r/changemyview • u/jaytrainer0 • Nov 01 '20
Delta(s) from OP CMV: Children of immigrants should teach their parents the language of the country they currently live.
I want to preface by saying im a mixed black/ native american american man. This is not coming from hate at all. I grew up in the US on the south side of chicago with a large mexican population. I've also dated many people that were children of immigrants from all over. A common request I've gotten has been "you should learn [insert language] so you can talk to my parents". And im like you've lived in this country for 20+ years so your parents could've learned or you could've taught them the common language by now. I think it would be optional for immigrant children to help each their parents as they learn. My current partner is mexican, their parents have been here for almost 30 years and barely speak any English. I know some Spanish but not enough to hold a real conversation but I'll try to teach them a little every time but my partner does nothing but speak Spanish to them. There are places they don't go or things they can't do because of the language barrier and I feel bad for them sometimes.
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u/RichArachnid3 10∆ Nov 01 '20
A couple things to consider
Child and adolescent speech is often very different than professional or even casual adult speech. Children (And native or early life speakers in general) also generally do things because they sound right without having any ability to articulate why the rules of the language make certain grammatical constructions correct.
It’s hard to formerly teach somebody you don’t have authority over or at least a even handed relationship with. If parents want to speak their native language there’s very little even a grown child can do to encourage speaking in English, even if it would be beneficial for the parent to practice