If you don't use patois pronunciation here people don't understand at all, so a few words can be useful Carol.
Ha-ha, if the burgers are made with Irish meat then there really is something for the Anglais to hold their noses up about ;-)
There's a report in the papers today about the effects of eating hamburgers on the health- mental health included!
I have a confession to make - I did this once! I was working in McDonald's and I always used to speak English to the English customers except once.... This horrible woman came storming to my till, no "Bonjour" or "Hello" and just said in a really pissed off tone of voice "I want 2 Big Mac menus!" I completely understand how difficult it is to learn a language and if she had of come in with a smile on her face or said "Hello" or at least tried to speak French I would have spoken English, but her attitude frankly annoyed me so much much that I thought "OK, but I'm going to make you work for it!" The woman didn't know I was English as I speak French fluently, but my boss did and told me afterwards that although he saw my point of view I could have of made the effort, he walked off laughing when I said I would speak English to anyone and everyone he wanted me to if he paid me the interpretation fee that went with it!
Having said this I think you are right, whenever possible I always try and use the language that most of the group of people I'm with understand whether that language is English or French and if there is someone who doesn't understand I translate. What I really don't like is when people don't make the effort at all to speak French and they have lived here for years but I think anyone who tries should really be encouraged. I would just ignore the woman she's not worth losing sleep over and she's probably got some kind of "issues".
Like you I have come across the same phenomena once or twice (or more ...)
I think the most bizarre occasion was when I was amongst a group of English ladies - there weren't ANY French present - and yet this one lady insisted on continuing in French! I didn't have a problem as I (luckily) speak reasonably good French - but for some of the other ladies there she might as well have been speaking in Double Dutch!
There have also been times when I have spoken in French, and been replied to in atrocious English (by somebody French) and I find that a real dilemma! Do I continue to "murder" their language? Or do I let them "murder" English? I never know the right thing to do in those circumstances!
I think I would "challenge" her on it - though not in a confrontational way ... if that makes any sense at all. Take the route suggested previously of complimenting her French, asking where she learnt etc, and also asking her (perhaps in French so that anybody else present will understand) if you could talk in English as you find it so much easier!
Then perhaps you will have the opportunity to explain to her that you are not being lazy, that you have spent 10 years trying to learn the language - but that you still find English more comfortable and comprehensible! Or perhaps just take your business elsewhere - it depends on how feasible that is!
Good luck! :-)
Bless you for the suggestion but I am now at the stage where I have come to the conclusion that I find out what I need to know (and the French for it). I do not need it for my job, far from it in fact although I now understand very much more written French than before I started my job, and am not bothered about socialising - in fact I find it gets in the way of things I want to do. I am perhaps something of a recluse but it is by choice now to a great extent. I speak to my French neighbour when I see her but I do not want to become part of the village any more and I am no longer interested in people in the village. I exchange polite pleasantries but that is all and would rather stay in - perhaps you only learn if you really want to in some cases and I certainly do not expect people to speak to me in English if French is their natural tongue.
The real problem is that many English want to live in France but just make excuses as to why they don’t try to speak any French (too old, too difficult etc), but then they complain about immigrants in the UK who can’t speak English.
Who said that Americans speak English? Their language is English based but not English!
I agree Glen MIchel Thomas is excellent, I used it and recommend it to everyone.
Glen,
It may well be snobbery on the the part that English lady, or it could be something else. If like I, she learned French the hard way. Which is to say, in a French working environment and knowing very few English speakers, She understands that the best way learn is by total immersion in the language.
She may actually be doing you a favour, weather she intends to or not. And quite honestly, after ten years you really should have a decent grasp of the language by now. I'm guessing that you live amongst other brits and spend most of your time in their company. I suggest that you are simply being subjected to the same "racist" rhetoric endured by any minority in a foreign country. i.e "they come to our country, take our housing and wont even learn the language" Most brits who've benn here long enough to learn the language, consider France their country now.
So dont worry it's not snobbery, just a little harmless racism. Hope this makes you feel better.
Mark.
I find it incredible that your fellow countryman refuses to speak to you in English.
Top marks for giving French your best shot, and hang on in there, but as a language teacher, I know some people have an "ear" and others don't.........
Take your custom elsewhere-I am sure a Frenchman would be more than pleased for you to speak to him with whatever French you have...............
I would make one comment: I believe everyone should have a "go" at learning the language -sadly, at the other end of the spectrum of the language "snobs" you describe, are those who make little or no effort to speak French.
When in Rome..............................
Exactly Carol, everywhere indeed.
I have been here for 7 years and fear more the catty comments of those English who speak French very well as I do not. Therefore I do not go out and mix with people any more as I find it so disheartening. I have joined a group and when I am not busy working for a living (AE) I go and sit and listen to the ladies speaking French and try to join in but I find it gives me the most awful headache as I am concentrating so hard, I tried to catch the occasional word and just guess the rest of the conversation and nearly ended up singing at a forthcoming wedding on one occasion. So I stay in and work and go out when I feel like it which is not often. You see I can speak some French but do not understand the answers given and I am afraid that it will make me appear rude if I do not respond with more than a "shit I did not understand shrug".
I don't know the set up of the language workshop referred but it would depend on what the stated aim of the group was. The one in our area never had any claims for "teaching" any languages but sometimes the extreme differences in capabilty made discussions difficult. At the end of the day these local groups often throw different types together and there's no reason to suppose that they would naturally get on together elsewhere. We saw lots of quite unpleasant rumourmongering and backstabbing but thankfully it was a passing phase. Often it's easier to get on in a group where one is the only expat or very much in the minority. Mind you one often saw unpleasantness in groups in the UK too! Maybe it's a national trait.
Language snobbery has many forms. The one that annoys me the most is as follows: Soon after arriving in France I found an affordable language "workshop" which I though would be good for both learning the lingo and meeting people, both French and British. I soon discovered there were two or three English who were very good at French and would strive to dominate all the conversations with the French. No one else got a look in. It seems like maybe they were playing the "big fish in a small pond" game. Their language skills gave them the edge on the rest of us mere mortals and as a result, many of us just gave up on the workshop. A shame really because some of the French people got the impression the loud, pushy types were typical British.
we get them in the hotel, only the other way around, they struggle to explain or ask for something, with a very strong Brit accent, and once I step in and say they can speak English if it is easier, they scowl, and INSIST on subjecting me to fifteen more minutes of spluttering, and broken French, instead of just blurting out "we would like a table for 5 for tonight."
I'm in a position to make their life easier, and so, I try, it workd for Germans, Spanish, Japanese, and so on, but some Brits simply don't want to be communicate in English. admirable, but please, give someone else the heartburn, I don't have the time.
My Dad was Polish, I can swear in Polish..................... ooops.............
Human!
In a way it epitomises why I keep away from the 'British' community in the next commune who mainly live in the heart of the village and really do own some of the best houses, have a finger in the best restaurant for many kilometres and even have representation. Whatever my origins, like Glen I grew up on a council estate, south of the Thames though. I think at one stage in my life I tried to get rid of my soufwest London accent, but spending a lot of time out of the English speaking world it managed to creep back in. There is enough of it left for the 'posh' speakers to pounce on. The assumption is that they need to speak slowly and very loud as if I was stupid and hard of hearing. I think it is one of the very things that has made me so defensive and always wittering on about the university I went to and stayed on at as a 'don'. I hold a small number of degrees that entitle me to use a Dr title and missed a Professor title. I do not think I am as thick as they assume my accent must make me, but some of them have done it more than once. Not long ago one of these people looked in my direction desperately for help when she was unable to say something to a market butcher. What I said to the butcher was something like: "I think she is looking for brains". He took me seriously and offered her a large glob of the foul muck. For somebody of such Anglais pretensions, what came from her mouth was not at all gentile. Then the butcher laughed. If she had gone along with the joke I would have helped her out, if I could. Stomping away making a fool of herself does her no favours, either with local tradesmen and women or with me. I just wish people would accept that none of us is better than the other, accents are on no real concern to a lot of people and really do not prove anything other than where we grew up usually and that not being posh means people are thick anyway. Most of the richest people in the UK today seem not to have plums in their mouths, so it is not about wealth either. As for living in France and somehow imagining oneself as better than them because they cannot speak English, well the less said the better. But then the 'I am Frencher than you, because I ALWAYS and ONLY speak it in public ' attitude is unspeakable anyway. So I simply do not cross the river to that village, merely pass through of necessity on my way somewhere else.
I am married to a French man and speak pretty good French, I would not say perfect as I still often make mistakes with the grammar. I honestly don't think any French person would think I was rude to speak to another English patriot in my own language, therefore I would especially if they were struggling to speak French themselves.After all they think nothing of speaking patois or Basque in front of there own fellow Frenchmen
Yeah right! Theo. Mine's a Surf & Turf with a Curry Sauce!
"self-righteousness is completely stupid" - it may well be, but there is a lot of it around: you just condemned the whole French Nation! (who are usually self-righteous, n'est-ce pas?)