Talking in your native language, is it acceptable in a group?

[AllDruggedUpWithNowhereToGo]

The other evening I was at an adult education class and there was an issue. So I have a “who was being unreasonable”

Person A and person B were chatting in their own language during the class and person C complained about it.

The thing is we are a very chatty class, and person A claimed racism due to it being a foreign language and that no one else had been named as being a distraction. The tutor shut the issue down quickly and stressed the “distraction” aspect of it, but I got the impression that the “foreign language” aspect was what person C had the real issue with (if it makes a difference the conversation A and B were having was nothing to do with the class we are taking)

I am neither A, B or C but now feel really uncomfortable by the division in the class because of this.

Also I can see both sides of the division. I was raised that to exclude people when you are all part of a group is rude (is this a cultural thing though?), but then if English isn’t your first language and you live in an English speaking country, I imagine it’s nice to be able to chat in your native language.

So who was BU?

AIBU for A&B
AINBU for C

(Also I have name changed, rarely post, but have been here since penis beaker)

As a teacher of adults, I'm curious about what kind of class it is where you sit and chat amongst yourselves whilst the teacher is actively trying to teach. But also, unless the teacher speaks the same language as A and B, how does he / she know whether those students are chatting about a problem with the teaching input or just discussing something off topic? As a teacher, if the students are chatting in English I can tell when they are discussing something relevant to learning and pick up on problems, and also tell if the students have just gone off topic and need to be pulled back. If the students are speaking another language to me, then I have no idea if there is an issue on not, which doesn't make for a very effective learning environment.

If the conversations that people strike up during teaching are about the subject rather than general chit chat then surely it is a bit rude to speak in a language that excludes other students from participating.

If it was a personal conversation then I'd say own language is fine, but then it really shouldn't be during class.

It seems odd to make a proper complaint though, and then equally odd to accuse racism. I wonder if A B and C are all difficult characters?!

plus half the time they spoke a dam sight better english than some people i know.so why shouldnt it be we know norwegian.

I agree MrsTerryPratchett

@AllDruggedUpWithNowhereToGo - if you don't understand, tough.
The world doesn't revolve around English speakers. Even in an English speaking country, if two native speakers meet and talk to each other, without engaging others, they should have the right to use their native language.
It's funny but I mostly see the paranoia of "omg, they're talking about me" mostly among the English speakers. I am perfectly cool when someone speaks Spanish, Italian, Russian etc. around me, don't expect them to switch to a different language just to satisfy my tender feelings. And even if they talk about you, so what? They could be talking about you behind your back and you'd be none the wiser.
People seriously need to grow up.
And yeah, I really would like to see the so called British ex-pats if people started pushing them into talking their natives languages wherever they are.
There are allegedly about 20 thousand British living in Japan. 19 thousand living in Portugal. UAE has roughly 40 thousand. Switzerland - 48 thousand, etc etc.
So how many of them actually speak Arabic, Portuguese, Japanese or Swiss German/French/Italian? Do they also switch to those languages when around the "natives" just as those two persons are expected to only speak English because the English speaking natives are afraid they are talking about them?

It depends. If it was during a break while everyone else was chatting I don’t think it is wrong. In class no, a private conversation in any language shouldn’t happening.

Full disclose, I am German and work for a company with around 1/4 of the staff being German. We only speak German to each other when there is no one else around or it is like everyone else chatting about what you did at the weekend.

When we have guests I normally speak English to DH (also a German) unless it comes out automatically but it may be more the line “please get us more wine please”.

I suppose all the people who think it's rude always learn languages when they travel abroad. Always. And never expect people to speak English to them...

@Unusualsuspicion oh yeah, I agree that's rude but my office has 40 people speaking about 14 languages. we have people grouped by languages and obviously they chatter a bit to people alongside them. If not just one on one chatting its usually english you hear. One manager who complained a lot was an english only speaker who'd spot two french people having a chat over the other side of the office and complain it should be English. Her theory was they may be complaining about the job / management and she wouldn't hear it. I never got why she thought she had a right to hear people's private comments even if they were complaining about something work related.

In a small class situation like that I think it’s rude. Similar to whispering I think.
If English speakers are abroad then they should make every effort to speak the local language too.

If it was loud enough that people (C) couldn't keep up with the teacher, then C is not unreasonable in complaining about the conversation.

Regardless, what language A and B were using is none of C's business. C was not entitled to know what A and B were talking about.

I would only consider it rude, if they were in a group and excluding others from the conversation.

PS - it's not a good idea to claim to be here since penis beaker, because that's not really that ancient, and everyone knows MN has gone to the dogs thanks to people who joined in at about that time.

Something I think a lot of English-only speakers don't understand is that each person in your life has a language assigned to them in your brain.

If you've always spoken Swedish (as an example) with your husband, trying to switch to English even in a group environment is SO strange and unnatural. Your personality is nuanced in each language and the way you apply vocabulary is probably slightly different too. If you don't speak a second language fluently, you might not understand that.

If A and B have always spoken to each other in that language, then it will have been an automatic switch.

I don't agree with leaving people out though if you're in a group, that's super rude and you should speak the most common language amongst you.

I'm Scottish and I've been to a yoga class taught in Italian in Italy where I live, with a German friend who also lives here in Italy. Our mutual language is English and sometimes in the classes when it's appropriate to chat, we chat in English, knowing full well others around us probably don't speak English. Is this percieved as rude?

I am not british and have another language as my mother tongue.
I find that sort of situation very difficult.

If I meet up with someone who speaks the same language and we are surrounded by other people who only speak english, I can ALWAYS feel that they think its unaceptable. Anything from automatically thinking you must be talking about them, feeling excluded, feeling that ypu ought to speak english etc etc even if the discussion has nothing to do with them. This has even been the case when I was speaking to my dcs and they 3 or 5 yo so very clearly not doing anything other than 'dont put your finger in your nose' type of conversation.

On the other side, if everyone was having a private conversation, then why shoud I have to have that conversation in english? Is that not xenophobic/racist/telling me the only way to be 'integrated' in the country is if you only speak english ever and do everything the english way?
Sometimes, it is also easier to have a conversation in your mother tongue if you are struggling with a certain concept (eg if I was learning another language, I would probably appreciate someone to talk about the grammar in my language because it is not the sort of vocabulary I have in english)

In that particular situation, the issue would be, imo, more about the fact they thought it was ok to have a private conversation rather than the language used so the techer was right in her approach. Person C thought just display a very common british attitude towards foreigners and foreign language, one that is not that inclusive after all....

A&B weren’t talking about anyone in the class, just general chat, the same as all of us do with the people we sit close to

How do you know? Can you speak the same language as A and B?

but if you don’t understand what is being said how do you know if it a private conversation?

The question is, when you eardrop other people conversations, how often are they talking about you? Why is that people automatically think that if someone speaks in another language its autoimatically to say something bad about them rather than the most innocent conversation 99% of people have?

Sorry you feel like that in @NomDeDieu, I've heard so many accounts of bullshit like that.

You clearly speak English very well, so I'd say carry on, and if someone dares to pick you up on it, have a perfectly English response ready. You should certainly be able to chat to your children in your own language!

Why is that people automatically think that if someone speaks in another language its autoimatically to say something bad about them rather than the most innocent conversation 99% of people have?

To be perfectly candid, the only time my partner and I speak in our shared language is to talk about people in public without them hearing.

I feel really strongly about this. For context, I'm English and teach other languages, sometimes to adults.

Disclaimer: obviously it is never ok to use another language to deliberately exclude or be rude about someone who doesn't speak it.

I think that being offended by people like A&B in the OP is typical of an unpleasantly insular and suspicious attitude to foreign languages that is commonly found in England. Because of my job, I've known and worked with many multilingual people, some of whom have lived in countries where it's pretty common to speak several languages and switch between them frequently, depending on who's in the conversation.

As an MFL teacher I have battled against this attitude for my whole career. Kids who think English is 'normal' and other languages are 'weird'. Kids who find it excruciating to even attempt the accent of the language they are learning. Kids who are suspicious of/baffled by native speaker MFL teachers. It's not the kids' fault - they are just aren't used to being surrounded by languages and see them almost as some kind of conspiracy! As though they've been invented to confuse and exclude. I doubt you'd find that attitude to English being spoken in France, Germany etc.

^Shared foreign language that should be

@5foot5 and why assuming it was NOT general chichat?
When you are talking to your friends, are you usually sending your time slagging other people off or having a nice chichat with them?

Either people need to work on their self confidence tbh.
Or that sort of reaction says a lot about what happens behind close doors and they slag said foreigners out of ear shot.
Because otherwise I am really not sure why the automatic reaction is that those foreigners are automatically talking about them (and im assuming in a bad way too)

And even if someone is talking about you. Who cares? It doesn't actually matter.

For people who are properly bilingual the choice of language may not even be deliberate, it's an almost instinctive choice based on environmental and personal cues.

It takes a special sort of victimhood to find this offensive, although there are situations where it might be inconsiderate (eg where you are in a small group of bilingual people with one monolingual).

@lazylinguist, yep i can assure you that a native english speaker would not be treated like this in my country. Actually I have heard many brits complaining that they always switch to english and they cant practice their french.....

@leadbetter5 re your own experience. I think it depends what language you normally use to communicate with your dh.
If it is english, and you specifically switch then you ARE ecluding people. And then tbh, its not nice.
But many peope arent in that situation. maybe they are married to a brit and dont get to seak their langauge very often. A friend of mne met her (british) dh in france and their language together was and has always been french. Now that they are in the uk, why should they HAVE to switch to english when french is the langauge they speak everyday at home?
Another one is a mixed couple who spoke in english as it was their common langauge (none of them are british). Now that they are back living in italy, should they stop speaking english together (even though iatlian is not the other tongue of either of them)?
There are many mnay different reasons why people will speak anoither language together but I have to say people like yourself do not help other people at all.

I don't agree with leaving people out though if you're in a group, that's super rude and you should speak the most common language amongst you.

I reply to this mindful of the post from AlexaAmbidextra - and he/she was right - that was quite rude as he/she was hosting the event.

But in Wales when wanting to speak Welsh in a social setting - you often find that there is someone can't understand Welsh but only English. So everyone has to switch to English to avoid rudeness - very damaging to a minority language in its own land. Sometimes a little bit of standing up for oneself and one's culture is required. There was a time when welsh like Brythonic language were widely spoken in the whole of the UK.

Kids who are suspicious of/baffled by native speaker MFL teachers

There's something very wrong when kids who are learning foreign languages don't realise that the reason they are learning them is because people speak them in other countries.

I didn't learn any languages until I went to secondary school although we had a Teach Yourself French book at home which I occasionally looked at but had no idea of how you pronounced things. My first French teacher was British, but it wouldn't have surprised me if she had been French. There again, I'd read books like St Clares and Malory Towers, where Mam'selle was obviously French!