>>>I suppose this is better suited to the personal section<<<
Since I've joined these message boards, I've noted an incredible amount of diversity and people of different nationalities. WHich isn't really surprising, when you think about it, considering Queen has been enormously popular in the US, UK, Netherlands, France, Argentina, Brazil, Japan, and most of Europe, just naming a few.
But it's rare that I come across such varied backrounds on a community, and I think that's wonderful. I also note that these people speak English very well.
So, I have a few questions.
> For those living in a country other than the US, UK, Canada or Australia, which country do you live in?
> How many people would you say are able to speak English?
>Do you see English used much?
> Historically, it has been shown that (to some extent) the popularity of rock music has helped spread the usage of the English language, namely I've seen The Beatles and Queen mentioned frequently. Was Queen part of the reason why you wanted to learn English?
I know, I guess this is all sorta stupid, but just wondering.
Hmmm, this topic name sounds a bit like my entrance exam book for English philology, but I think it might have been some other word that 'Queen' was replaced with.. :)
As for your questions,
1. Finland
2. From the younger generation, almost everyone can cope with English, and there are amazingly many fluent Eglish speakers anyway because we learn English at school from 3rd grade on. From the older generations, I would imagine less than half speak English, because until the 70's-80's German and Swedish were the more learned languages in schools. I mostly depends on the job line they're in, whether they have had the need to learn English or not.
3. Every day, but that's mostly because I live in the capital area where most of the foreign people move to when they come to Finland, and I work in a post office which is used quite a lot among tourists.
4. Many people in Finland learn their English from TV and movies, because we don't have them overdubbed like they have in many Middle European countries, e.g. Germany. To me, it was Queen though that made me want to learn English as early as possible. I used to translate Queen's songs into Finnish (word to word, which must have sounded very awful) with a dictionary when I was about 8, but I have to admit that for me too, watching quite a lot telly as a kid, has helped me to learn English the most.
deleted user 29.07.2004 05:01
> For those living in a country other than the US, UK, Canada or Australia, which country do you live in?<
Bavaria.
> How many people would you say are able to speak English?<
Dunno.
>Do you see English used much?<
Yes.
> Historically, it has been shown that (to some extent) the popularity of rock music has helped spread the usage of the English language, namely I've seen The Beatles and Queen mentioned frequently. Was Queen part of the reason why you wanted to learn English?<
No. Music (pop culture in general) may have a certain influence (it creates a feel of familiarity with the language), but it's not the reason why most people learn English in the first place. Usually, people learn English at school, it's as simple as that. The tendency to be bi- or even tri-lingual is rather strong outside the Anglo-Saxon world. So there's no big deal behind it.
There are certain European countries where the percentage of accomplished English-speakers is quite enormous. Island (where English has become something like the official language) springs to mind, Skandinavian countries in general. The Dutch are very good as well. Having sub-titled instead of dubbed movies certainly helps. That's an advantage (if you prefer movies in their original language) of smaller countries, because their markets aren't big enough to make dubbing on a grand scale worthwhile (as it often also includes producing your own DVD- and video-products), especially if several different languages are spoken in one country.
Some people think that those countries, such as the German-speaking ones, who have all their TV shows and movies dubbed are too moronic to learn English or maybe unwilling to watch films in foreign languages because of somewhat nationalistic sentiments. However, the reason is far more simple. With some 100 million native German-speakers there simply is a market for all that
I don't think that German, French or any other people who dub their movies and tv shows are moronic or anything like that. The non-dubbing is just one of the main reasons why children in small Nordic countries start learning their English at a quite early age.
But yeah, it used to piss me off when we had German music channels and whenever they had any interviews or documents of interesting bands, especially Queen, they were dubbed and I couldn't understand a word! But then I learned a little German so now I can understand those too =)