Honestly how amazing is it that we have fluent English?

Permabear

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Omackeral

Permabear wrote: »

This post had been deleted.

You're missing the OP's point that we're lucky to have it as our first language and that the rest of the world pretty much accommodates it. Paddy goes to Spain on holidays, he'll be speaking English. He goes to France for Euro 2016 or Amsterdam for a weekend, it'll be English all the way. If people from those countries come to Ireland, we're not gonna be speaking Spanish,French or Dutch for them. The point is moreso that we're lucky to have English rather than it's amazing.

Permabear

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Duffy the Vampire Slayer

Sam Kade wrote: »

Maybe because of the fact that English is the most difficult language to learn and the op is elated about being able to speak it. Spanish is the easiest to learn by all accounts, I might try it sometime

In many ways English is very easy. It's definitely not the most difficult.

Spanish is easy in some ways but the huge amount of conjugation is quite difficult at the start.

Chuchote

take everything wrote: »

Yeah my French teacher reminds us that we will never sound like the real thing. Maybe close but never like a real French person. Apparently, unless you're speaking it before 7, this will be the case.

I don't think this is true. Here's Gerard Hoffnung, who moved from Germany to England at the age of fourteen:

BabyE

Permabear wrote: »

This post had been deleted.

What? Its fairly obvious that's what I meant, and if it was lost in op, my subsequent posts clearly show I was talking about how good it is we speak english. Poor comprehension skills man, I think you are seeing what you want to see. Logically speaking as well, it would just be logical to infer I meant how much of an advantage it is that we speak it fluently. Seems a lot of people here lack perspective, probably haven't spoke to any non native speakers in their life.

Froshtbit

LordSutch wrote: »

Just leaving Irish peoples language aside for moment, there are plenty of English people who also have issues with their 1st language!

It's now commonplace on the BBC to hear such grammar as "I am stood here ...." or "I was sat over there" We was sat in the cinema! The standard of English in England has really dropped in recent years.

To be fair, you could make the argument that they were using the transitive, passive versions of those verbs as a colloquialism. Not entirely correct but not the worst either. The active way of writing would be 'I stand myself here'.

Or maybe they're using them as the adjective form of the verb instead. Similar to: 'He's gone' which can be written as 'He has gone' or 'He is gone' without much change in meaning.

Thinking about it, it's likely the latter rather than the former, 'stand' is not a tative verb and so it would have to be 'I have been stood here' or 'I am being stood here'.

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

BabyE wrote: »

What? Its fairly obvious that's what I meant, and if it was lost in op, my subsequent posts clearly show I was talking about how good it is we speak english. Poor comprehension skills man, I think you are seeing what you want to see. Logically speaking as well, it would just be logical to infer I meant how much of an advantage it is that we speak it fluently. Seems a lot of people here lack perspective, probably haven't spoke to any non native speakers in their life.

I think it was more the manner in which you expressed yourself in the OP. It's not 'amazing' in the slightest. It certainly is advantageous however.

As for fluency, well, some of the grammar in the quote above would question that assertion.

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

take everything wrote: »

Yeah my French teacher reminds us that we will never sound like the real thing. Maybe close but never like a real French person. Apparently, unless you're speaking it before 7, this will be the case.

Not so at all. My daughter is often mistaken for a native French speaker, by French people, and she started the language at secondary school. A friend took up Germany after college and is, likewise, considered to sound like a native German speaker. It depends on your aptitude for the language and your immersion in it.

Galwayguy35

Hugh Mungus wrote: »

Spend half an hour on Facebook and then tell me that the Irish people are fluent in English.

Half the population it seems can't spell words like "this" and "that"... Instead you get "dis nd dat"

Honestly if you're one of those people who spells "and" as "nd" I sincerely hope you die of a flesh eating disease...slowly.

+1

It's gas reading the comments when some scumbag is sent to prison or is up in court for something, all the illiterate friends come on the defend them.

riclad

Some people have a small vocabulary ,its not amazing we speak english ,ireland .We can all speak english , whether we are all fluent is debatable .
was ruled by the uk.The irish people decided it was better to speak english,many moved to the us and the uk.If you wanted a good job, and not to work on a farm it was important to be able to speak english.
All rich and middle class spoke english in the 1800,s .
Just speaking irish limited your chance of work or of a a good social life.
Imagine a teen in 2016 who cant use a smartphone, install apps, send email ,use a pc.,use a web browser ,every business is online .
This teen would find it hard to get a job or get info on college courses ,
vacancys ,and would be at a disadvantage with other people .
Most jobs are advertised online .
So in 1800 anyone who just spoke irish would have limited choice,s in regard
to getting a job.
And of course the government spends millions every year on signs
and translating documents into irish in case theres one person out there
who can,t read english .

myshirt

There is no bigger compliment you can pay your enemy than to speak their language.

Yes I realise the irony here, but there you go.

riclad

millions of irish emigrated ,speaking english helped them to work in the usa
or other countrys .America speaks english , america has always been an irish ally and made it easy for the irish to go there and work .
At least before the 80s, when they got more strict on green cards ,work permits.

It's great that we have English fluency but sad that the majority of us don't have our own first language. My standard of Irish would probably be above average but nowhere near fluency.

Look at Denmark, The Netherlands, Iceland, Sweden etc. - all countries that have a very high level of English fluency but who still have their own native language (and sometimes a third or fourth on top of that). Imo, in an ideal world, Ireland would be on a similar level with all Irish people being bilingual in Irish and English, and most people further having a good working knowledge of a third language.

myshirt

^^^^^^

That's because the language was beat into us here. Better minds will be able to explain what the issues are, but the teaching of the language is done in too wooden and archaic a format for me.

Canard

As a language fan and English teacher, I have a lot of thoughts on this topic! Ignoring the pedantry of taking the word amazing too literally, I have to agree with the OP.

Spanish, as mentioned earlier, has a ton of verb conjugations which are indeed difficult at the beginning. It's why Spanish people (and speakers of many other languages) love to brag about how 'easy' English is. But how many Spanish people speak English really fluently? Very few. By contrast, Scandinavian languages are almost less complex in terms of conjugation than English. While the language education system in Spain leaves an awful lot to be desired (not unlike our own), a huge difference is that while Spanish has more verb forms, it has a huge lack of nuance in its words. The same word in English (or many other languages) can be expressed with just one word in Spanish, which isn't a good or bad thing inherently, but does mean they'll have a lot of trouble with slightly different words like acknowledge, recognise and admit, for example.

I used to wish my first language wasn't English purely due to how much material there is out there for learning it. These days I'm glad it's my first - the majority of material for learning other languages (especially less common ones) is in English. Also, to give an example from my experience teaching it, the smallest things that we would never think of can pose problems because of the connotations. One of my students used the phrase "in progress" to rephrase a text discussing something that was "underway", which focuses a lot more on the process and lack of completion than the success of the beginning of the project.

As for never reaching native standards, that is more or less true too. I've worked with foreign people with incredible English and even very accurate Irish accents, but they do slip up from time to time. That said, some of my colleagues aren't native speakers, but you'd never realise it unless you listened to them very, very closely. It takes much more work when you're not a child and you won't really have the same intuition as a native speaker, but it's definitely not as impossible as people make it out to be if you're dedicated and have the right supports.

So in short, English is nowhere near as easy as people make it out to be as despite its simple structure, we can manipulate it in ways that other languages can't (e.g. "to google" vs "googlear" or something in Spanish, where you can clearly recognise a verb from a noun). I don't know how we'd fare if we spoke Irish natively... it would depend on the immersion from abroad, but I do think we'd be very good at it given our proximity and the fact that it'd be a choice between adapting to it or dubbing it all into Irish.

Chuchote

Incidentally, Gaeilge is the new craze with language learners worldwide who use the Duolingo app and website; over 2.3 million people have signed up to learn Irish using it. Had a quick run through the level-test lesson and it seems to be Munster Irish it's teaching (ag cur fearthainne rather than ag cur báisteach or ag fliuchadh).

NikoTopps

I was born in Russia so I speak Russian first then when I emigrated here I was sent to a 'good' school which happened to be a Gaelscoil so I learnt Irish then before English. My boyfriend is Greek so I've been learning that for a while now too. Languages are a great thing!

Professor Moriarty

Chuchote wrote: »

Incidentally, Gaeilge is the new craze with language learners worldwide who use the Duolingo app and website; over 2.3 million people have signed up to learn Irish using it. Had a quick run through the level-test lesson and it seems to be Munster Irish it's teaching (ag cur fearthainne rather than ag cur báisteach or ag fliuchadh).

Ag cur báiste is what I was taught in Cork (or sometimes ag cur fearthainne).

yo soy carlos

BabyE wrote: »

It's unreal tbh, while in some sense Id like if we spoke Irish, the fact that we are fluent at English is amazing.
God bless the Anglosphere seriously, anyone who has lived on European mainland knows we are about as European as kangaroos, it's weird that we can feel way more at home in a place thousands of miles away than we would in a European city a couple of hours away by flight.

Speak for yourself.I love Europe but hate the Anglosphere as you call it.Was your grandad a peeler or did he fall in Flanders?

yo soy carlos

Canard wrote: »

As a language fan and English teacher, I have a lot of thoughts on this topic! Ignoring the pedantry of taking the word amazing too literally, I have to agree with the OP.

Spanish, as mentioned earlier, has a ton of verb conjugations which are indeed difficult at the beginning. It's why Spanish people (and speakers of many other languages) love to brag about how 'easy' English is. But how many Spanish people speak English really fluently? Very few.
h.[/q
The reasons Anglo speakers and Hispanics are so poor at foreign languages has little do with grammar.
Reality
Spanish 500 million native speakers plus another 200 million who speak a good level.
English 350 million native speakers plus another 700 million who speak a good level.
They don't need to learn other languages with the same diligence as a Swede in English terms or a Brazilian for Spanish.

murpho999

I do think speaking English is an advantage to this country but as someone with has lived abroad and has foreign family I do feel we have lost some national identity by not being native Irish speakers as the vast majority of people I meet from abroad think I am British not Irish and they do not hear a different accent or recognise a cultural difference between the two countries.

Iwasfrozen

Deleted User wrote: »

It's great that we have English fluency but sad that the majority of us don't have our own first language. My standard of Irish would probably be above average but nowhere near fluency.

Look at Denmark, The Netherlands, Iceland, Sweden etc. - all countries that have a very high level of English fluency but who still have their own native language (and sometimes a third or fourth on top of that). Imo, in an ideal world, Ireland would be on a similar level with all Irish people being bilingual in Irish and English, and most people further having a good working knowledge of a third language.

All that is ignoring how terrible of a language Irish can be

Iwasfrozen

Deleted User wrote: »

It's great that we have English fluency but sad that the majority of us don't have our own first language. My standard of Irish would probably be above average but nowhere near fluency.

Look at Denmark, The Netherlands, Iceland, Sweden etc. - all countries that have a very high level of English fluency but who still have their own native language (and sometimes a third or fourth on top of that). Imo, in an ideal world, Ireland would be on a similar level with all Irish people being bilingual in Irish and English, and most people further having a good working knowledge of a third language.

All that is ignoring how terrible of a language Irish can be for example.

A leabhar - his book.
A leabhar - her book.
A leabhar - their book.

Uhm, wut?

Also since the distinction between the broad and slender r has been lost among non native speakers. Leabhar and leabhair sound like homophones.

So his book, her book, their book, his books, her books and their books all sound identical...

Great language altogether. No wonder the revival died. :rolleyes:

Iwasfrozen

yo soy carlos wrote: »

BabyE wrote: »

It's unreal tbh, while in some sense Id like if we spoke Irish, the fact that we are fluent at English is amazing.
God bless the Anglosphere seriously, anyone who has lived on European mainland knows we are about as European as kangaroos, it's weird that we can feel way more at home in a place thousands of miles away than we would in a European city a couple of hours away by flight.

Speak for yourself.I love Europe but hate the Anglosphere as you call it.Was your grandad a peeler or did he fall in Flanders?

You hate your own country? An odd position but OK.

Shenshen

murpho999 wrote: »

I do think speaking English is an advantage to this country but as someone with has lived abroad and has foreign family I do feel we have lost some national identity by not being native Irish speakers as the vast majority of people I meet from abroad think I am British not Irish and they do not hear a different accent or recognise a cultural difference between the two countries.

I have to ask, would you immediately recognise a cultural difference between Germany and Austria? Most people don't even see a difference between Spain and Portugal in my experience.
People never see the small next to the big, their minds tend not to work that way.

Faith+1

Shenshen wrote: »

I have to ask, would you immediately recognise a cultural difference between Germany and Austria? Most people don't even see a difference between Spain and Portugal in my experience.
People never see the small next to the big, their minds tend not to work that way.

Very true.

Irish / British
American /Canadian
Australian / New Zealander
Ukrainian / Russian
Polish / All of Eastern Europe

Omackeral

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

All that is ignoring how terrible of a language Irish can be for example.

A leabhar - his book.
A leabhar - her book.
A leabhar - their book.

Uhm, wut?

What about this;

Through [Troo]
Rough [Ruff]
Bough [Bow]

Chuchote

yo soy carlos wrote: »

Speak for yourself.I love Europe but hate the Anglosphere as you call it.Was your grandad a peeler or did he fall in Flanders?

Don't know about the person you're addressing, but two of my great-uncles fought in Flanders and my grandfather and another great-uncle fought in the Rising. None of which makes me hate Ireland, or Britain either.

Why do people swell up with venom and spite (on either side) when we start talking about Irish? Cén fáth é? Cén fiú é?

Canard

yo soy carlos wrote: »

The reasons Anglo speakers and Hispanics are so poor at foreign languages has little do with grammar.
Reality
Spanish 500 million native speakers plus another 200 million who speak a good level.
English 350 million native speakers plus another 700 million who speak a good level.
They don't need to learn other languages with the same diligence as a Swede in English terms or a Brazilian for Spanish.

True, but I was referring more to the fact that Spain is full of English academies no matter where you go and it's a very popular choice of degree, and yet not that many of them actually manage to get a good level in it, much less in other languages. I found German to be very problematic for Spanish people when I was there.

On the other hand, people from Latin America, who have arguably even less reason to learn English given their location, seem to speak it a lot more fluently. They tend to have bilingual schools with many (but not only) native teachers, whereas Spain's are almost invariably Spanish, hence the gap in level I suppose.