I think I've just experienced what it's like in England..

[Builtthiscityonsausagerolls]

To not be a native English speaker.

My natural first language is Welsh. I went to an English university and obviously have a native proficiency in English but when chatting im more comfortable in Welsh.

So... I'm on a train in the Midlands with a friend. Had a chatty conversation with the conducter in English, guy sitting across from us very friendly. The we switched to Welsh and the difference in attitude was immediate. Felt very hostile. Very hard to explain, but as soon as we switched languages it became almost threatening?

I'm used to speaking Welsh in maybe more border towns (mainly chester) where its quite common, but thinking about it not in 'deep' England :) 😀

We keep going over it, but the change in attitude was definitely when we changed language. Is this really the experienced of non-English speakers? The hostility really was quite overt

On your opening post you said it was threatening. How were you threatened?

@CounsellorTroi - don't believe me? It's a common practice in most primary schools. Out all of my friends who have children in schools in North Wales, only two do not have the same kind of monitoring/punishments and those are the ones closer to the border, where Welsh isn't as forced and it's more of an English/Welsh split in schools. Get into Gwynedd and Anglesey and to some extent Conwy and children will absolutely be punished for speaking English on the playground

Here you go @counsellorTroi, why don't you educate yourself

www.telegraph.co.uk/education/primaryeducation/9677976/Primary-school-children-punished-for-not-speaking-Welsh.html#:~:text=Children%20in%20some%20primary%20schools,Welsh%2C%20according%20to%20concerned%20parents.

It's the English you see. We're all racist violent wankers and mostly responsible for everything bad in the world that has ever happened and all the things which are going to happen.

Didn't you know?

@Progress2019

My daughter works in a hotel in Guernsey. Apart from her and one other, the staff are from two non English speaking countries (lots and lots of rivalry and bitterness between the staff groups too)

The rules state that English is to be spoken in public areas, but this seems to be ignored a lot. My daughter gets paranoid that she’s being talked about, and this isn’t helped that her name is a commonly used word in one of the languages!

I do think it looked rude.

A working/professional environment is different though. The OP is talking about a stranger on a train, with whom she was not required or expected to communicate. If he was paranoid about being talked about (which may or may not have been the case), that was his problem alone. People are entitled to communicate in their native language.

Perhaps he'd visited North Wales in the past and experienced people switching from English to Welsh in his presence and just thinks the Welsh are routinely rude.

[quote Autumndays123]@CounsellorTroi - don't believe me? It's a common practice in most primary schools. Out all of my friends who have children in schools in North Wales, only two do not have the same kind of monitoring/punishments and those are the ones closer to the border, where Welsh isn't as forced and it's more of an English/Welsh split in schools. Get into Gwynedd and Anglesey and to some extent Conwy and children will absolutely be punished for speaking English on the playground[/quote]
What form does this “punishment” take? Children in schools in Wales used to be punished for speaking Welsh. The Welsh Knot was a piece of wood on a string that a child speaking Welsh would be made to wear. Whoever was wearing it at the end of the day would be caned.

[quote Autumndays123]Here you go @counsellorTroi, why don't you educate yourself

www.telegraph.co.uk/education/primaryeducation/9677976/Primary-school-children-punished-for-not-speaking-Welsh.html#:~:text=Children%20in%20some%20primary%20schools,Welsh%2C%20according%20to%20concerned%20parents.[/quote]
Sorry that article is behind a paywall so I can’t read it.

I think he thought he was going to be having a chat with two women on the train, thought he was in there, then you started speaking Welsh and he got miffed. Just like if you'd turned to your friend and started speaking English, but pointedly ignoring him. Ie. It wasn't the language, but the exclusion that brought the hostility.

I really don’t get some of the comments here. OP’s first language is Welsh, why shouldn’t she speak it, she can switch to it whenever she wants to too.

I think this is all quite telling. If someone’s first language was Polish and they switched back into Polish after speaking to the conductor in English (which they had to, you know, to communicate) I’m sure people wouldn’t be making the comments that it was rude etc.

People are used to different languages in English due to immigration and tourism but I often hear about this attitude when it comes to Welsh. So what’s the difference?

I honestly think it’s because people are ignorant of the fact Welsh is a first language for a lot of people, people mistakenly see it as only a second language like it is used as a ‘secret code’ language or solely learnt and used to talk without being understood.

You often hear people say all huffy ‘then they changed to Welsh’ well yes, of course they spoke to you in English, so you’d understand, then changed back to their native language. You wouldn’t go to Germany and get put out because they reverted back to German.

There’s a lot of ignorance about our own (non-Anglo Saxon) native languages in this country it seems.

Carry on speaking Welsh OP it’s a beautiful language, the original language of a lot of ancient Britain and I for one don’t want to lose it for the sake of an ignorant few.

@CounsellorTroi as a Welsh person I am of course familiar with the Welsh not, I'm not sure why you've brought it up though. Are you trying to suggest because people were punished for speaking Welsh in the 19th century it has absolutely anything to do with children getting punished for speaking English in 2021?

Nevertheless, I will explain. The 2011 census showed the around 19% of people in Wales could speak Welsh. In an effort to increase the number of speakers, the Welsh government changed the language of the schools (again we are talking about the north) and pushed for Welsh to be at the forefront. Whilst I agree this is important to stop the language dying out, they attempted to do it through coercion. The punishments my daughter received for speaking English (other than being bullied because English was 'naughty') included being excluded from playtime, being refused to use the toilet until she asked in Welsh (as reported in the article I linked) and I was spoken to in parents evening quite severely because the teacher was 'concerned' my child was speaking in English on the playground with another international child.

Other examples of trying to force out the English language included making many, many jobs Welsh mandatory. This meant that regardless of whether you had amazing skills and experience, if you could not speak Welsh, you would not get the job. The only places you wouldn't see this practice was universities, hospitals, the police etc. Although I do believe the police were moving towards that when I left. I remember it being most frustrating for English students who attended Welsh universities and then could not find employment afterwards because the basic Welsh language skills they learned were not 'good enough'.

Before arguing with strangers on the internet and disagreeing with their experiences based on what appears to be absolutely nothing, why don't you do a bit of research and try and equip yourself with a better knowledge on the subject.

Sorry that article is behind a paywall so I can’t read it

AndI have tried to find other articles saying the same thing but had no joy. If you can I would be interested to see them.

@rifling

I'm guessing all the people who have a problem with this are monolingual!

I imagine so too. I don’t get this new emphasis on the switching being the problem either. It happens very naturally when a couple or group talking together have more than one common language. It really isn’t the terrible faux pas presented here.

I used to work in a company where everyone spoke a couple of languages and about half of the employees were not from the UK. The dominant language was English because it was common to all, but if a Dutch speaker went up to another Dutch speaker they’d talk in Dutch. It was entirely normal to be sitting next to or opposite a conversation going on that you couldn’t understand, and it really wasn’t an issue for anyone!

@Hathertonhariden

Perhaps he'd visited North Wales in the past and experienced people switching from English to Welsh in his presence and just thinks the Welsh are routinely rude.

A perfect example.

I know you wouldn’t have this opinion of French people if they spoke French in your presence in France, or spoke English then reverted back to their language, in their country.

Why is this? Is it because you don’t believe Welsh is a first language in part of Wales. You think it’s English and everyone has switched to their second language just to spite you?

it is likely he wanted peace and quiet

I lived in North Wales for 24 years (many moons ago) and was a frequent visitor to Liverpool City centre during that time. You would regularly hear Welsh spoken - especially on a Thursday which was known as Welsh shopping day). I then moved to Chester - plenty of Welsh shoppers there too. I now live in another border town and hear a few Welsh speakers when visiting Shrewsbury.

I was on a train yesterday (travelling cross border) - didn't hear any Welsh spoken but did snigger to myself upon hearing the guy in the seat across from md on his phone saying to the caller "I don't know where I am, somewhere in Wales". He was most definitely in England at the time and wasn't due to cross the border into Wales for another hour+. I suppose chatting in Welsh would have further added to his confusion!

As you said you hadn't engaged in conversation with the other passenger then I would say you were free to talk in whatever language you like to your friend. If you had engaged with him then I would consider speaking Welsh in front of him to be rude.

@Goldi321

Hm, I wonder if he thought you were talking about him? My DH family speak English and Welsh and it makes you a bit paranoid when people suddenly go from speaking English in a group to speaking Welsh between themselves knowing you can’t understand. A bit like 2 people whispering when you are in the room. I’ve got over my paranoia somewhat but still find it a bit rude…

I think this is it.

@CounsellorTroi

Sorry that article is behind a paywall so I can’t read it

AndI have tried to find other articles saying the same thing but had no joy. If you can I would be interested to see them.

The internet is full of articles. I'm not spending my day spoonfeeding them all to you, but here is another

www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/pupils-caught-speaking-english-will-be-punished-1453709

My piano teacher and her daughter were Welsh speaking and I wasn't. They used to talk in Welsh in front of me all the time. It didn't occur to me to be offended. Yes I was excluded from the conversation, but so what? I always assumed it was stuff they didn't want me to hear. Again, so?

People should also think through the natural consequences of ‘switching’ being some awful taboo - it will discourage people from speaking other languages at all since it is so natural to switch between them. Entrenching English more and more as a result. Then we get to the sad stage some posters have already reported on here where even speaking another language in earshot of English speakers is avoided in case they’re thought rude.

The more I think about it, the more I think it is totally unreasonable to pander to those who feel excluded and slighted by hearing people speaking other languages, including when they switch back and forth!

@Alaimo

I'm a non-native English speaker but have mostly lived in bigger cities so when i speak my native language people probably just assume I'm a tourist.

In my experience is only monolingual (English) speakers who equate speaking in your own language with being gossiped about. Most people i know who speak more than 1 language understand that sometimes it's just easier to speak in your native language.

Absolutely. I'm a native English speaker but I speak other languages too and this attitude ("oh, they're obviously talking about me") has always baffled me.

I think some monolingual people genuinely don't appreciate how mentally tiring it is to speak a language that's not your mother tongue, even if you speak it "fluently" you still need a break from time to time. Also as PP have said, sometimes you switch without really noticing.

It is quite rude to switch languages to something others can't understand when you're proficient in the "common" language

@Autumndays123 this thing about Welsh mandatory jobs is nonsense. I worked in the civil service for 30 years including in recruitment and while some jobs were advertised as Welsh desirable very few were mandatory. My organisation had as many non Welsh speakers as Welsh speakers.

As you will see, the article I linked shows a school who operate a 'three strike' system for children who are caught speaking English on the playground. Punishments include suggested expulsion.

Back to my main point though, I have been to many places in the world and Wales is definitely up there with the most xenophobic. I say that as a Welsh person whose entire family ancestry is Welsh. I think that is probably the starting point for conversation, not whether someone's body language may or may not have changed when you switched languages mid conversation 🙄

I think it's s peculiarly English trait to get so get up about, because the overwhelming majority of English people only speak English. In so many other countries, people speak two, three or more languages.