Yeah, we’re much more strongly encouraged to take French, as it’s our second National Language (and yet, for some bizarre reason, we’re taught European French rather than the Quebecois French that is the native tongue of 1/4 of our population. They are diverse enough dialects that visiting French usually can’t understand what Quebecois are saying).
Similar suckness in NYC High Schools – the Spanish offered is Castilian, the upper-class Spanish of MADRID, which only has a passing resemblance to the spectrum of New World Latino dialects spoken in NYC, Puertorequeno, Cubano, Mexicano, Columbano… you get the idea. Puerto Rican kids generally WIPED OUT in HS Spanish. It’s like asking English majors to do all their work in upper class British English from the 1950s.
To compound matters, Language teachers are compelled to teach the language they have their advanced degrees in – so very few foreign languages are even taught by Native Speakers.
It’s pretty much the same way between America & England, Spain & Mexico. Same base-language but diversified by time & distance enough that they’re a lot more different than most people tend to consider.
I was in Scotland with my then boyfriend and we’d go to a pub for dinner. Our waitress spoke in a very lovely example of the local dialect which which I understood perfect (no clue why but I never have problems with Irish or Scottish dialects despite having never lived their or had exposure to them outside of Hollywood productions) and I spent a bit of time telling each them what the other had said. One night our waitress lost it and said that she couldn’t understand a word my boyfriend said through his thick accent. Which caused both he and I to laugh and agree that it was her country, so he was the one talking funny. Still don’t know why she had no problems understanding me, for ones I didn’t pick up the only accent I can ever drop into.
To be a grammar nazi it should be “toda la mañana” since it is a feminine noun. Not a big deal though, plenty of native speakers make similar mistakes.
Thank god for translation software, we canucks only get Spanish as an elective on the occasion that the school we attend has that available.
Yeah, we’re much more strongly encouraged to take French, as it’s our second National Language (and yet, for some bizarre reason, we’re taught European French rather than the Quebecois French that is the native tongue of 1/4 of our population. They are diverse enough dialects that visiting French usually can’t understand what Quebecois are saying).
All I got out of that was Abuelita. 😛
Similar suckness in NYC High Schools – the Spanish offered is Castilian, the upper-class Spanish of MADRID, which only has a passing resemblance to the spectrum of New World Latino dialects spoken in NYC, Puertorequeno, Cubano, Mexicano, Columbano… you get the idea. Puerto Rican kids generally WIPED OUT in HS Spanish. It’s like asking English majors to do all their work in upper class British English from the 1950s.
To compound matters, Language teachers are compelled to teach the language they have their advanced degrees in – so very few foreign languages are even taught by Native Speakers.
It’s pretty much the same way between America & England, Spain & Mexico. Same base-language but diversified by time & distance enough that they’re a lot more different than most people tend to consider.
I was in Scotland with my then boyfriend and we’d go to a pub for dinner. Our waitress spoke in a very lovely example of the local dialect which which I understood perfect (no clue why but I never have problems with Irish or Scottish dialects despite having never lived their or had exposure to them outside of Hollywood productions) and I spent a bit of time telling each them what the other had said. One night our waitress lost it and said that she couldn’t understand a word my boyfriend said through his thick accent. Which caused both he and I to laugh and agree that it was her country, so he was the one talking funny. Still don’t know why she had no problems understanding me, for ones I didn’t pick up the only accent I can ever drop into.
for those who don’t speak Spanish:
“Come on, grandma has been in the kitchen all morning!”
Thanks ;3
Thanks!
I can read spanish but I can’t speak it. Thats cool and blows at the same time.
lol me too xD
To be a grammar nazi it should be “toda la mañana” since it is a feminine noun. Not a big deal though, plenty of native speakers make similar mistakes.
Depends on which dialect. Some dialects drop unneeded connective words for speed and ease of speech. It happens in English too.
i speak english and bad-english. i have forgotten most of my 2 years of espanol from high-school back in the 90’s.
also our teacher being the education equivalent of a extreme fundamentalist *point and memorize, point and memorize, point and memorize* didn’t help.
WHERE ARE THE LASER LLAMAS