Speak English but don't limit yourself

 

"Speak English, you're in America," my brother growled at me. I'd been chatting with our French waiter in French.

Now the Orange Wonder has declared English the official language of America. Although I can't guarantee his motives, I suspect it is another attempt to boost the white male and put down foreigners. 

The attitude of many Americans who look down on anyone not fluent in English is at best sad and at worst ignorant.

I do think, however, a person living a long time in another country, should try to be as least functional in the main language. At the same time, I believe being bi or multi-lingual is something wonderful. 

When I lived in Germany, I brought my German up to a functional level until I was able to do a directed study in Faustus by Schiller comparing it to Marlowe's my senior year of university. My German has now slipped to shopping level because I need to use it only occasionally.

In my first Swiss job, my clients included Digital Equipment and HP. They worked in English. My boss maintained at 48 I was too old to learn French, but still paid for lessons. He later admitted he was wrong.

To become a naturalized Swiss citizen I needed French (or any of the official languages).  

Switzerland has about nine million people and four official languages: German, French, Italian and Romanash spoken by only 13,000 people and even among those there are various dialects. Many citizens also are fluent in English.

Geneva which is 43% foreign is an ocean of languages. My company there had over 50 nationalities among 90 employees with English/French/Russian the official languages. Meetings were either in French or English. Product labels are in three of the four languages. I guess there wasn't room for Romanash.

For 14 years I dated a Swiss businessman and we communicated in French. When my daughter was with us, they spoke German as she and I spoke English. His son and daughter-in-law would often speak Spanish although they were fluent in English as well as French.

On extended visits to Syria, although my host family-of-choice was fluent in English. Outside the home, except for a few polite words in Arabic, my French worked well if English didn't. Once when both failed, I was able to get a new battery for my watch using my German. At least I think I did because the watch worked again.

I had to go to Bern for my radiation treatment after surgery and chemo, which I did in French. I was nervous about communicating in Swiss German. No need. He started out in French and switched to English one sentence into my French. I've a sucky accent. He spoke seven languages fluently, four others functionally and understood about three more limitedly. 

My daughter took German when I wanted her to take French, a more than acceptable teenage rebellion. Boston Latin required five years of a modern language along with Latin. It worked well. She did a gap year attending a Gymnasium (high school) in Munich. She did most of her university in Mannheim at the cost of about $43 a semester. That alone is a good reason to be bilingual compared to U.S. university . costs. Think how much could be saved on a kid's education by sending them abroad. Plus they would not be burdened with debt upon graduation.

So why does the English Official Language decree annoy me? Or comments made by people like my brother?

Because limitations of language are limitations to entrance to the world. It's impossible to know all 7,100 living languages estimated to exist on our planet. But knowing the main ones in times when world peace is threatened, means one can cross check a politician with information from a less-biased press. It is one thing to have a U.S. news source say that Macron said this or that, only to hear the original to see it was wrong. If you can't speak Russian, fact-checking Putin by listening to what the Germans, French and Spaniards are saying about what he said could be important, especially if the U.S. press did cover the story accurately. 

It is harder to hate a foreigner if you can share a conversation maybe about a good meal, a sport, or directions when you're lost. 

English as an official language. Dumb idea if it reduces the already too low use of other languages by the U.S. population.

There's also a cultural benefit to knowing another language in terms of reading material, arts, history, etc.

If the U.S. wants foreigners to integrate limiting information to English is the best way to discourage such integration. If they want foreigners to obey the law, the law written in their own language makes following it easier which could affect the safety of everyone.

Under the edict will information that is important now be printed only in English? I hope not. The multi-language postings is also a good exposure to other languages for English-only speakers.