English Superiority Complex Questioned

I know all 3 of you who are reading had been anxiously awaiting my next post. Stop staring anxiously at your computer screen while hitting the refresh button. It's here.

If it had simply been laziness, I might apologize for my tardiness. But it most definitely was not that. I was actually on a short backpacking trip in Europe with some friends. We went to Paris, Nice and Rome.

A splendid time it was. But since this isn't a travel blog, I won't bore you with details of the 3 am bike ride around Paris, our late night jam with a

Senegalese bongo player on the streets of Nice, or the best Italian food ever in...yep, Italy. I will narrow my focus to linguistics. Specifically French.

I found out that most French people don't like speaking English. Many don't know it and have no desire to change. And that's fine by me. I've gotten over my disdain of French people for their linguistic stubborness. I may still disdain them for other reasons, but that's another story.

I don't expect myself to learn Arabic or Russian in order to communicate with the many people around me who speak those languages. Why should I demand that of the French?

We Americans have an implicit, subconsious sense that everyone in the world should speak our language. And especially Europeans. That is somehow a given to us. Going to France was a slap in the face for me. A healthy slap in the face.

When I travel, I try to take one lesson or insight from each place I visit. This was my French lesson. Only after this visit did I realize how deeply ingrained this linguistic superiority complex is within me. I haven't yet shed myself of this nasty habit, but now I'm much more aware of it.

It especially hit me at the Louvre.

I love the historical element of museums. That sounds funny, but it's true. At museums, I end up spending more time reading the historical background than I do looking at pictures.

But at the Louvre, these text displays are only in one language. French. I didn't know anything about any of the pictures I was looking at! It was terrible. I was forced to actually appreciate them as works of art.

And that's hard to do when you're looking at amateur stuff like the Mona Lisa. Au revoir!