That’s not limited to Americans and it’s also not true. I’ve been to Paris a couple of times the last couple of years and I found the Parisians very nice.
I have also been told by a man in a pub in York that I and a friend should speak English instead of Swedish because he couldn’t eavesdrop on us.
That’s been my experience there, as well. But you missed the second part. These people who complain about rude treatment also made no attempt at learning the local language and customs–that is, they were probably perceived as rude and received the same in return.
Me and my SO found Parisians to be nice as well. Or at least as nice as we needed them to be.
I’ve only had one time when I was in Brazil where someone got pissed off when we told them we didn’t speak their language. Probably because they were Austrailian.
Only a fascist believes in freedom from being offended. ~~Bleda, Attila the Hun’s brother.
I used to live in Berlin and, contrary to popular belief, not all Germans speak English - so depending on where you go, you might be out of luck if you don’t speak German. That said, Germans would at least throw their 3 or 4 words of English out there, and try to communicate with gestures.
I was only annoyed when I would meet Americans who had lived in Germany for 6 months or even years, and not even bother to learn the basics of “Bitte” (please) and “Danke” thank you. That is just rude.
Now, living in Las Vegas, we get lots of foreign tourists who speak little, if any, English and I am always willing to help as best I can. Speak slowly, don’t use any slang or idioms, use those hand gestures and speaking loudly doesn’t help make it easier to understand. You would be surprised how well you can communicate when necessary.
As an example, about a month or so ago there was a small group of Chinese in a local casino who seemed a bit lost and confused. I speak a grand total of two sentences in Chinese (“How are you?” and “Are you tired?”) and yet I was able to figure out their dilemma, help them find the buffet and even showed the younger couple with them how to play a slot machine they were interested in trying. Spent about 10 minutes with them all, and you could see how happy they were that anyone even tried to help/communicate with them, one on one. Then again, I guess it helps if you too have traveled and been in the position of not understanding the language - you learn to appreciate every act of kindness and help.
I was flying from LA to Kuala Lumpur, but there was a layover in Tokyo. After landing in Tokyo, preparing to deplane, I needed to take my stuff from the overhead compartment above an older Japanese couple. So while moving to open it, I said “Shitsurei shimasu” with my best pronunciation (I’d taken a Japanese language class the year before and always tried to practice it).
The Japanese gentleman twitched and stared at me with a shocked expression while I got my stuff. I had been primed to expect such a reaction when, shortly before that trip, I’d read a book about how hard it is for Japanese people to deal with gaijin speaking Japanese. Something about how after losing the war and being occupied, they felt they’d lost everything but their language, because it was so special it was impossible for gaijin to learn, so all their feelings of national identity got vested in the Japanese language, and for gaijin to speak it shattered that psychological refuge. I don’t remember the book’s title or author, though. It was kind of a double bind for me which language to use there: follow my usual rule of always speaking the language of the country I’m visiting as much as I can? Or risk upsetting someone who feels I have no right to use their language?
Huh. Earliest mention of the word fascist I could find was 1920’s.
ETA:
You are quoting from a TV show ??
This. This! Three hundred million times this! I’m forever embarrassed and exasperated by my compatriots on this issue. It’s OK if you don’t learn it fluently. It’s OK if you only learn a little. It’s just this downright allergy toward making any effort at all that exasperates me.
From my experience and estimation, at least 70% of Germans can speak English at a functional level. 15-20% of them can speak at an advanced level with great deal of fluency. 5% of them can be mistaken for a native speaker. 
Those who cannot speak are either Turkish and Muslim immigrants or those who don’t give a damn about education.:smack:
This attitude kind of surprises me. I wouldn’t expect a cashier at a fast food place in Washington D.C. to speak a second language, so why should I expect a cashier somewhere else to speak English. McDonalds and Starbucks aren’t really opening locations there to try to appeal to westerners but rather to tap into profitable local markets.
That said, when travelling in a foreign country where I don’t speak the language, I will certainly speak in English to someone. I’ll try to learn a few phrases of the local language, and while I’d be pleased if someone I meet spoke English, I wouldn’t expect it.
As for the rude French in Paris, I didn’t find them any ruder than the folks who live in other big cities like London, or New York.
Guess it depends on where you go and where you live. I first lived in a working class area of Berlin (the Wedding district - and no, the name has nothing to do with matrimony). It was far from the tourist/hip part of the city - and trust me, nobody in that area could speak English with any fluency whatsoever. This helped me learn German far faster - amazing how necessity can influence speed of mastery. I would also guess that of my closest friends in Berlin, maybe 30% could have a conversation in English - if that.
Germans do learn English in school, but this “school English” there kind of sucks. They only learn it twice a week for an hour, and often the instructor will teach the English class in German, just throwing in English vocabulary but not really practicing pronunciation or having any kind of conversational practice. Thus they might know a few vocabulary words, but have not really practiced speaking it in a conversation. And if you got a crappy grade in English, you can imagine you were not exactly fluent when time came to communicate. As an ESL teacher at many private schools there, I can’t begin to tell you how horrible this “school English” was, and generally useless. Luckily, Germans love to travel and wind up using English more and more, so at some point you will meet some Germans who can speak English better than most Americans! I had a German woman teach English at a school in Los Angeles, and you would have never guessed she was born and raised in Germany.
And speaking of MacDonald’s…the day they first opened in my area of Berlin, I went there to buy food for the office and the menu was mostly in English. I ordered a cheeseburger (as it clearly stated in English on the menu above) and the woman behind the counter said, "Mit Kaese? (With cheese?). Obviously they had not trained the employees what those items in English meant in German.
As with everything, the nitty gritty specifics of what you are doing isn’t really all that important. What matters is that you approach the situation with cultural awareness, respect, humility, and kindness.
If you show some basic awareness for the situation (i.e. don’t just assume everyone is ready to to follow a loud, complicated barrage of Esperanto…and likewise, don’t just assume that someone doesn’t speak English, even if they look like they just stepped off the farm), do your genuine best to politely convey what you are communicating (which may be a mix of sign language, smatterings of the local language, and simplified explanations in your own language) and use lots of smiles and apologetic looks, you are doing it right.
Honestly, I think it boils down to a person’s nature. An arrogant bigot is probably not going to learn any of the other language, and even if they do they will still come off as arrogant and ethnocentric. A warm and open hearted person is probably going to learn the polite words ahead of time just because that’s what warm and open hearted people do. But people end up in all kinds of crazy situations and have all kinds of language learning capacity, and if for whatever reason they don’t come in with any of the local language, they’ll find a way to communicate that’s still pleasant and warm.
In the long term, I think it is generally a good idea to learn the language of where you are living, if just from a practical standpoint. Not to mention language learning is generally rewarding in it’s own right. But living where you don’t speak the language is one of the harder things a person can do, and often it is deeply embarrassing and can be humiliating, so I’m not going to fault anyone for their coping mechanisms (which may well be staying home most of the time and watching home-language DVDs.) People tend to learn what they need when they are ready. If someone doesn’t learn to speak the language around them, I tend to look on them with compassion more than derision. Clearly they have something going on that makes it hard for them to do something that offers to bring so much value to their lives.
My husband is from Switzerland and Swiss German is his native language. Once, in a restaurant he ran into an old friend of his who was also from Switzerland and they started chatting in Swiss German just to catch up on old times. This woman approached them and started complaining that they should be speaking in an other language besides English and why were they in the U.S. if they couldn’t speak English. Of course they were both fluent in English and they asked her if she was visiting another country and ran into an old friend from America what language would she speak to him/her in?
Then she turned red and got very apologetic and said she’d just had a very bad day and was in a bad mood.
The thing is, in America, everyone speaks English for 3000 miles in any direction. It’s not like Europe where they have countries the size of our states where each one has its own distinct language and culture.
Well in America you really should learn some Spanish if you want to get any work done.
I grew up in a midwestern town of roughly 20,000 people so not a rural area but no big city either and I found learning spanish to be useful. Even in the heart of america, there are pockets of other languages and cultures. It’s homogenous but it’s not thathomogenous.
Sure, that’s true. But why would you travel to ANOTHER country and expect everyone there to speak English?
Probably because you’re overestimating how much English people there are learning in school, how much English proficiency they need for their jobs, and (for Dopers, at least) how much they hang out online in places where English is the commonly used language. I think a lot of monolingual English speakers don’t quite realize how little the average non-traveling, non-internet-surfing, just average person (whose native tongue is something other than English) needs to use our language on a daily basis.
OP does not specify a context.
If you are just doing your own thing, who cares? Speak any language you want. It’s not rude.
However, when you speak to a member of that nation it is extremely rude to presume they speak English or demand that they accomodate your lack of language skills. If you are in their country, it is not their problem that you didn’t bother to study for it.
If you are incapable of speaking the language, it might be better to stick to your tourist group where at least it’s expected.
Yes, I have been to foreign countries and yes, I did spend years learning the language before attempting it.
Likewise, I expect anyone in America will at least attempt to make themselves understood in English.
I think the options are a bit broader than that. Phrasebooks are published for a reason, you know.