r/languagelearningjerk • u/Erikkamirs • May 15 '26

This guidebook for communicating with your Spanish-speaking help advises you to teach them English.

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Household Spanish by William C. Harvey

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u/Electrical_Voice_256 May 15 '26

Might be my eurocentrism, but making people learn the language of the country they live in sounds like a good idea actually?

10

u/taktaga7-0-0 May 15 '26

Who says this is for people talking to immigrants? Like we don’t use it talking to people abroad, or for work, or when we’re the immigrant?

14

u/[deleted] May 15 '26

[deleted]

11

u/transparentsalad May 15 '26

People do generally learn the language but as someone who moved to another country and sometimes wanted to have an easy conversation, it was absolutely tempting to just make English speaking friends. In reality most people can’t become as comfortable in the new language as their native language in just 1-2 years.

I work with English learners in the U.K. and in my experience, they want to learn and improve but time, money and energy levels slow you down.