Does anyone speak english in italy

Italy ranked among the worst at speaking English in Europe #ExpatLife I did not make this video to offend anyone or to cause drama. Mar Did you know English is by far the world's most studied language? And that 20% of the world speaks it? Read on to learn more interesting facts. Leire Laboreo, Sales Team leader of EF English Live in Spain. What does the ranking mean? european trends. In the latest edition of.|#|

Here is a good summary of the prevalence of English as a whole across Italy and in the major cities:. Only Romans have a reputation for being grumpy, and that really only happens much in the heat of the late summer ;.

A pocket dictionary should suffice…or a list printed out and taken with you of some important words and phrases. And other good account of the general low level of English speakers from a native Italian:. Only the high-end stores and restaurants have employees who speak English. In places like Sweden on Holland you can pretty much count on anyone on the street understanding English and being able to reply easily — not so much in the Mediterranean countries.

Put simply, if you are dealing with people who are dealing with tourists a lot in the main cities, you should be mostly fine. Elsewhere you cannot really count on English being widely spoken and having some basic Italian will really help you. Here is a quick overview of the reported prevalence of English speakers in different Italian cities commonly visited by tourists and businessmen.

Take each comment as a summary of the most common general tourist account of how widely spoken English is in each city. Rome — The vast majority of the people on the well worn tourist paths will know enough English to do their jobs. This includes staff in hotels, restaurants, and tourist shops and destinations.

Less so in more general supermarkets, shops and out of the main tourist centers. Romans also appreciate tourists making at least a basic effort with some Italian words and phrases — see further below for more on this.

Florence — Has a higher level of English proficiency, one of the highest in the country along with Milan. Has lots of English speaking students and tourists, and so people are more ready to communicate in English. Staying in the center of Florence, you can easily get by just using English. Milan — Again reasonably high levels of English speakers compared to the rest of Italy, since it is an international business hub and has a lot of well educated people there who will have been taught some English.

Will usually be at least one person nearby who speaks English, even if you have to ask a few different people. Venice — Receives millions of English speaking tourists each year so English proficiency is decent enough to a basic level in the main central tourist areas and hotels, restaurants, museums etc. Leave a Reply Cancel reply Enter your comment here Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:. Email required Address never made public.

Name required. Previous Post French: the language of high gastronomy and more. Next Post Seeking asylum and working in Ireland. Follow Following. Polyglot's Corner Join other followers. Sign me up. Already have a WordPress. Log in now. Loading Comments On my first day, another student and I were looking for a bank. In slightly broken Italian, he asked a few locals where he could find one.

As someone who was personally terrified at the thought of no one outside the school speaking my first language, I was dumbfounded. It certainly seems that Italy is more foreign language-friendly than America. Italian is the native language for Italy, but around 29 percent of the population speaks English.

In America, where Spanish is the second most commonly spoken language, when you count native speakers and Spanish students, only about 16 percent of the population speak it. And remember the recent Senate bill in the United States that would overhaul the immigration system? One of the requirements for undocumented immigrants to get citizenship would be to learn English. All this strikes me as odd — the country seen as a symbol of freedom for all other countries would be less friendly to foreign speakers.

Why is that? As a consequence, less resources are dedicated to foreign languages. On the other hand, it is worth highlighting that many students and workers are moving abroad, in order to find a higher level job or education. Nevertheless, I think that you centered two major points of the issue.

I leave my email, please feel free to get in touch with me! Your email address will not be published. I have read and agree to the Privacy Policy. November 15, The Italian Fish Stand. Italy Not Italy. Renaissance Gardens in Europe: Connecting Eras. Long Reads. How To Fight Fascism Again. Never The Last. The Never Ending Present. Share Tweet. Italians are the worst English speakers in Europe The last English Proficiency Index report by Education First — an international education organization specialized in language training and cultural exchanges — not so surprisingly ranked Italy significantly well below the first place, namely 36th out of countries.

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