for free to spanish in their church, i cant' remember which religion it was...

In Spain, they're ads everywhere with " Learn english and show you the money...." they're playing with that, ok. Southern ppl are not smart in Foreign langage, as the one from northern countries.

BUT NOW LET TALK ABOUT THE NATIVE ENGLISH SPOKEN, and let's laugh a little bit. ( I hate when i see U.S or U.K ppl saying French ppl 're bad in English, it DOES deeply IRRITATE me !!!!)

I've spend those six months among american blokes and english blokes.

Well, some of them learned french during exactly during this very same time French did English. And they talk as shit, i would even say they don't talk you cannot get a word of what they said. But yes it was nice, it's was fashionnable to say i learn french when i was @ School... LMAO.

An indeed, French is awfull to learn in my opinion, isn't it hard all this particular things, so many irregular stuff you need to remember. Oh Yes, it is, if if i takes you lot to get it, consider it takes a lot to get english too.

Well, let stop with this french "R.I.P" lying in the graveyard for years now.

They were going to Spain to learn Spanish. At last, they told me
- "you know we only have to attempt our exams..."
I ask :
- "attempt ?" "what does it mean..."
- "Well, we need to go the exams but we don't need to pass this exam."
- "We have the first langage in the world. Everyone has to learn our langage, so why should we make effort to get antoher langage. EVERYONE HAS TO KNOW OUR."

Nice said. Indeed, everyone has to know english, but be sure @ the end of the sixth month, they were even worse in Spanish and French cos they were mixing the both cos indeed in some way they're similar.

"Je mets le bolas dans la billard" i would always remember this sentence...

And they were continuing their European trip by going three months in France. As they said, "nous allons essayer d'apprendre le français" "voulez vous coucher avec moi ce soir...."

I had a great time with them and i'm still keeping in touch with some of them. But among those 15 guys, i can tell you that no one would have had the idea of saying well French really speak a bad english, cos' i would have slapped them all...

Da hell, i couldn't get the quote of C Naptik, if you wanna let foreign ppl think that French are some stupid guys lost in their French langage, do it on your own, but if you have ever talk to an american or an english, French should not be ashamed of their level in foreign langage. and it's really not a question of IMPERIALISM : We have Mac DONALD, we have Star Wars, we have Nike, We have Disneyland Paris.

So, if it's cos' of imperialism believe me we're already invaded.

This was a little message of A French guy who loves to speak in English or Spanish, who loves the melting pot, but also who is enough proud of France, not to be dis like this by another French

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Last edited by LoginZ on Mar-20-2002 at 20:10

Ok, well...
My native language is Russian, but I also speak fluent English (after living in the US for nine-ten years), French, and currently learning German.

I love languages

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Else, i never told you that before but it's a French name "Eugène" written with and accent on the "e"

I'm always impressed by ppl who learned another langage with even a different alphabet. Really amazing. As for chinese langage...

Bye

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I've seen many posts by american and english members...and they can't even write their own mother language the right way! LOL what a joke

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Schiller - Ein Schoner Tag (Kaycee Remix).. it has those 2 little periods over the "o" (..) I love this song...and just wanted to know what the title meant. Thanx!

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First of all, thanks for your long post LoginZ

I'm not exactly sure if you understood the quote i used.
Maybe it's different in the West of France where you live, but 80 % of the people living near me have a strong hatred towards everything that is American or English

I spent one year in a fucking IUT (note to people who don't live in France, an IUT is a type of french college) in Metz (with Lytchix), and believe, i got so tired and pissed off of all those people with their hatred against the US and stuff

And i heard many of them, and so many other gown-up around me, talk to me and saying that the French shouldn't learn how to speak English well like all the Northern European countries, because "they didn't want to be invaded by the American imperialism"

I didn't make this quote up, I heard it many times, and I agree with you, it's total bullshit !
And about having Mc Donalds, Star Wars and all the rest, well, that's precisely what the French around me use to complain about, because they feel invaded and don't want to be "forced" to learn English, because they think that would be a nice advantage for the countries where English is the national language.


As for the difference between latin and anglo-saxons languages, i totally agree with you. I wanted to say something about that actually in my previous post, that's what I meant about the difference between Mediterranean countries and northern ones.
It's very true that it's fucking difficult to learn English for the French (especially getting the accent) while it's relatively easy for the German or the Dutch. I wouldn't go as far as saying that it's like switching alphabets though...
You made a good point by pointing out the need for the Dutch to speak English fluently for their economy, it's also very true.


I can tell you that i know the US pretty well, my girlfriend is American and I know that the Americans are not very gifted with languages because they don't bother much trying to learn a foreign due to the hegemony of English, which could be understandable, but it's not a valid excuse either.

I remain on my position that the French don't speak English well for two reasons :
1) French coming from a latin language
2) the hatred they have against everything American/British

I really don't think you can't say that what i'm saying is wrong, I could tell you so many examples of hatred, which piss me off a lot...
And how many times do french comp geeks complain on message boards that they suck at speaking English ?

What I'm trying to show to foreign people while I'm online is that France is not as bright as they think it is ("Ohhh...France is such a beautiful country, people are so lovely, I'd love to live there") and that it's full of people with prejudices and shit, like any other country.
Maybe it's good for you that you're proud of France, but it's true that i don't give a fuck about nationalistic pride, I don't consider myself being French, neither American or whatever else. I just hate any nationalistic and patriotic shows, I hate flags and national anthems, because all that shit, to me, tends to deepen the difference between people on Earth and to generate hatred.
Shouldn't we just try to accept other cultures and not "showing ourselves off" by being part of a specific kind of people?
To me being proud of being a citizen of a country is just a burden.
That's just my view I guess...


I'd like to clear up some more points from your post right now, but I don't have time
Just wanted to tell you thats it's great that you had this experience with these American and British guys

This thread shouldn't belong to the Music Discussion forum anymore btw

Glad to see that we're agree on many points but now i've never suffered from ppl saying to me well "halloween, this is a total bullshit" "we're invaded by americans."

I'm not nationalist. But i find many times that english spoken are easy to criticize our capacity to speak foreign langage when most of them don't give even give a piece of effort to learn another one.

And this will always pissed me off.

Else, yep, i'm French cos' of this i'm really different in my way of the thinking and culture than an American or a Dutch or an English. I don't even know if it's good or not. But when you travel, as you did, you can notice that we're definitely not european citizens, either citizen of the world, yeah we live in the world, but we are deeply tagged by our native nation.

We just get open minded in travelling and i love that.

So i feel really sorry if you had such bad experience with your friends @ school, but yep in paris as in the western part of France, ppl are glad to speak english and are not opposite to the anglosaxon culture @ all.

Maybe you're living too near from germany, maybe the first foreign langage their is german. Here, it's still English.

And yep, I do prefer to give ppl a whole vision of the situation cos really here no one is against English and everyone has an enough good english to get it red, talked, not to understand from another english spoken ppl as American or English. But the level is not bad at all.

Ppl will make their opionion from this posts, the truth should be in the average as usual.

Cya'

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