Sorry, @Bettina - I forgot to include a link to the website of Centre Dentaire Cholet.
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International language means that two or more countries speak it.
The question was , why do the english expect the French to speak English? Hence the reply above.
If the practionner understood English it would help the patient. Afterall the patient should come first. But one cannot expect the French to know English or any other language because they are no good at languages, unfortuneately.
Oh, you little wind-up merchant…
This not even worth a reply, rofl:
Which is what I said - a bridge between countries 
That made me laugh out loud! The French are infinitely better at languages than either the British or Americans. But anyway there is no requirement for a doctor to speak the patient’s language and legally that would be problematic anyway.
I have to agree. Only myself,my brother and one of my sisters speak any french in all our family and yet friends here in France, nearly all of them speak very good english and so do their children. So many brits here just can’t even be bothered to learn a few simple phrases which is so embaressing when you hear them shouting out loud in english to the supermarket cashiers.
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Sorry to contradict to you but I read a survey of people speaking foreign languages in many countries and the French came at the bottom or near to the bottom of the list!
Also being a retired English teacher I speak from experience!
Well you are lucky, because I have lived in France for over 40 years and I still have to find a French person who speaks a passable English! An American friend, quite annoyed, asked me if I knew one French person who could speak English, I hesitated. She replied, “Not one!” I have to agree with her.
Even yours isn’t perfect 
QED it must be contagious
So by that definition, French is an international language, which brings us Ouroboros-like, back to the original question.
I beg to differ, IMHO I think English is more widely spoken.
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Well, each to his /her own opinion! I was told that I spoke perfect English!
My wife speaks perfect English. My three French kids speak perfect English.
The girl who works at our local tabac speaks quintessential English and Italien. Perfect in every way. I thought she was British actually….no she is French.
My dustbin man speaks English. Two kids down at Lidl speak English. There is a guy at the dechetterie who speaks English. A security guard at Leroy speaks English. I could go on. All working in lower class type jobs…!
The thing is I am only the English in town. So they learnt their English somewhere.
But on a point, older middle/upper class workers in well paid jobs in France who have gone to the best universities etc do lack basic English. French politicians are good examples. But they will have on their CV they are fluent in English. A lot of lower class workers in France who left school at 16 type folks do speak good English. Some perfectly.
Maybe you hang out with wrong people !
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One explanation I read for the “French don’t speak English” thing was that the French school system is keen on accuracy over fluency where language teaching is concerned, which makes French people less inclined to “have a go” in a foreign language for fear of making a mistake.
I don’t know how true this is, just presenting it as an observation.
But while it’s handy if you are having difficulty in French and find the person you are talking to can speak English, I think it’s still incumbent upon Brits to speak French when in France and not expect to just speak English.
As an aside, in the Netherlands it’s actually a bit annoying how good their English is - when I have attempted to speak a bit of Dutch I always get a reply in English!
(I think they watch a lot of British and American TV that’s subtitled rather than dubbed!)
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I worked there for a while back i the 90s, it was quite handy they all spoke English. I tried to speak some dutch, honest😉
I think most people in France under the age of thirty get their English from the internet, youtube, netflix, music and all the rest. VO showings at the cinema are always paked out with folks in that age bracket.
Those above that age had to learn English at school. They did not have the internet. And even today, English is not taken seriously at school. Imagine 30 years ago. So they did not have much chance unless they studied abroad. All the kids who want to learn English today tend to have external lessons because either they want to learn English or their parents force them too.
If I was a French parent I would get them English lessons outside of school. Learning French takes up most of schooling. Everything else is secondary.
In my opinion France is becoming more and more English speaking. Well actually multilingual. In supermarkets you can hear many languages. And they are not tourists. 30 years ago English was non existent in everyday life.
Today you can move to France and get by with basic French. Well in large towns and cities. Rural locations probably not so much.
You don’t write perfect English from what I have seen here, but in an informal situation we don’t always reread for mistakes - and many native speakers don’t write ‘perfect English’ according to the standard of e.g. Fowler with whom, as an English teacher, you will be familiar
I didn’t say anything about how widely spoken either language is, I said that according to your definition, French is an international language. That’s all.
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I’m not sure about that - my pupils in Terminale get 9 hours of English lessons a week. They are lit specialists of course currently reading an excellent (and long!) novel by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. In their 2 hours of compulsory English they are working on gun violence and seeing how the USA differs from other countries, which means a look at lots of international press in English and a look at the legislation including the constitution because the NRA quote the 2nd amendment as justification for keeping eg assault rifles at home. In their Euro English class they do maths in English.
So I’m not sure we don’t take it seriously, we invest a lot of time in teaching languages and 2 MFLs are the compulsory minimum.
So 6 hours lit +2 hours compulsory curriculum + 1 hour Euro option every single week.
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