Does anyone who speaks more than one language, or is social with people who know more than one language, actually think that your first language is just stuck in there?
I know the stereotype of people from the USA is that they only speak one language, but they should at least know someone who’s first language isn’t English, right? Or do most only socialize with people who are very similar to them?
The vast majority of my social circle is bilingual, with French being the language they spoke at home growing up and English because it’s the more common language in my area.
I know plenty of people who have moved to quasi-exclusively anglophone areas, working jobs in English, who have found themselves surprised to start losing their French. The idea can seem absurd when you’re in a situation where you get to speak your first language on a regular basis.
The article is really mainly about how language ties in to identity, and IMO was a really interesting read. This is something monolingual anglophones can sometimes have a bit of a blind spot for; when your language is so dominant, it can be hard to see how it’s intertwined with culture and identity. Many people I’ve talked to, even if mostly sympathetic, have struggled with the idea of French being important to my sense of self. Language can be just seen as a tool when you speak the “default” language of an area. I’ve been asked “Why do you bother keeping French alive here? Wouldn’t it just be easier for everyone if we’d do everything in English?” Note, plenty of francophones in the 1940s and '50s did switch to English out of social pressure, shaming, prejudices, economic prospects, not bothering to teach their kids French. I know so many unilingual anglophones with French last names who can’t have a full conversation with their grandparents because neither of them can fully speak the other’s language.
Sorry if that became a bit of a ramble, but the stuff the article explores is very interesting and very relevant to my experience as a member of a linguistic minority. I mostly wanted to clarify to anyone reading your comment that it pertains more to the headline than the content of the article.
I’m natively German but nowadays I consume almost everything in English and barely ever speak German, which causes me to slowly forget my native language. I can feel my vocabulary getting more and more limited and I often have to think hard for certain words that I know immediately in English. So yeah, if you don’t use a language, native or otherwise, then you’ll slowly unlearn it over time. Shouldn’t be too surprising, it’s like this with a lot of mentally related skills, like math for example. I couldn’t do most of the shit I’ve learnt in school at some point because I never really had a use for it and consequently forgot all about it.
Does anyone who speaks more than one language, or is social with people who know more than one language, actually think that your first language is just stuck in there?
I know the stereotype of people from the USA is that they only speak one language, but they should at least know someone who’s first language isn’t English, right? Or do most only socialize with people who are very similar to them?
The vast majority of my social circle is bilingual, with French being the language they spoke at home growing up and English because it’s the more common language in my area.
I know plenty of people who have moved to quasi-exclusively anglophone areas, working jobs in English, who have found themselves surprised to start losing their French. The idea can seem absurd when you’re in a situation where you get to speak your first language on a regular basis.
The article is really mainly about how language ties in to identity, and IMO was a really interesting read. This is something monolingual anglophones can sometimes have a bit of a blind spot for; when your language is so dominant, it can be hard to see how it’s intertwined with culture and identity. Many people I’ve talked to, even if mostly sympathetic, have struggled with the idea of French being important to my sense of self. Language can be just seen as a tool when you speak the “default” language of an area. I’ve been asked “Why do you bother keeping French alive here? Wouldn’t it just be easier for everyone if we’d do everything in English?” Note, plenty of francophones in the 1940s and '50s did switch to English out of social pressure, shaming, prejudices, economic prospects, not bothering to teach their kids French. I know so many unilingual anglophones with French last names who can’t have a full conversation with their grandparents because neither of them can fully speak the other’s language.
Sorry if that became a bit of a ramble, but the stuff the article explores is very interesting and very relevant to my experience as a member of a linguistic minority. I mostly wanted to clarify to anyone reading your comment that it pertains more to the headline than the content of the article.
I’m natively German but nowadays I consume almost everything in English and barely ever speak German, which causes me to slowly forget my native language. I can feel my vocabulary getting more and more limited and I often have to think hard for certain words that I know immediately in English. So yeah, if you don’t use a language, native or otherwise, then you’ll slowly unlearn it over time. Shouldn’t be too surprising, it’s like this with a lot of mentally related skills, like math for example. I couldn’t do most of the shit I’ve learnt in school at some point because I never really had a use for it and consequently forgot all about it.