No need to speak more than 1 language if you already know the official global business language.
In Sweden we get the option to learn german, french or spanish as a third language in school at a young age. I know i’ve heard other countries are like that too. I don’t why we’re higher but i suspect it has to do with our pitches in our language which allows us to adapt quickly.
As usual with these things, there are two key factors:
– defining what speaking means
– considering who is evaluating the language knowledge
I know a few Italians who say they “speak” English because they studied it at school, and they can read basic instructions, but they couldn’t speak if their life depended on it
I can never use my Romanian because everybody will always respond “I can speak English.” 🙁 I guess I am around younger people compared to older, but still.
I clicked those arrows, twice!
People in the UK obviously feel less pressure to learn other languages. Most of the people who know another language in those other countries probably also speak English (and maybe other languages).
I suppose it’s more worrisome (for them) that most people in the other low-percentage countries don’t speak English or any other language. Your options are somewhat limited if you speak *only* Romanian.
Ok… what does it mean “speaking another language”? At what level? Can that person speak fluently or they only know how to order a coffee?
Because i call BS on the hungarian percentage. Not even here in Budapest can half of the adults speak another language on an adequate level.
That’s also a reminder of which countries are the most vulnerable to fake news / disinformation. The greater the number of those who cannot be reached by foreign or international news sources, the more vulnerable they are in the case of a regime which controls the media in the country. That’s what exactly happening now in Hungary and it could happen any time in eg. Romania or Bulgaria.
What is “speaking” in this context? The title is in present tense. I’m Swedish. Does my 67-year-old dad giving directions to German tourists in broken English from both parties once a year count as an English “speaker”?
France, no way.
2016…
Fake, in Serbia, Croatia etc 100% of adults speak even more than two languages – Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian….
Hmmm I know it’s anecdotal evidence but when I visited Romania few years back everybody spoke English and was very helpful. And I didn’t go to the biggest cities
We should be teaching languages from age 4 , it is much easier to learn at that young age. Even if its just conversational.
I lived in Holland and was always impressed when school kids could switch from Dutch to English without skipping a beat.
We are far to comfy with speaking ‘International ‘ English.
The world is much smaller now
Discounting English (which pretty much everyone here speaks), Swedish and Norwegian (which unless Nynorsk or heavy dialect is very interchangeable and easy to understand as a Danish speaker) I speak German reasonably well, but due to neglect my vocabulary “on tap” is bad when having a conversation.
Then I used to speak Spanish and a little tiny wee bit of Italian which means I can kinda make my way around Spain, France and Italy, the two latter at least read instructions and in Spanish have some awkward very long conversations with little content because it’s not been spoken properly since 1999.
UK: why do we need to learn more than one language, after all, we are the Brith empire. Right
Knowing a language isn’t a binary variable.
I can probably write in English at a quite decent level, elaborating even sophisticated social or scientific topics (of course not without some silly mistakes at times, but nobody’s perfect).
But can I hold a fluent conversation with a native speaker for several minutes? No chance, this is a big struggle and a different set of abilities (in my case – definitely underdeveloped). In fact, I’m not even good enough at conversations in my mother tongue.
Do I “speak English”? Probably I do, but my level of linguistic competence seems to be inconsistent and thus hard to assess.
50% is way too high for Ireland, a lot of Irish people say they can speak Irish/French/German on the census because they learned it in school but if they really needed to have a conversation they wouldn’t stand a chance. Of all the Irish people I know I’d say less than 10% are fully bilingual, really don’t see how it could be even close to 50%
A massive reason for Brexit. The brits do not have the ability to consume media from other countries so they are completely at the mercy of their own media. That is why they are so insular
I’d love to see this percentage if English was removed as a language
How is Ireland at 50% when Irish is compulsory to learn? Every person who graduates secondary level in Ireland has 12 years of Irish under their belt.
there is no way netherlands and austria are so close and austria being on top…
My parents weren’t allowed to study English because it was considered an enemy language and it was only reserved for the communists and their lapdogs
LOL for UK, WIN for north europe
I think its unfair to compare countries like Spain that have multiple native languages with UK for example, but sure, go ahead.
USA don’t appear in this list because they barely speak one language
I can guarantee that Italy’s percentage it’s utter bullshit.
I’m British and I do speak more than one language, but there’s no way one in three of us do. Almost all of the people I know here who speak other languages properly are (a) second-language English speakers or (b) language nerds.
Kinda makes sense for the UK
Endonesians: “Hold my 6 language!”
Bosnian education is as challenged like any other in the Balkans, but I refuse to believe we’re behind Serbia or Croatia at all when it comes to foreign languages.
I spent way too much time trying to click the arrows and wondering why isn’t the picture changing
33 comments
[deleted]
No need to speak more than 1 language if you already know the official global business language.
In Sweden we get the option to learn german, french or spanish as a third language in school at a young age. I know i’ve heard other countries are like that too. I don’t why we’re higher but i suspect it has to do with our pitches in our language which allows us to adapt quickly.
As usual with these things, there are two key factors:
– defining what speaking means
– considering who is evaluating the language knowledge
I know a few Italians who say they “speak” English because they studied it at school, and they can read basic instructions, but they couldn’t speak if their life depended on it
I can never use my Romanian because everybody will always respond “I can speak English.” 🙁 I guess I am around younger people compared to older, but still.
I clicked those arrows, twice!
People in the UK obviously feel less pressure to learn other languages. Most of the people who know another language in those other countries probably also speak English (and maybe other languages).
I suppose it’s more worrisome (for them) that most people in the other low-percentage countries don’t speak English or any other language. Your options are somewhat limited if you speak *only* Romanian.
Ok… what does it mean “speaking another language”? At what level? Can that person speak fluently or they only know how to order a coffee?
Because i call BS on the hungarian percentage. Not even here in Budapest can half of the adults speak another language on an adequate level.
That’s also a reminder of which countries are the most vulnerable to fake news / disinformation. The greater the number of those who cannot be reached by foreign or international news sources, the more vulnerable they are in the case of a regime which controls the media in the country. That’s what exactly happening now in Hungary and it could happen any time in eg. Romania or Bulgaria.
What is “speaking” in this context? The title is in present tense. I’m Swedish. Does my 67-year-old dad giving directions to German tourists in broken English from both parties once a year count as an English “speaker”?
France, no way.
2016…
Fake, in Serbia, Croatia etc 100% of adults speak even more than two languages – Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian….
Hmmm I know it’s anecdotal evidence but when I visited Romania few years back everybody spoke English and was very helpful. And I didn’t go to the biggest cities
We should be teaching languages from age 4 , it is much easier to learn at that young age. Even if its just conversational.
I lived in Holland and was always impressed when school kids could switch from Dutch to English without skipping a beat.
We are far to comfy with speaking ‘International ‘ English.
The world is much smaller now
Discounting English (which pretty much everyone here speaks), Swedish and Norwegian (which unless Nynorsk or heavy dialect is very interchangeable and easy to understand as a Danish speaker) I speak German reasonably well, but due to neglect my vocabulary “on tap” is bad when having a conversation.
Then I used to speak Spanish and a little tiny wee bit of Italian which means I can kinda make my way around Spain, France and Italy, the two latter at least read instructions and in Spanish have some awkward very long conversations with little content because it’s not been spoken properly since 1999.
UK: why do we need to learn more than one language, after all, we are the Brith empire. Right
Knowing a language isn’t a binary variable.
I can probably write in English at a quite decent level, elaborating even sophisticated social or scientific topics (of course not without some silly mistakes at times, but nobody’s perfect).
But can I hold a fluent conversation with a native speaker for several minutes? No chance, this is a big struggle and a different set of abilities (in my case – definitely underdeveloped). In fact, I’m not even good enough at conversations in my mother tongue.
Do I “speak English”? Probably I do, but my level of linguistic competence seems to be inconsistent and thus hard to assess.
50% is way too high for Ireland, a lot of Irish people say they can speak Irish/French/German on the census because they learned it in school but if they really needed to have a conversation they wouldn’t stand a chance. Of all the Irish people I know I’d say less than 10% are fully bilingual, really don’t see how it could be even close to 50%
A massive reason for Brexit. The brits do not have the ability to consume media from other countries so they are completely at the mercy of their own media. That is why they are so insular
I’d love to see this percentage if English was removed as a language
How is Ireland at 50% when Irish is compulsory to learn? Every person who graduates secondary level in Ireland has 12 years of Irish under their belt.
there is no way netherlands and austria are so close and austria being on top…
My parents weren’t allowed to study English because it was considered an enemy language and it was only reserved for the communists and their lapdogs
LOL for UK, WIN for north europe
I think its unfair to compare countries like Spain that have multiple native languages with UK for example, but sure, go ahead.
USA don’t appear in this list because they barely speak one language
I can guarantee that Italy’s percentage it’s utter bullshit.
I’m British and I do speak more than one language, but there’s no way one in three of us do. Almost all of the people I know here who speak other languages properly are (a) second-language English speakers or (b) language nerds.
Kinda makes sense for the UK
Endonesians: “Hold my 6 language!”
Bosnian education is as challenged like any other in the Balkans, but I refuse to believe we’re behind Serbia or Croatia at all when it comes to foreign languages.
I spent way too much time trying to click the arrows and wondering why isn’t the picture changing