The 8th President of the United States Spoke English as a Second Language

[ProudLib72]

I did not know this until I did some digging around on multilingual presidents. Martin Van Buren's first language was Dutch. He was also the first president to be born and American citizen. This must be problematic for the English only people.

[John Fante]

1. What's Trump's first language? It sure as hell ain't English.

[yonder]

3. his first language is "ME"

[lunasun]

2. Not really ,he was white, & he did not come from a shithole country , it's only 700 mi from Norway!

Plus speak English now days isn't for thier own sweet European nana who prefers her first language
No that is not who they mean

[IluvPitties]

4. On point! The problem is with people of color.

[ProudLib72]

8. Yep.

It's not about English. It's about POC. Woe to those who are dark skinned and speak Arabic. That is likely to get you killed!

[Igel]

5. How so?

When in Brno I found that while touristic areas accommodated German, it was otherwise a Czech-only town.

In fact, it's as I suspected when I opted for studying Czech there. I didn't want to have a reservoir of English-speakers to fall back upon, a comfort zone or safety net. I had no choice but to chow down on a lot of vocabulary, and for every single interaction for any purpose whatsoever conduct everything entirely and only in Czech.

Having Czech as the language for public interaction didn't mean I suddenly forgot English. Nor did it mean I didn't use English in my personal life--I had Internet access, and kept abreast of what was going on in the US, checked email, even from time to time helped some English student with his/her English. But if I wanted to order a beer, figure out where a store was, order food, or simply sit and talk to somebody at a pivnice or figure out how to extend my visa, it had to be in Czech. I was the visitor. And believe me, I was motivated to learn vocabulary, practice my Czech, and acquire auditory skills. It was that or die.

To expect them to accommodate my English would be to expect them to accommodate the Spanish, Italian, French, German, Russian, Vietnamese, Cambodian, Igbo, and a dozen other languages. Why should they be burdened with this huge cumbersome task simply for staying put in their own town and expecting to uphold their own, indigenous culture, while I and people from dozens of other ethnicities get to bask in being served. I chose to impose myself on them; why should they be punished for my choice?

So this seemed reasonable to me. And to most other people over time. Consequently, Van Buren is the norm for much of the US' history. He's not an exception, nor is he somehow disconfirmation. Потому что, не все хотят выучиться нескольким языкам. Vita brevis, ars longa, etc.

[ProudLib72]

7. I'm talking about the xenophobia of the English only movement

It has nothing to do with respect for America. It's outright bigotry. Somehow I cannot picture people yelling, "Speak American or go home!" when Van Buren's parents came to visit and they spoke in Dutch with their son.

[Blue_true]

6. Citizenship.

Because of the native born clause in the Constitution, many Americans of many generations may be from illegal parents. My dad was an immigrant and my mom was generations native born. In my family, how my dad ended up here is a bit sketchy, paperwork, but not ironclad paperwork.

[ProudLib72]

9. Back then everyone was an immigrant

They were well aware of that fact. And anti-immigrant sentiment is not new either. Once the Italians are accepted, they can pick on the Irish or the Germans or the whomever. But it is interesting, to me at least, that there was a point in our history when someone who grew up speaking a language other than English could become president and no one batted an eye.

[Hekate]

10. At the founding of the nation there was a real debate over whether we should speak German...

There were a lot of Germans around, and some sentiment that we might want to cast off the language of Britain along with everything else.

English-only bigots, like all bigots, are the most ignorant people around.