A British magazine ridicules the English position of the French

Why are we so bad at English? The question often makes the headlines. Till then the British remained silent dear onesMore than a polite grimace trying to get our tongue between our teeth “th” And other dangerous soundtracks. Oxford's canons attack Moliere's successors today. It was a London weekly the observer Which, in mid-January, raises this infamous question: “Why do the French struggle to speak English?”

You may need to translate the title: “Why do the French have such a hard time speaking English? » Journalist Patrick West begins by citing an investigation times: Many French people do not know how to greet someone in English. He goes further in his published study Reservation, an online language learning platform. Google Translate receives 14,800 searches every month to find out how to say “good morning” In Shakespeare's language. 8100 for weekdays “Thursday” A word that generates 12,000 searches, the French have a hard time. Translation of words “shirt”, “image”, “Mrs.”Or “Thanks” A single search engine generates 6,600 queries per week.

A tale of French hatred

The London Weekly wishes to reassure its readers. If English speakers are known for their monolingualism, let them all rest! Obviously, we would be worse off than them. Meanwhile, we turn to find a study of the position of the English in French … the article continues and accuses us “Our Pride, Arrogance and Hate”. Here we are dressed for winter…

So are we jealous of the British? Yes, continues the journalist, “They may be jealous that our bastard language has become a language”, must say the favorite language in the world. See you in 2050. According to the forecasts of the International Organization of Francophonie (OIF), French will become the world's first language with the growth of the population of French speakers.

However the observer Citations supporting our pages PicaroIt seemed that we were sorry for ourselves “Lack of Confidence in Our English”. However, the Weekly acknowledges a better reason for our lack of fluency: historically, we didn't necessarily speak English. “When you speak a language that is a means of communication in Africa, the West Indies, Canada and elsewhere, there is no need to learn another.”

And the article ends: “Actually, and ironically, we can blame the French for our monolingualism. Many of us were ridiculed in France for our level of French schooling, met with such a humiliating response in English that we made up our minds not to try again. What a shame.…