WHY DO POLES USE ENGLISH WORDS IN CONVERSATION?

Do you honestly believe Polish is 100% just Polish?
"Co za pech!"
Ask BB where that word comes from :)
(also many words of tools etc have the same origin)

My Polish landlady yesterday was shouting to her 9 years old son (the boy speaks in English only) - Open the door, ty glupi idioto!

I completely agree with you guys who are against the use of those words, it is quite annoying, but what I dont understand is why when Polish people leave Poland to go to, lets say the UK or the US, when they come back they act like they have forgotten to speak polish, I just don't get it. What is so cool about that, what is so cool about speaking English?

I am 100% polish, i speak polish fluently, and I have lived in various countries. So I can say that I have been around. I used to have this "polish pride" and got so angry when someone said something bad about Poland or Polish people. The more time I spent around Polish people and living in Poland,(im including my family sadly) I realized that I too dont like Polish people myself. Now I am generally ashamed to be Polish, the only good thing about being polish is having a EU passport. The more time i spent around polish people, I realized that they are by far the most negative and backward thinking group of people I have ever met. They confront everything with a negative and realist perspective. All they do is complain, mainly about life, politics, and money. If they spent as much energy on actually taking a risk in life or doing something great as they do on complaining, perhaps Poland would be a stronger nation today. I would agree with anyone who argues Polish people are very well educated, in all actuality they are among the top 5 most educated young people in Europe. The problem is due to their backward mentality all that education will mean nothing in the end. This does not pertain to every Pole, but I can safely say the majority. Through out history they have been whiners, it is probable because of that history they became that way, which is OK, but I mean after, now what 60+ years after the war, people are still crying about something. Whether it is the Russians did this or the Germans did that, SO WHAT!!! Any person who lives in the past during the present will never enjoy a future. And to say that, to not like polish people is being a racist, is quite the outrageous statement. As polish people are probably the one of the most racist nations in all of Europe. so haha to sum it up im acting really polish right now, by complaining about something. sorry for that.

It's an attempt to look smart and it's often an epic fail unless in a classroom environment where they are trying to produce certain language.

Language is changing and you will see more and more borrowing from English. There's nothing wrong in that as it's an evolutionary process.

Sometimes it happens not coz people want to be seen as cool. When a person uses two languages the same time often it is hard to use one word in the exact meaning in which it has in the other language so people chose the easiest option and use the foreign word. But that's laziness, true.

And in some cases when you use one language mostly and u have little or no contact with your native language then you forget some words etc But that's natural, i think.

I also noticed from experience that sometimes i use English words (or Polish when talking English) and i dont realise that. I dont know if anyone has the same?

No, you are just mad ;) ;) Just kidding, I do the same! Sometimes I know a word in Polish and can't remember it in English.

Damn, u could break the news in a more sensitive way :P

Was it news to you? ;) Some of those Poles that use English are just calling on what they have been taught in the past. You know, when you have seen much of the world, why should you confine your focus to seeing one object as only one name? You know, must it always be a chair? Can't it be krzesło, isu, chaise or stuehl?

The point is, be respectful to your audience and don't try to outdo people by going over their heads. That achieves very little!

Well, i dont think people chose really what words to use, it just happens - when u speak english (or polish) most of the time, when u think in english/polish (that's the condition of being fluent in a language - u dont translate, u think in the language) then the word comes to ur mind (or straight to ur mouth?) and that's it. You realise what you said when u look at the faces of people whom u were talking to :P

I live in Belgrade, and my friends are more and more using english words in everyday communication. I honestly don't understand this phenomenon when we have in our language words that are almost completely equivalent.

Unfortunately, we all are witnesses of language colonisation, general anglization? Visible in culture (music, movies, fortunately literature is still not giving up) noticeable everywhere, especially in those countries that don't have a critical standpoint towards the powerful ones.

It's not just a simple evolutionary process, it is a consequence of subordinated positions other non english nations have.That explains why for example, turkish language is not present in german, as much as english, although one million turks live there. Their social -economical status is not allowing them to fertilize german with more turcisms (not counting few words for fast food). Similar situation is visible in french that's not influenced by arabic, english untouched by ex colonies languages, etc.

I see this only in terms of domination-subordination.
Also, that is I guess, the explanation why i do not speak a single word chinese evn though 20.000 are living within a few km distance. English I can see on every corner.

So, with apologies for the length of this post, I will finish with this question:
Why native english speakers don't use polish, german, russian or swedish words ?

Buhahahaha that made my day


Because they have so many French ones that it's killing them ;)

It is not about domination. It is about assimilation policy of brits, frenchs and latins.
Look. Ottomans have controlled balkans and arab lands for more than 500 years, but, Balkan people (except Turks immigrated to Balkans) and Arabs don't speak Turkish at all. Even Ottomans themselves used Arabic words (assimilated themselves.)

Lets look at the English, French and Latins.

Wherever Brits invaded in the history even for a short time, the first thing they did has been to apply their assimilation policy which is about language and soccer (remember first thing they did in Iraq after invasion. We see photos of Brits and Iraqs playing football.)

Look at Frenchs. They invaded Algeria, Tunusia, etc for only a few decades and folks there speak French like their mother languages, even as official languages.

Latins. Spainish and Portugesee. Most of central and south america speak these languages, almost forgotten their old languages.

It is a long term policy of these countries.. Nowadays, it is more indirectly, invisibly.. Look at your governments (ministry of educations) under their influences of them. Good or bad for Britain and your country? Worse is happening to Brits cause of Britain (now, with USA) policy. Ok, it is another issue..

That's a mistake.
South slavic languages are FULL of turkish words, especially parts of south and central Serbia, FYR Macedonia, Montenegro and of course Bosnia and Herzegovina were it's flowerishing again ( thanks to islamization of that part of ex YU).

Turkish words we use everyday, not knowing mostly that they were implanted here during turkish invasion and occupation of southern Europe.
So, turkish words are still here, disappearing slowely but definetly from serbian,and now we
have a different sovereign and new influence.

I think we said the same thing.

Using words from other languages is a thing, speaking another language is totally another thing. What i said was Balkan people including Serbs never spoken Turkish even though this region was under control of Ottomans for 500 years. Same for Arabs. None of them have spoken Turkish at all even in 500 years. Ottomans had this power, could force education ministries of the time in these regions. But, no, they didnt do that. They didnt do anything to religions either. Remember in Ottoman ruling, Christians were ruled according to Christianity by churches in their inside relations and Jews were ruled according to Jewish rules in their inside relations and Muslims were ruled according to Islam. If Brits or Frenches or Latins controlled these lands for 500 years, your official or mother languages would be English or French or Spainish today.. Sure there are some minorities like Bosnians who converted to Muslims, but, they are only a minority and even Bosnians dont speak Turkish. Most of people speaking Turkish in Balkans are those Turks (descendents of Seljuk Turks, another tribe that was power pre-ottoman turkic kayi tribe) who were forcefully moved by ottomans to Balkans to weaken Seljuk Turks in Anatolia..

Btw, most of Turkic words in Slavic languages come from Khazar State (800-1000), a Turkic country with Jewish Turks, Christian Turks, Muslim Turks and Shaman Turks. Biggest minority in that powerful country of the time was Slavs. So, interaction of Slavs with Turks is older history than Ottomans who actually used Arabic language more than their own language Turkish.

Do cholery jasnej! I just noticed that onet.pl uses the term "live" like for "live broadcast" etc. You can't use the word "na żywo"?? Debile.

I can see that you would like that we don't understand each other.
Sorry, but we are on the same side.
I agree with you.
Ich stimme zu.
Slazem se.

I disagreed about that..


What Turkish words? Most of them are Arabic words due to Islam character of Ottomans.

Sure there are turkish words such as "yoghurt", but, it was spreaded everywhere long time ago before ottomans. There are real turkish words there, but, it was not due to ottomans, but dates back to khazar state i mentioned above.

Returning to topic by relating. What i saying is poles (like all other countries) are using english words due to assimilation policy of britain, now with usa.. education ministries of many countries are under their control of usa now. good for americans? no, they are staying like kids not understanding folks of other places of the world.. hence, their dominations are short periods.

That's a funny choice of words. ;) I'm yet to meet a smart idiot. LOL

Explain please

You are like a basketball player for a chinese. Would you like to be with a man with a height of 210 cm/7' ? Chinese is a spoken language by about 1.5 billion, most spoken language in the world. If domination is about language, Chinese is most dominant in the world now then.

oh that made me chuckle hahahaha xD

*its the little things that do*

Wrong, there are Indian words in our language.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_English_words_of_Hindi_or_Urdu_origin

Your version of English drives people nuts, but we don't start threads about it.

Oh, but they do use words from other languages. Russian words, like Quark, Turkish words like Yoghurt and loads of Indian words like Bungalow, Shampoo and a few others. This is a process that has been going on for decades if now centuries. English uses also a lot of Dutch words, like the Russians do as well. Nearly all maritime terms in Russian are derived from Dutch. Kajoet, Sjtoerman and so on. It depends on the level of trade countries have with eachother and how influential a certain country is.

It's also a hegemonial thing. France tried to retrieve political hegemony twice, but failed. However, it did achieve cultural hegemony: French was up to 1914 the standard diplomatic language, loads of French things were taken over, also words. I am sure you can think of some French words which seem very normal nowadays, but are French in origin. The current usage of English words is not thanks to the UK, but thanks to the hegemony of the US. It's because of the power of the US that we use more and more English words, not because of Britain. Britain hasn't been a true worldpower for the last 70 years and even longer, so the influence on that part is neglectable.

As far as Serbia and Poland (and most other former communist states, except Russia), they are basically forced to swim quicker in the stream in order to get on par with the Western European countries, so lately everything has been going over there at a much higher pace than anywhere else. And this includes language too. It's not an external attempt of taking over a country's culture, just the normal flow of things. I would say get used to it, it makes no sense to resist it; you'll fight a losing battle.

>^..^<

M-G (just received a huge bottle of wodka from his Russian neighbour)

Impressive list ;)

polish is a crap language, no serious people other than poles speak it, most poles given half the chance will switch to English in a flash...go figure

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_English_words_of_Dutch_origin

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_English_words_of_Polish_origin

A few more lists.

Edit: who would've thought that Mannequin is actually Dutch in origin? :)

>^..^<

M-G (see how long the list of words of Dutch origin is?)

.

hehe.....Friendly advise, but unfriendly message in essance.


That others also don't percieve it as a normal flow, and don't see it as a lost battle, is visible by attempts (with some success) in WESTERN european countries fighting to preserve their own language and identity via legislation that's taking care of presence of english language in media.

France, Germany, Spain.....
Right?

But there you name the worst. Those are also the ones who dub all the foreign tv shows and films and so on, making it very hard for their citizen to communicate when going abroad. Although the Germans, and to a lesser extend the French are doing ok.

>^..^<

M-G (nuff said)

I have to agree there. In those countries were TV-shows aren't being dubbed, people are exposed to other languages and therefore, these people find it much easier to communicate in another language.

Even those of us who watch "The Bold and the Beautiful" on a daily basis and thus (at the peril of being slaughtered here), aren't the most intelligent under us, are still exposed to English every day and therefore, something is bound to "linger" in their brains.

In practically every country where they dub television shows or movies or where they have a lektor, the general knowledge of languages is poor, to say the least.