Why are so many Americans anti-multilingual?

Question

In Canada we have two official languages, and in reality it's not a huge issue. It's not unheard of for an English-speaker to move to Quebec and learn French.

In Canada most people respect bi-, and multilingualism.

There are many other countries where the population is relatively happy, educated, and healthy which would never even imagine of using only one language. Places like Switzerland and Sweden come to mind.

Americans seem to be shooting themselves in the foot by being so ignorant of languages other than English.

Not only that, but English of course is from England. If America is supposed to be such an independant country, they could at least have their own language, perhaps one of the aboriginal languages.

Really, the U.S. looks like one big English colony to me. Canada may still use the U.K. monarchy as powerless figureheads, but at least there is diversity and utter recognition of bilingualism, not to mention multi-lingualism. The U.S. are changed Brits.

Answer 1

Your comments show quite a lot of arrogance and ignorance towards and about the US.

Please. I know MANY Canadians who speak only English, not that many of you speak Quebecois (which is a dialect, different from proper french)outside of that area/the Eastern seaboard. I used to live in Canada myself for a time, and have worked there, it's a lovely country. I myself speak French badly. Quite a lot of Americans in New Orleans speak a dialect of French as well. It's a culture/location thing.

I think at last count over 100 languages were counted as being in active use daily in the borough of Queens, NY. Many western states, such as Texas, Arizona and California are basically bi-lingual without it being an official policy. Hawaiians speak their native tongue as a matter of pride as well as English and some Japanese.

Canada is about as large as the US, so you have the similar problem of distance - in Europe and Scandinavia, neighbors are much closer so it is a matter of business and practicality. Also, Europeans have been invading each other for years so language has spread. The US has never been invaded. Many Americas speak a variety of languages but it depends on their background and where they are from.

American Indians do speak their own language as well as English, same as Canadian Indians. They are your aboriginal peoples - shouldn't you perhaps adopt their language? Why don't you speak the Inuit language?

Stop siting up there in Canada being judgmental, get off your couch and actually visit different parts of the US.

And by the way, The US doesn't even come close to the royal worship that I have seen from English speaking Canada. I assume that you have been to Victoria Island? There is the most boring museum of things the Queen or King touched onec there. Won't find that in the US - we don't look back on our colonial past so fondly.

Answer 2

First off, I agree a lot of Americans are against languages other than English, however in the more liberal places you'll find a great diversity of languages and culture. I'm fluent in five languages and learning two others. Many of my friends are the same.
American English is a different dialect than English. The vocabulary differs greatly between the two countries. I would hardly call the population "changed Brits." If you were to visit the larger cities in America you would find greater diversity than most other countries, including Canada (yes, I have lived in Canada).
Probably the biggest reason for Switzerland and other European countries to put such emphasis on bilingualism is because of their close proximity to other countries. The US is fairly isolated.
Throughout California there are incentives for students to learn Spanish, and in Northern California incentives for Chinese as well. Truth is, most of Americans truly don't need to learn other languages for their jobs and much of middle America is in no position financially to attend classes for language anyways.
I would love to see a Native American language as one of our official languages, but few speakers remain today because of hundreds of years of oppression. There are so few Native Americans left that the language would serve for appearance only, rather than function.

Answer 3

So are you actually wanting to learn something or is this a thinly veiled soap box with a maple leaf painted on the sign? I didn't learn a language because they don't teach languages in school till you're like 14 most of the time. And by that time the part of your brain able to learn language has been hard wired to what it learned as a toddler and makes it much more difficult to learn a language than if it was taught in preschool. So I've actually learned Spanish, Latin and ASL only to have forgotten most of it over the years.


EDIT: I also have deduced that, based on your logic, you should all have some sort of Inuit language as a national language.

Answer 4

Hello, No; they work longer hours than many of their counterparts around the world and don't have as posh social safety nets and welfare like in Europe, I still see lots of innovations coming out of there, music, movies and entertainment is yet flourishing and last I heard, Harvard to MIT and California Tech are still granting degrees and diplomas. There are some xenophobic people as in all western countries around the world these days who'd love to see massive deportations but they are not the majority. Cheers, Michael Kelly

Answer 5

WHOA! I am African American. I speak fluent spanish and english as my first language. I DECIDED to learn spanish all by myself. I bought a dictionary and spanish is SOOOOOO simple that I learned it in less than a year. Not everyone has time on their hands to learn a second language. It's taught in schools but I wasn't interested in those teachers who couldn't even speak the language as good as me.

Ahora, asi estoy ganando mi dinero. Aqui sentada mandando la gente que NO pueden hablar ingles a trabajar. Y a mi me mandan un cheque cada semana del dinero de los cheques de ellos. Y si no te gusta...me vale pija.

AND SO WHAT!?! I'm glad that I took the time to learn the language so that the "lazy ones" can pay me to do my job.
Sometimes I do find myself taking advantage of people who don't speak english because they were cruel to me when I couldn't speak their language. And I overcharge people for translating english to spanish.

Do what I did, stop complaining and take advantage of what you know.

Answer 6

I disagree that Americans disrespect multi-lingualism. Foreign language studies are required in most college prep high school tracts, and most universities require them. Voting ballots and product packaging usually reflect a multitude of languages. I have many old school mates that speak between two and seven languages.

Unfortunately, my years of Spanish and German studies have atrophied because there's little chance to use them on a regular basis where I live.

Canada is bi-lingual, not because it is intellectually superior or elite, but because it must bow to powerful political pressures to avoid civil war between the two cultures.

As for aboriginal languages, American English is universally accepted around the world for conduction of business endeavors; it incorporates other languages (unlike French), and doesn't use the word "eh?" as much as Canadian English.

Kick back and chill. If it weren't for your neighbors to the south, you'd be speaking Russian only. Eh?

Answer 7

Call me what you will. We speak American english here in the USA. I should not have to learn spanish because a literal flood of mexicans have infiltrated our country.
Many people have come here down through history. Swedish. Germans. Italians. Japanese, so on and so forth.
Did we all learn italian when all the italians came here in the early 1900's? No. They learned the language in order to communicate.
When the post WW II era came along and all the germans came here, did we all learn german? No. Japanese? No.
The official language here is American english.
If they want to live here, come in legally, go through the proper channels to get set up here, then LEARN THE LANGUAGE like all the immigrants have done all through history before you.
Don't want to do that? Stay home! We don't need you here.

Answer 8

You know, I used to have a lot of respect for the Canadian people because of the many we met in our travels, but, it's idiotic ramblings like this that are turning me off to them.
First off, up until the invasion of the illegal Mexicans, people coming to America under legal means, were most happy to assimilate and learn the language, then came this invasion of illegals, not only do they come here illegally, but they expect us to learn their language, and provide them with the necessities of life until and when they decide to take care of themselves.
If you people in Canada desire to have two, three or more official languages, fine, by all means do it, but mind your own business when it comes to the United States and our one language.
Until you decide to move here, pay taxes here and vote here, stay out of our affairs. From what I see, you have enough trouble in your own country with the French without getting involved in our affairs.

Answer 9

Why don't you tell us about the fascist, anti-English, anti-freedom, language Nazis known as the Office de la Langue Français - the Language Police ?

Answer 10

Americans are lazy and believe that the vast majority of the world should conform to them and learn the "international" language of English rather than force them to learn something so important as a foreign language. I'm sure if they did, they'd realize it's not very easy to just learn a language and should stop demanding immigrants to "just learn it".