To ask a friend to stop speaking her own language?

[jujujbel]

I have a very dear friend who is from another country but has lived in the UK for 20 years. Her DC are bilingual. Often, when we are together, she will break off the conversation to speak to her DC in her own language. This makes me uncomfortable and I find it rude but I have never mentioned it. However, a few days ago my DD came home from spending the day with my friends DD (they spend a lot of time together). She talked about how she hated it when they talked in a different language in front of her as it made her feel excluded. I explained that i had felt the same way and that it was actually considered bad manners to do this. I told my DD that if she felt uncomfortable she should say to her friend in as nice a way as possible and that I would do similar with the mum. The very next day, my DD did do this when the situation arose again and explained how it made her feel. She came home quite upset as she had argued with her friend about it.

We were all meeting up later anyway. When we got together my friend immediately said to me 'have you hear detox?' She then went to say, I'll speak to your dd to explain that I'm not talking about her it's just how we speak. I then said that I agreed with my DD and it made us both uncomfortable. My friend was shocked that I found her rude. I explained that it was only in the context where we are all having a conversation in English and they then break away to speak in a different language. Although I know they are not saying anything bad about us it is a horrible feeling and I don't understand why they feel the new to do it. I compared it to whispering. I have been very clear that it is only in the context of a group conversation being started in a shared language and then being continued in a language that not all of the group can understand.

My friend has now told me she will not speak her own language in front of my DD but that she will distance herself from us. She feels I am the inconsiderate one and that I am discriminating against her.

I am so hurt and confused. I guess I am just looking for a bit of MN perspective.

Sorry for the essay.

Thank

Yep MrsTerry my DDs best friend has a pretty good grasp of conversational English and understands a lot of what I say to DD having been at our house at least once a week for 6 years (and comments or replies in German, though she's been trying bits of English recently) despite only having learnt the like of colours and numbers so far in school. I only ever speak Englisdh to my kids though therir friends are all monolingual German (mostly the kids are off playing together in German, but if I need to speak to my kids I speak English - obviously I speak German to the friends). Her mother is nothing but delighted :o

Christ bamboo, my mother only speaks English and my inlaws speak German (plus a bit of French and Italian but no English). Which set of grandparents would you like us to ditch?

My children chat happily to their grandparents. I am not precious about it nor am I a slave to it. It's not a burden you have to bear. They will pick up conversational chat easily without all this song and dance about it. Chill.

I think YABVU. It is not your place to dictate which language your friend should use to address her dc.

I get that you might feel a bit left out if you don't know what they're talking about, but it's not like they're deliberately trying to exclude you. I think you have overreacted and it isn't surprising that your friend wants to distance herself from you.

Jesus is it tunnel visioned monoglot idiot day or something????

I think it was pretty obvious from the 'saying no to a sleepover' comment that the friend was admonishing her daughter without wanting to embarrass onlookers. I'd say that was polite rather than rude, nobody enjoys those encounters, they are really cringe making.

Agree with pp that:

• the context is important

• what is rude in one culture isn't necessarily in another
• I'm trying to teach my children my language, this means I speak my language with them all the time regardless of who is around. I find that if I mainly speak English to them then they reply in English as this is what they are mostly used to speaking from being around peers at school etc and really, the language they prefer. So I make a point to only communicate in my language to get them to practise it.
• even if we were all having similar conversations ie the girls asking to stay late, it would not occur to me that a friend would feel left out if I had this conversation in my own language. After all, this is between my daughter and me at this stage - no one who should be party to it is being left out. You are talking to your child and I am talking to my child. I am using the language we normally communicate with to negotiate her staying round/nit staying round. There are certain phrases etc in my language which conveys much better what I want

her to understand and she would be used to these already. So a shortcut when having tricky conversations.

I understand feeling left out. My inlaws speak a different language and sometimes switch and it can be frustrating. And boring to sit whilst they finish. In time though I have just learnt that they just switch to natural language without noticing and because they feel that comfortable around me. Forcing them to always speak a mutual language unnecessarily would make spending time with them a bit stilted. They don't do it for the whole time I'm there that's fine with me.

I would distance myself from a friend which brought this up as such a big issue. It would make me feel that they do not understand me like I thought they did and that I was wrong to feel comfortable with them.

Nolim - just shows what you know. I've lived abroad in a non-English speaking country. Also, i worked for several international countries. This is how I know what is considered good manners.

I speak 2 foreign languages - one French and the other obscure, albeit I'd never be considered fluent in either. In fact, ten minutes ago, i was just reading a newspaper article in a language that I bet no one else on this board speaks.

The fact is, it is bad manners to speak a foreign language in front of other people whose company you are in, if you have the option of speaking a common language. Nothing can or will change that. The Op's daughter could explain why.

Projecting there's been a lot of this on MN in the last few days. Bloody depressing.

Whenever I nostalgically wish I still lived in the UK I can rely on MN to smash the rose tinted glasses underfoot!

Just a few typos there!

I am really surprised by the strength of feeling here.

And the insecurity - why would they be talking about you when speaking in the language not known to you?

I have raised my older 2 bilingually and did not manage to keep it up with the younger 2 - something I feel really bad about. Partly it was because I felt uncomfortable using another language in front of English speaking adults.

Maybe we all need to be a bit more secure in ourselves?

The fact is, it is bad manners to speak a foreign language in front of other people whose company you are in, if you have the option of speaking a common language.

Not a fact by any stretch of the imagination. I just asked DH if he thought it was rude when I speak my language with my family, and he shrugged and said "bof". He couldn't care either way.

i worked for several international countries

Sadly, some are not even monoglot...

Op, you describe her as a dear friend, I would apologise to her and tell her you did hit mean to cause offence. If your dd does not feel comfortable, she has every right not to be, if she is feeling excluded, have her dd over to yours instead.

YABU and inconsiderate and I'm not surprised your friend is really offended. We are bringing our DC up bilingual. My husband speaks in his native language to them at all times. If he starts to mix up the languages it becomes confusing to the child if they're young, or harder to maintain the bilingual bit when they're older. And really, no an argument about whether to have a sleepover is not a group conversation.

They weren't being rude, but you are coming across as a bit Nigel Farage.

You know what OP, if she reciprocated your feelings of holding her as a dear friend, then she would not be so inconsiderate in the first place and not so willing to downgrade your friendship when you ask her to consider you.

It's very controlling that "I will distance myself", as if she was only one that dictates everything that happens between the two of you. And to say that out loud - you might think it, you might do it but saying it aloud? Never! What would she hope to achieve by saying it?

Don't she'd be best friend material for me, I am afraid.

var123, surely you recognise that what's good manners at an international company is not really the standard for in your own or your friend's house, with your children?

I am in this situation all the time as I live in a Welsh speaking area, but having grown up in a not very welsh speaking part of Wales, I am not fluent. I wish my fluent Dad had only ever spoken to me in Welsh actually. Anyway, often at school pick up mothers will chat to me in english but talk to their dcs in welsh. I don't think that is rude. It is our native language, they are used to using it with their children, and it also helps my welsh improve. It is hard to switch languages about, I use welsh when I can, and there are some things where I naturally use the wlsh rather than the english and it takes time to stop and use the other language.
op if they were talking about you, or at great length, then maybe you would have a point, but this is a friend who you supposedly like, why on earth be so touchy that you spoil the friendship? She wants to keep up her language and culture with her child, and as I assume they are often around other people, if she had to use english all the time to be polite then she would be doing her child a disservice. Sometimes it is just easier to express oneself in one language or another. why not try and learn a little bit of her language yourself?

var nothing can or will change your opinion. Saying something is a fact doesn't mean it is. It is your opinion.

Being able to get by in a language isn't being bilingual. I'm not bilingual but my kids are. It is massively importasnt to me that my kids speak my language as a mother tongue as well as their community language indistinguishably from any other native speaker. To me that is a far greater gift than an expensive private education or a big fat savings account. Its what I can give them - fully bilingual and biliterate skills. I'd be devastated if they could only get by in English and not think and dream in it, as well as German. So I will slave over it and would drop a friend shallow and insecure enough to behave the way OP has, and has encouraged her DD to.

OP: I have been very clear that it is only in the context of a group conversation being started in a shared language and then being continued in a language that not all of the group can understand.

This above is what I think is quite rude actually! No problem if she turns around to her daughter and ask what do you want for dinner, but if OPs DD have been involved in the conversation and they then swithc, that is RUDE, that's totally excluding

No, not a monoglot. What i think is going on here, is some people are thinking that its just a case of the complexities of bringing up a bilingual child (that's not what the OP describes).
Others are unwilling to change their own behaviour and don't wish to consider that they have also been extremely bad mannered by doing the same thing.

Then the big group who are reacting to this, with exactly the same motivation that led to the failure to listen to the victims in Rotherham and Nottingham i.e. a greater concern to be seen to be welcoming of all ethnicites, rather than requiring the right thing to be done.

"YABU. Have you any idea how hard it is to maintain the 2nd language in a totally English-speaking environment?"

This

MrTumbles. "Her mother is nothing but delighted" is exactly how my parents and my friends' parents were. They could see nothing but upside in learning another language by being immersed. My friend and I both live in a third country BTW. Not the one of my birth and not the one we met in. Broad horizons, baby!

In my life speaking other languages has; kept me safe and un-ripped off on holidays; meant I could get into Rwanda at a very weird border crossing; got points to emigrate to Canada. You never know when your languages will help. I was in China earlier this year and my few words of Mandarin and years of making myself understood to the Forrin worked wonders.

It really isn't unusual on Mainland Europe for a household to be speaking a number of languages.

"It really isn't unusual on Mainland Europe for a household to be speaking a number of languages."
lol well nor is it unusual in far island Europe!
We speak at least three languages in our house......not very well but...
Polish Welsh and English ...:)

Who said being able to get by in a language makes you bilingual?

I worked for both intl companies and visited peasant houses (genuine peasants, not some derogatory word for poor people). Both groups understood what is good manners. So many things were different from Britain, but the internationally accepted basis for good manners appears to be not to do what makes others feel excluded.