Idk about the Polish and Germans personally, but for the Netherlands at least it’s a relatively small country with a limited amount of entertainment made there, so a ton of media is imported and subtitled. Since a lot of it comes from the US and UK, and most of it is subtitled (for the most part only kids’ shows are dubbed over), the majority of people speak or at least understand English. According to Wikipedia, it has been estimated that as much as 90% to 97% of the population is proficient in English.
Also English, French and German are part of you high school curriculum next to Dutch so at least you get a basic understanding of 3 other languages, of the 3 English is the one that sticks the most because of the aforementioned media that gets imported.
Belgium alone has 3 official languages: French, Dutch and a German speaking part.
The French part refuses to learn any of the other official languages, even in school. They don’t see the need.
While the other parts are a lot more open to other languages. You will be hard pressed to find someone in Flanders that doesn’t speak French on top of their Dutch.
Miaou@jlai.lu 6 days ago
Why would the Dutch/Polish/Germans speak more languages?
dalekcaan@feddit.nl 5 days ago
Idk about the Polish and Germans personally, but for the Netherlands at least it’s a relatively small country with a limited amount of entertainment made there, so a ton of media is imported and subtitled. Since a lot of it comes from the US and UK, and most of it is subtitled (for the most part only kids’ shows are dubbed over), the majority of people speak or at least understand English. According to Wikipedia, it has been estimated that as much as 90% to 97% of the population is proficient in English.
Nugscree@lemmy.world 5 days ago
Also English, French and German are part of you high school curriculum next to Dutch so at least you get a basic understanding of 3 other languages, of the 3 English is the one that sticks the most because of the aforementioned media that gets imported.
Honytawk@discuss.tchncs.de 5 days ago
Belgium alone has 3 official languages: French, Dutch and a German speaking part.
The French part refuses to learn any of the other official languages, even in school. They don’t see the need.
While the other parts are a lot more open to other languages. You will be hard pressed to find someone in Flanders that doesn’t speak French on top of their Dutch.
AceOnTrack@lemmy.blahaj.zone 5 days ago
?
What are you talking about.
We have obligatory 2 foreign language in our school curriculum.
Most people take English lv1 and then whatever of Italian/Spanish/German is closest border to them.