Do you Guys, think the french will speak english in a few years?

???

No. They are to waaaaay to proud for that to ever become a reality. Not in a million years.

When I was in France, hardly any of them were capable of speaking English consistently. Those who do speak it well, seem to be those in white collar professions and those who work in higher level IT positions.

The answer is simple: No.

What you say is not fair guys

maybe they will.Most of the youth in france nowadays write better english than french (i don't exagerate, look at our spelling system, nobody today makes the effort to master it).The young french are not so proud as you say, what you describe is the older generation, the young french are losing their culture and know better us cinema than french one.If the french gov. switched the language, imponing english, in less than 2 generations all would speak english.The frenchman proud of his language, camembert and god knows what else is an old-fashioned cliché.

I think I agree with Vincent....many of my generation of French people (I'm now 22) have learned English at school and speak it much more than their parents and generations before that. It's true that the French as a nation have resisted the "English language tide" but I honestly think the present generation realise that this is not good any more.

One thing Vincent said I hope is not really true...that the young French are losing their culture. That is sad...learning and speaking English does not mean they should abandon their own langauge and heritage and stuff. I can't see that happening. I hope it dosn't anyway. I love listening to the French language. I love it in songs, too. Vive le francais. (sorry no cedilla on my keyboard...c'est l'anglais je pense!) A bientot!

dear damian,
as Metallica sang in the old times,it's "sad but true".My proper sister is a good example (poor girl! she's 14).you know there were also other languages in France like breton, occitan, catalan, picard, etc... they are all vanishing.The problem is that people nowadays only think in making money.So why learn a language which only is useful to speak with the sheep (said a former education minister called Allègre, speaking about occitan language)? Moreover nowadays we're in a european (and global)perspective so there's a great massification - standardization-unification of what we used to call culture.But i don't think we soon abandon french, we'll keep it like you scots with the gaelic.One thing we should do too is to reform our spelling system, it makes our language very un-competitive, most of the french language teachers agree.It's an useful complexity.

Vive l'Ecosse et Marie Stuart!

How can that be? Over 90% of French speak French as their first language.

The vast majority of new migrants who speak French in France as a second language, speak a non-English language as their first language. So very few speak English as a first language.

Lastly, too few French people speak English well. Even if many do learn to read it and write it in school, they don't use it routinely or speak and listen to it daily. All the mainstream newspapers, TV, radio and literature generally are all in French!

How can the English language possibly arise from a culture that is completely fixed and immersed in French? Have you ever seen a French movie or one dubbed in French where English is spoken?

How about English in Italy, Greece, or Spain? I don't think so!

Am I too proud to speak English? Well I don't think so... I try to speak English the best I can, and a lot of my fellows countrymen try to do so... because we know we have to speak English nowadays. The things are changing, what was true yesterday is no more true. Moreover I hate hearing somebody says we French are "too proud", because yes some of us are very proud (and I hate that) but I happen to know this is the same everywhere (don't you agree Juan?).

French could start speaking English only if the English suddenly started to have lot of babies, overcrowded their island, moved en masse to France and married French people.
Or if 2 million English moved to a small country like Latvia/Slovenia, refused to learn the native language and married natives. They could very quickly anglicise a small country with their big population if they wanted to.
But that's very unlikely.

"Vive le francais. (sorry no cedilla on my keyboard...c'est l'anglais je pense!)"

Damian, have you tried holding the ALT key down while typing "0231"? That's what I do to get the c/cedilla (ç)

I agree with Mighty Mick,

When I was in France, hardly any of them were capable of speaking English consistently. Those who do speak it well, seem to be those in business, white collar professions and computer profesionals. A surprising number of University graduates in France have no usable English.

And the majority of new migrants who speak French in France as a second language, speak a non-English language as their first language. So very few speak English as a first language. In EU, some English are stating to work on the continent, but they usually work in french.

Lastly, too few French people speak English well. Even if many do learn to read it and write it in school, they don't use it routinely or speak and listen to it daily. All the mainstream newspapers, TV, radio and literature generally are all in French!
English shows are always dubbed into French on TV and the Movies.


How can the English language possibly arise from a culture that is completely fixed and immersed in French? And where the French people have strong feelings about their cultural and political superiority.

Regards, Paul

to paul,
i think there are much more french who speak english than english guys speaking french.I've heard that, according to a european survey, UK is the country where very few people can speak another language than theirs, so...

Elaine: thanks for that tip....I am working on the installation of keyboard settings for accent marks in Windows.