SleepyBanana

Desi folks working with people in the US suck at English! Why?

From my experience, I see 7 out of 10 desi people working with people in the US suck at English, some despite living there for 5, 6, 7 years or even more.

And the reason I call them mediocre is they don’t even realize how bad they are at English. They take their non-native English speaking background as an entitlement to suck at English.

What irks me more is desi people communicate with their clients & counterparts in the US but still don’t realize the need for polishing their English language skills.

“English is not my native language but I will work with native English speakers, and suck at English.” How is this fair?

What’s your experience like?

17mo ago

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BouncyBurrito

Stealth17mo

I disagree with you. Many of them may not be able to correct their grammar so late into corporate.

Just understand that white people are working with desi people because they are cheap and good at their work. They don’t give two fucks about who’s speaking how.

I have been dealing with US and Europeans since last 8 years and yes my English has drastically improved but it doesn’t mean I have the right to shit on people who can’t.

Have you ever spoken with Russians or Germans or a Brazilian? They are worse in English than us and yet they are proud of that.

SleepyBanana

Stealth17mo

I appreciate your views. I do understand how hard it is for us to pick up language skills. I am myself no better than an average English speaker. I too make mistakes inadvertently. But I consciously make a point to go back to all my communications and try to improve bit by bit. And I have spoken with Russians, Chinese and Germans. The former two suck it up with their slang, accent and grammar. The Germans though, communicate much better, at least their grammar and sentence construction are near perfect. It’s the usage of intonation patterns that makes it sound like a non native speaker. But this is purely what I have experienced. Your experience might be different.

Other non-English speaking countries aside, I feel Indians always carry a reputation of adapting themselves to learn English. I know whites don’t care much but that doesn’t give us entitlement to suck at English.

Furthermore, my concern is especially towards the attitude of people playing Manager roles & above. What good are they when they don't even realize their command on language but behave as if they are statesmen?

FloatingRaccoon

Oracle17mo

As far as I know, German and English have similarities compared to Russian and Chinese. That may be the reason why Germans are able to speak good English compared to the rest of the counterparts you mentioned.

SqueakyCoconut

Porter17mo

Hard disagree here. I had the same opinion when I got out of college and got into my first job at an Israeli company. But experience changed my views.

Only in India we are so much obsessed about English. I see comments that equate English fluency with competence.

Have worked with Israelis, Germans, Spanish, French, Brazilian, Chilean and Ukrainian and Canadian people across two of my previous companies.

None of them gives a shit about how their English sounds as much as we do. And I have seen that most Indians speak better English than non-English speaking Europeans. What matters is how good they are at their jobs and can they communicate reasonably well? Even white people are not as judgmental about others not speaking English well since they know it is not their first language.

Remember, English != Competence. And vice-versa.

SleepyBanana

Stealth17mo

Nowhere in my post did I equate English with competence. And it is excuses like these that make most desi people live in denial about their non articulation in English.

People from the non English countries you mentioned, don’t brag about knowing English. We Indians leave nothing to brag about knowing English only to give excuses later citing our nativity. That’s the problem I want to highlight.

“Whites don’t care about the English we speak, so I will suck at it”, is the attitude we desi people carry to not work on improvement.

By the way, I have seen 3 out of 10 desi people articulate so well despite passing out from ordinary schools in India. If they can realize and improve, why can’t other desi people?

Remember “English != Competence” cannot be an excuse to suck at English.

SleepyBanana

Stealth17mo

If desi meetings are conducted in English, if desi people exchange emails in English, if desi people insert English words when speaking in their native language, then is it not fair to expect some minimum standard?

PeppyRaccoon

Vercel17mo

Can you give an example? Is it like completely broken English?

SleepyBanana

Stealth17mo

Here are some common mistakes I noticed:

“I can’t able to hear you”,
“I didn’t had any chance to go through this issue”, “I listened this audio recording”

Some people use too many fillers, “you should try this approach, no, because you know, this should save time, actually”

PeppyRaccoon

Vercel17mo

Wow. This is pretty bad. I wouldn't expect someone with decent experience to speak like this. Nowadays, people automatically think broken Indian English = scammer

SillyPretzel

Microsoft17mo

Maybe you could work on your own punctuations and usage of commas and periods.

BubblyCupcake

Stealth17mo

I swear! Using a full stop after a space at the end is fucking infuriating

BubblyCupcake

Stealth17mo

Like this .

GoofyDonut

Stealth17mo

Hey, it’s not just desi folks. Plenty of Americans don’t know basics of grammar. Iirc some statistics show Americans speak 0.8 languages on average lol

Collect content for r/engrish 😆

SleepyBanana

Stealth17mo

That’s an interesting perspective! But how does that justify desi people who suck at English? Are we comparing bad with worse and trying to justify the state of being worse? Come on, this is not done.

PS: I have seen so many native English speakers using the Grammarly app. That goes to show their humility and urge to learn.

GoofyDonut

Stealth17mo

Woah dude calm down. English has a lot of variants, if they folks they’re communicating with understand what they’re saying, there is no reason for them to change.
A lot of these people learnt English much later in life, from non native speakers themselves, unlike say us, who picked it more from western media and the likes.

Maybe they could converse better, but if there’s no reason for them to spend energy doing so, why would they. Kind of like asking your doctor to write the prescriptions in a human readable, not pharmacist readable font

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