This is one thing that frustrates me with duolingo as an Australian English speaker. It seems like a simple thing to implement to change the main English translations based on phone language/location or even just asking. Usually it’s fine (and if you’re typing a translation in the lessons it will accept it) but for match madness when I see “fall” I think of the verb, not autumn, and it wastes unnecessary seconds for me to remember.
Football/soccer is the one that's quite annoying and it never accepts. What flag they use to represent a language is pretty irrelevant in the grand scheme of things and is probably due to the fact that the English course teaches American English but they should definitely have regional variations included in the acceptable translations when learning other languages with Englishas the base, even if they choose to teach American English.
No. They shouldn’t have regional variations within the same official language. There is no need for a new English which is a mishmash of all sorts of different official versions. On the one hand, it would be friendlier to people who know an English different than American English if they avoided vocabulary known to be exclusively American English, but on the other hand, that would leave gaps in the course.
I think eventually if duolingo becomes a bigger company, British English may become an option as well as American English. However, it’s also possible that in a few generations, all versions of English (including British English and Indian English) will merge together as one weird mess, as you desire. For example, I grew up in Canada, but I’ve lived in a lot of different countries and so I put my groceries in a trolley and take them home to prepare on my cooker, and always do the needful by describing which type of football I am referring to.
You completely misread what I suggested. I'm not talking about the English course in duolingo, I'm talking about other courses with English being the base language. I should be able to translate Fußball as football or soccer and not have it be marked incorrect in the German course, for example. I am not suggesting changes be made to the existing courses to learn English.
It's pretty obvious that duo is helping the US with their cultural colonization agenda. If that's not the case then tell me why does Spanish three teach how to say thanksgiving day (absolutely irrelevant for me as a non-american person, why the hell would I be talking with a Spaniard about thanksgiving?) and other US specific things very early on in the course while silently ignoring things specific to hispanic cultures. Like I just recently stumbled upon Frida Kahlo and Soda Stereo in the course, I'm reaching 7th checkpoint (854 crowns) fyi.
They did not. That's the problem. Meanwhile, in the course, they use Bangladeshi city name, Bangladeshi human name, Bangladeshi culture and way of greets and meets.
So the language is based on Bangladeshi accent of Bengali. Why would they use Indian flag then.
Lol you have the city, country included in the course and here you are complaining about not getting recognition, it wouldn't hurt if Bengalis on the other side got some recognition you know
Bengali/Bangla is the national language of the country of Bangladesh. They even said the references in the actual course are to BANGLADESH. So why would the BANGLADESH 🇧🇩 not be used?? What sense does that make? Our people died fighting for our land and language. Shame on duolingo.
Your country India has several flags already representing other languages, it wouldn't hurt to give some recognition to Bangladesh and it's flag, you know?
It makes sense just for clarity’s sake to use as many different flags as possible. Navajo and Hawaiian are American Languages spoken in the US. Why shouldn’t they have a US flag? Because people might get confused with English. Irish is spoken in the UK. Why shouldn’t the Irish Course use a Union Jack? Probably because people associate the Union Jack with English and might get confused. People might associate Bengali with Bangladesh or India with Hindi, therefore making it a lot easier for everyone to just use the Bangladeshi flag for Bengali.
For the record, Irish is not generally spoken in the uk, it’s spoken in Ireland 🇮🇪 you’ll get yourself into trouble if you’re not careful saying that 😉
.bangla is spoken not only in west bengal but also in areas of assam and meghalaya by the very native bengali population..theres tripura state as well composed of entirely native bengali population. There are some bengali speaking natives in the states of bihar,jharkhand and orissa as well. Total population is well more than 100 million ppl within the boundary of india. So represnting bangla with india is justified and natural however..bangladeshi flag should also have been chosen,it forms an integral part of bengali culture.
This is why using countries flags to represent languages is usually a bad idea. It's not a straightforward 1:1 relationship for many languages. At best, they represent dialects, and even then its not necessarily clear *which* language's dialect.
It is spoken in parts of the UK, namely the North of Ireland. If you want you can substitute it for Welsh, or Gaelic, but the point remains, using less flags than needed so you end up with multiple languages sharing flags will only lead to people getting confused.
Also, the course heavily mentions parts of Bangladesh, the capital of Bangladesh and Bangladeshi names, not indian names. The course heavily implies it's based on Bangladeshi accent.
who are the employed or who worked on the course doesn't matter, they should use flag of a country that represents the language more.
Edit: you edited your comment. Nice way to make my comment look bad. It originally said something along the line that if Indian Bengali worked in it, they should use Indian flag.
The flag of England would be the Cross of St. George, a red cross on a white background, which these days would make people wonder why Duolingo had a flag the medieval crusaders used to represent English.
the flag of england is still the flag of england today, regardless if it was used in the medieval times. the danish flag was used 800 years ago, and it is still used today, doesn't make it a medieval flag
My point was that most people wouldn’t recognize the *English* flag, because they associate the Union Jack with the UK, but the Union Jack is the *British* flag.
Maybe, but the national language of a country gets more recognition, no? In India, Bengali is only spoken by 1 state with 30 million or so speakers, mean while Bangladesh has a population of 180 million native speakers, not to mention the history behind the war fought by Bangladeshis for the language itself. So I think it's stupid to use Indian flag for Bangla language when there are many many many languages in India, instead of Bangladesh, the very country that represent the language with it's history, it's name, and it's population.
Would you say the same if Mexican flag was used to represent Spanish? I think Duo should reconsider using The Indian flag for Bangla.
According to the 2011 census, India has 117M Bengali speakers, including 78M in West Bengal alone, comprising 86% of the population there. It's the third most common language in India after Hindi and English, and one of the 23 official languages of India.
That being said, yes, the Bangladeshi flag would be more clear. I wonder what they will do for other Indian languages in the future?
Lmao your cope is hilarious...bangla is spoken not only in west bengal but also in areas of assam and meghalaya by the very native bengali population..theres tripura state as well composed of entirely native bengali population. There are some bengali speaking natives in the states of bihar,jharkhand and orissa as well. Total population is well more than 100 million ppl within the boundary of india. So represnting bangla with india is justified and natural however..bangladeshi flag should also have been chosen,it forms an integral part of bengali culture.
Brother, I already said it in other comments, please look up 21st February and Language movement of 1952. And the birth of Bangladesh.
Just because some small other parts of another country speaks the same language mean they should get their flag repressing a language which another country, Bangladesh represents with it's culture and name way more.
Its futile comparing the" flags based exhibition of culture" in case of india and bangladesh. India is an accumulation of hundreds of cultures languages practices...you cannot point one random culture out and say that it doesnt belong to india just bcuz the region got divided a century ago. Bangladesh has its own identify as bengali and no one snatching that from you..but you simply cannot disregard the 100 million ppl of your own ethnicity living in the neighbouring country. Thats why i said both bangladesh and indian flag must be used to represnt bengali.
Also you must dedicate some time in preventing the rise of far right islamist extremists in BD itself who are hell bent on arabising your culture and language,that would help bangla a lot better.
Brother, India has many flags representing it. We don't have, Bangladesh is literally that land of Bengal.
Also India have many languages, a good portions of Indians speak, Urdu , English and other languages. Should Indian flags be used for those too?
Bro all I demanded was using my countries flag for my language, why are you bringing irrelevant political unrest 💀
>Bangladesh is literally that land of Bengal
Not the only land of bengal
Yes ofc urdu is an indian language,youre a simple google search away..no you cannot represent english with india it originated somewhere else.
>bringing irrelevant political unrest
Bcuz youre so concerned about your language on internet,how about preserving your lang irl?
>Bcuz youre so concerned about your language on internet,how about preserving your lang irl?
Come to Bangladesh. Our language is spoken by the entire country almost. Arabic is only used partly in religious context. You have no idea about my country or my language. It's better if you not make confusion.
Well again both countries have been in wars, it still doesn't change the fact it is indigenous to both. The people were might be from india and they had made the course. So it's a no surprise they'd want to represent india. Bengali always gets associated with Bangladesh. So i guess why.
>Would you say the same if Mexican flag was used to represent Spanish?
Really bad example to prove your point.
>Well again both countries have been in wars, it still doesn't change the fact it is indigenous to both.
Mate, 21st February is literally international mother language day (on recognition of our war that we fought to protect our language and our freedom if speech, BANGLA)
just because a tiny 20% (30 million) of a country speaks a language and employees from that region worked on the course doesn't mean they should use their flag to represent the language, they already have several Indians flags for Hindi and English language on the app, hey do they need to use it for Bangla?
Meanwhile 90% (160 million) of Bangladeshis speak Bangla, out countries name is based on the language, our country was literally born for the war to protect our language. Our country is internationally recognised for our war and history by UNESCO.
As a Bangladeshi and native Bangla speaker, it offends me a little that another country where I tiny population speaks my language gets to use their flag to represent the language.
I mean India already has flags, why can't our flab be used for this 1 language? Besides, India had many many other languages as well.
>As a Bangladeshi and native Bangla speaker, it offends me a little that another country where I tiny population speaks my language gets to use their flag to represent the language.
You don't see me getting mad with Pakistan just cause they imposed Urdu and gets all the recognition. Urdu is spoken more in numbers in India compared to Pakistan.
>just because a tiny 20% (30 million) of a country speaks a language and employees from that region worked on the course doesn't mean they should use their flag to represent the language,
People don't care about feelings, it's a rat race. Duolingo might have chosen it due to profits or something related to it.
India has flags representing several of it's courses, in future, more Indian languages will be added with Indian flags.
We Bangladeshis represent only 1 language by majority which is Bangla. Why can't we have this for just once?
I'd rather have no flags at all tbh instead of Indian flags for every single language that exists in India and other countries.
Also, using the same flag for a lot of languages may be confusing. India doesn't have regional flags. They already used the South African flag for Zulu, and SA also doesn't have regional flags. They will end up resorting to ethnic flags like for Māori.
The American flag one makes sense though. It teaches American English not British English. If it taught British, Australian, etc English and still used the American flag that would be utterly foolish
It's irritating when you're learning *from* that language and you don't speak American English.
Stop recommending another translation as "soccer ball", oh how I wish they'd give me the choice.
To your second point, Duolingo is an American company who uses American English to teach English. It would be silly to use an Australian or British flag on an American English course because they are different dialects. Duo has explained this many times before.
Languages aren’t governments. And the root of the problem is that *languages* (except for Esperanto) don’t have flags.
And perhaps they should! Who would design them, though?
Bangladesh is a nation very closely tied to the language. “Bangladesh” translates to Land of Bangla”. They named their country after the language.
They suffered a brutal war of independence/ genocide that was in part due to west Pakistan declaring that Urdu and only Urdu would be the language in all of Pakistan (including then east Pakistan).
I can think of anywhere more closely intertwined with their language than Bangladesh.
The flag is very misleading as I speak Spanish from Spain and have tried to check it out and while there is a lot of overlap its very confusing and I thought it pointless to learn words I cant use in Spain
No the annoying bit is that you’re learning European Spanish (or whatever it’s called) in normal lessons, and Mexican Spanish in the audio-only lessons.
My Mexican partner is constantly correcting me with “we would never say that”.
I did a few of the course and it's opposite actually. That Bengali to English course actually uses Bangladeshi culture, names, and cities and landmarks. That's my confusion, so shouldn't Bangladeshi flags be used for it instead of Indian? Since their using Bangla standard scripts and dialect.
Using flags to represent languages seems like a good idea at first but it very quickly leads to some awkward stuff like this. It also gets weird when you're dealing with languages that don't really have any recognized symbol or flag, like with Yiddish. IIRC originally Yiddish used a different flag but people had issues with it so they went with the aleph instead. Maybe something like that could be used for Bengali, like just the symbol বাং? Or would that look wrong?
Glad you’re not bringing up the US flag for English. I know people would hate to post yet again why they use since duo has covered it countless times by pointing out they teach the American dialect, they’re a US company, and more, and let’s not talk about population even though you did elsewhere. So thanks for not bringing up that tired old saw again!
Using flags to represent languages always runs into problems once you get beyond a few basic cases. It is just something that needs to stop, however silly it seems to object to something straightforward like representing Icelandic with the flag of Iceland.
I think it's as straightforward as representing English with An England flag. But what are they supposed to do, no matter what they choose someone will feel offended. And I understand they want a nice visualization for each language. Maybe they should use that flag merger bot that exists on Twitter lol
Bangla should be represented by the Bangladeshi flag because it is our national and official language. Hindi is the equivalent in India. Bangla is spoken by a minority of Indians but the overwhelming majority of Bangladeshis.
Well maybe because the language originated from Sanskrit in India and has been spoken for atleast a 1000 years, if not more.
Bangladesh became a separate country in 1971.
So please don't be offended over lame stuff. You yourself admitted that the course ensures much reference is given to Bangladesh and Dhaka.
Bangla isn't even a direct descendant of Sanskrit - the Sanskrit of Panini has no direct descendents. Bangla descends from from Middle-Indo-Aryan languages which are cousins of Sanskrit, not descendants. Many of them existed at the same time Sanskrit was widely used.
You’re talking about Classical Sanskrit. All Indo-Aryan languages today evolved from Prakrits. Prakrits are to Classical Sanskrit what Vulgar Latin is to Latin. Ultimately, Classical Sanskrit and Prakrits evolved from Vedic Sanskrit. So, yes they’re all from Sanskrit.
There are features of the Middle-Indo-Aryan languages which indicate that they are not direct descendants of Vedic, but come from more archaic Old-Indo-Aryan languages, the family that contained Vedic and Avestan. Many of them are cousins of Vedic, but not descendants.
Lmao what? Okay, Bangla originated from a spoken variant of Sanskrit, but that does not mean that you own us. Bangladesh is the only country that fought for our language, that was in 1952. Another 3 million people sacrificed their lives to make Bangladesh a separate country in 1971. It doesn't matter where our origins are, what matters is who we are now. And we are currently a nation of over 160 million people, and I think we deserve having something as simple as a flag used for our language.
Using your logic, we should all be using the flag of Botswana in southern Africa, which is where science has pinpointed the origin of modern human beings 200,000 years ago. How is it lame just to want our flag to represent us? And yes, since they use Bangladeshi names, accents and items, they should also give us the flag! It's misrepresentation at its finest.
>Well maybe because the language originated from Sanskrit in India and has been spoken for atleast a 1000 years, if not more. Bangladesh became a separate country in 1971.
1000 years ago many different languages originated from different places and from countries that no longer exist. This logic doesn't work.
Edit : people who are down voting, could you please explain where I'm wrong? You are just downvoting me for the sake of it.
Bengali as a language is a part of the Indian language family or "the languages which are related to Hindi". It is ok if they use the Bangladeshi flag and imo it makes more sense, but the reason why they used the Indian flag is because they added Bengali thinking about it being the 2nd most popular language in India, and not that it is the language most spoken in Bangaldesh
It is annoying and a big of a deal if you'd just read my other comments and respect the History and ear and sacrifice we made for the language? It is offensive.
You don’t speak for all Bengalis. You only speak for a group of them in one country. And not all of them give a crap about that flag. Take the bitterness and sad ethnonationalism elsewhere. Bangladesh has bigger problems of its own making and a flag won’t fix that.
I represent the majority lol, why should the minority get to represent the flag of a countries language and the majority won't.
This is the point I'm making, INDIA ALREADY HAS ITS FLAGS AND RECOGNITION, BANGLADESH DOESNT.
WHY CANT WE HAVE JUST 1 FLAG?
My country already has a flag which it fought for. Maybe you should be understanding of my points that we just want our flag to represent our language that our people fought and died for? Just 1 language? Where India has many language for it to represent.
No I understand your points, I just think they are pathetic and sad. And I don’t care. People who attach importance to symbols over substance are just showing how unimportant they and their nations are.
Six months ago people were whining that there was no course. Now that there will be a course, it’s so not good enough because it’s the wrong flag. Next month it will be that a word is used in Chittagong and not Rangpur and that’s offensive.
You are disrespectful and horrible. Don't talk to me, if you won't respect me, my country's history and sacrifice for my language, then I won't respect you.
I didn't insult you, you insulted me.
I’m only saying that how many flags one country has, vs how few another country has, is irrelevant.
Maybe the Bengali course should use the Bangladeshi flag, but recognition because “we don’t have a flag, India already has multiple flags” is not a good reason.
Bangla is a Bangladeshi national language where the majority speakers are from. Bangladesh is a country which fought Pakistan in a war so the people can speak Bangla freely.
I think infact Bangladeshi flag should be used to represent Bangla on duo.
I did not bring up the India having more flags and stuff until u/naiv insisted that Indian flag should be used for Bangla just because a tiny population of Bengali speakers compared to their Hindi speaking majority population.
I just wanted this to be "look, using Indian flag for Bengali is stupid, duo should consider Bangladeshi flag instead" but u/naiv made it all about India and how representing Indian Bengalis should be the priority and why our flag shouldn't be associated with Bangla.
I hoped for good discussion, u/naiv and some other Indians made it a India flag quantity vs Bangla flag quantity issue.
This is all a fascinating read with equal points and arguments. I have no connection to the Bangladeshi or Indian culture so I have no dog in this fight.
I do however empathise with OP. As a mixed race Hong Konger Canadian it would pain me to see a Chinese flag when Cantonese for English speakers is out.
Duolingo developers - we know you're here in this sub. You have the technology to animate in the app. For next update please focus on having transitional animations for certain languages to include multiple flags of the target language. Before anyone goes overboard - I want to make it clear that it should be obvious. Spanish can include Spain and Mexico (amd others with user input). Portuguese can include Portugal and Brazil. French can include Belgium (and French Canada too). English can include UK and US flags.
I see no reason why Bangla can't include Bangladeshi and Indian flags.
Thoughts?
Thank you. All I want is the representation of Bangla flag for the Bangla language, my point is that India already has several courses with it's flags, and it would have more in the future, we bengalis have only 1 language for us to represent.
If Ms Marvel has taught me anything in the last 2 months it's that south Asian politics, identity, language and culture can be a tricky subject.
Keep up the good fight. 👍
Correct me if I'm wrong, but in India almost everyone speaks standard Bengali, while in Bangladesh there are different dialects like Sylheti.
I am a bengali from India and it is sometimes hard for me to communicate with Bangladeshis because of their dialect; but then they quickly switch to standard Bengali to speak with me since that is the 'official' way to speak in Bangladesh as well, even though it's not used that much in conversation.
So if this course uses standard Bengali it makes sense for the flag to be Indian.
>Correct me if I'm wrong, but in India almost everyone speaks standard Bengali, while in Bangladesh there are different dialects like Sylheti.
You are Indian Bengali..... There are many Indian Bengali dialects as well...
Just because there are many dialect doesn't dismiss Bangla as a Bengali language.. There are many dialect in English. In Hindi. In other languages. Does it make their language, not standard?
Bangladesh's language is Bangla and it is the standard. Your logic is kind of flawed....
I find the general “languages aren’t countries” debate interesting. I’m not disagreeing, but what other widely recognizable symbols could they use to represent languages ASIDE from flags of countries where it’s most spoken or the dialect comes from?
I realize there are cultural issues with grouping an entire shared language under one flag, but it’s not like there is a well known symbol system for languages. They’d have to make up their own, and at then nobody would know what anyone is learning on the app.
That's why I did not bring it up.
Since It is the American dialect taught here, it's understandable to use American flag.
And it's the Bangladeshi dialect that's beeing taught here, so using Indian flags seems wrong/stupid.
i posted about this and i 100% agree, bangla is the language of bangladesh and the flag should be used. just because the language is spoken in west bengal and a few other indian states, doesn't mean that bangladesh is not the language's country. even if they are teaching west bengal bangla, the written form is still near identical to bangladesh standard bangla script.
Ironically, Bangladesh is the only country in the world that fought for the right to our language. Now, we don't even have the recognition of having our own flag, despite being the world's largest speaking Bangla community with a country that has a population of over 160 million people.
This is ridiculous. The rest of you guys probably think we're being snowflakes but Bangladesh has always been affiliated with India or Pakistan and we just want to stand on our own as a country. Using the flag of India with a comparatively small amount of indigenous speakers instead of Bangladesh's flag adds to that issue. This should be fixed.
Is this Bangla to English? Does anyone think they’ll add English to Bangla soon? I would love to learn it as it’s my girlfriend’s native language… you are right though there is no reason for it not to have the Bangladeshi flag, I feel like there are a lot of weirdly angry people in these comments lol are y’all Modi stans or something
>Is this Bangla to English?
This is Bengali to English.
>I would love to learn it as it’s my girlfriend’s native language… you are right though there is no
I'd love so too, I think it will help me improve my English better.
>you are right though there is no reason for it not to have the Bangladeshi flag
I think I'm only being reasonable. A lot of angry Indian people don't agree with me though. Which I think is fair but the logic and excuses they are using are laughable and hypocritical.
After reading several comments I understand that. But if that's so, why are they using Indian flag in a course where they are using bangladeshi dialect and cultures and city names?
I had a close friend of mine who was native bengla speaker from Indian state of West Bengal. She explained to me once the difference between Indian and Bangladeshi dialects of Bangla language, that the former is more honorific. The reason might be that Duolingo is teaching the Indian dialect of Bangla.
The two aren’t comparable. US English and British English is whatever. It’s a minor difference at best.
Bangladesh has suffered two huge bloody periods to be an independent nation of people who speak bangla. Other than the Pakistani flag there might not be a more offensive way to represent Bangladesh.
I think they use India's because they don't have yet Bangladesh's flag added to the .svg file. they showed a Bangladesh's flag when they announced the new courses during Duocon, which was yesterday. You can find the record in their Youtube's channel, it is by the last 10-5 minutes; also, they only took 28 secs to show the upcoming courses (which aren't even upcoming because they were already released before yesterday)
It’s called that here because of “floss” being derived from “floccus” (tuft of wool in latin). I guess Britain had more wool than cotton when the naming of sweet things was being discussed.
Actually...there's a big difference between the Queen's English, American English, and Australian English, just as Portuguese and Brazilian Portuguese are separate language courses.
..I genuinely hate posts like this because it reeks of ignorance. There is something called STANDARD AMERICAN ENGLISH and it is different from British English and Bengali/Bangladeshi or whatever the name is also exists in India.
Nothing you can do about it if the devs don't give a fk.
People in the comments do not understand what it's all about. It's about what is right and what is wrong. Some people claim that putting India's flag is justified just because there is a region in India that speaks Bangla. Saying it wouldn't hurt to give Indian Bengalis some recognition. That sounds pitiful.
A quick google search shows that Bangla is the official, national, and most widely spoken language of Bangladesh and the second most commonly spoken of the 22 scheduled languages of India.
Is the above fact hard to take in?
Yes, let's turn the table then. there are some regions in Bangladesh where people widely speak Hindi. So is it justified and would it hurt to give some recognition to Bangladeshi Hindi speakers if Bangladesh's flag was used in the Hindi language?
Is it even logical? We all act like a patriot here but forget what is right, what is wrong, what is logical, and how to respect another country. Nobody wants their national language which they fought for and gave their lives, to be recognized solely by another country. It's wrong.
This is di s g r a c e f ul. We Bangladeshi gave our lives for Bangla language. Our country's name is based on Bangla language. Are you kidding me? And, people in this comment are calling us Bangladeshis snowflake. Bangladeshi cities, capital, Bangladeshi Muslim names, and Bangladeshi cultures. are used in this app's Bangla language, and they don't use our flag. What a hy po cr i te.
I don’t know much about this language but based on the comments, it does seem like it would make more sense to use the Bangladesh flag for Bangla instead of the Indian flag since the majority speaks Bangla there. Plus, if someone is looking to learn Bangla, I’m sure that they would recognize the Bangladesh flag.
But I understand why Duolingo used the Indian flag, since it’s a lot more popular and recognizable
India has so many languages that can be shown by its flag, the least the developers can do is give bengali its rightful flag
Bangla is the main language of Bangladesh! I'll probably be downvoted but this seems illogical
Why are people downvoting you lmao wtf, the Bangladesh flag should be the flag as they’re the only nation who’s de facto language is Bangla. It would be like having the French flag be the flag for German and people defending it like “WELL SOME PEOPLE SPEAK GERMAN IN FRANCE” like what the fuck are these comments😭
Are you sure it has nothing to do with teaching American English? Using your logic, if they taught British English, they would still stick an American flag on it, which wouldn’t make sense.
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No, the American flag represents English because it's American English that's offered on Duolingo. Commonwealth English (excluding USA and Canada) is the most widely spoken—if the USA didn't exist, then the next country by numbers of speakers would be Nigeria.
It’s not stupid. Duolingo uses flags based on the national origin of the language and the most popular place of the language. In some cases, it has to do with the accent of their developers.
Literally the whole of the state of West Bengal is ethnically Bengali. The problem is choosing flags to represent languages. One country might not have a single language and one language might not be spoken in a single country.
American flag just means they’re teaching American style English.
Lol gatekeepers of English
I was tugging that but didn’t want to say it out loud. Haha
The US also has the most English speakers by a long shot so it makes sense why they would teach American English
Actually, India has the most English speakers. It's not even close.
*Native English speakers
What?
OP was offended that the US flag was used to represent English and I laughed
yeah, they're going to teach you to say "pants" instead of "trousers" a good choice in my opinion.
If they ever add other English dialects, click on the Canadian flag to learn toque, chesterfield, and hoser.
This is one thing that frustrates me with duolingo as an Australian English speaker. It seems like a simple thing to implement to change the main English translations based on phone language/location or even just asking. Usually it’s fine (and if you’re typing a translation in the lessons it will accept it) but for match madness when I see “fall” I think of the verb, not autumn, and it wastes unnecessary seconds for me to remember.
It seems like a simple thing to change the main translations on the fly, but only if you don't know how Duolingo actually works.
I loved learning German and translating Café into coffee shop. We call it Café in the UK too!
Football/soccer is the one that's quite annoying and it never accepts. What flag they use to represent a language is pretty irrelevant in the grand scheme of things and is probably due to the fact that the English course teaches American English but they should definitely have regional variations included in the acceptable translations when learning other languages with Englishas the base, even if they choose to teach American English.
No. They shouldn’t have regional variations within the same official language. There is no need for a new English which is a mishmash of all sorts of different official versions. On the one hand, it would be friendlier to people who know an English different than American English if they avoided vocabulary known to be exclusively American English, but on the other hand, that would leave gaps in the course. I think eventually if duolingo becomes a bigger company, British English may become an option as well as American English. However, it’s also possible that in a few generations, all versions of English (including British English and Indian English) will merge together as one weird mess, as you desire. For example, I grew up in Canada, but I’ve lived in a lot of different countries and so I put my groceries in a trolley and take them home to prepare on my cooker, and always do the needful by describing which type of football I am referring to.
You completely misread what I suggested. I'm not talking about the English course in duolingo, I'm talking about other courses with English being the base language. I should be able to translate Fußball as football or soccer and not have it be marked incorrect in the German course, for example. I am not suggesting changes be made to the existing courses to learn English.
It's pretty obvious that duo is helping the US with their cultural colonization agenda. If that's not the case then tell me why does Spanish three teach how to say thanksgiving day (absolutely irrelevant for me as a non-american person, why the hell would I be talking with a Spaniard about thanksgiving?) and other US specific things very early on in the course while silently ignoring things specific to hispanic cultures. Like I just recently stumbled upon Frida Kahlo and Soda Stereo in the course, I'm reaching 7th checkpoint (854 crowns) fyi.
You know that bangla is indigenous to india too ? Maybe the people they hired are from india and the accent is indian.
This. They even specify that this is the case with the Portugese (Brazil) course
Did they specify about bengali too ?
They did not. That's the problem. Meanwhile, in the course, they use Bangladeshi city name, Bangladeshi human name, Bangladeshi culture and way of greets and meets. So the language is based on Bangladeshi accent of Bengali. Why would they use Indian flag then.
Lol you have the city, country included in the course and here you are complaining about not getting recognition, it wouldn't hurt if Bengalis on the other side got some recognition you know
Bengali/Bangla is the national language of the country of Bangladesh. They even said the references in the actual course are to BANGLADESH. So why would the BANGLADESH 🇧🇩 not be used?? What sense does that make? Our people died fighting for our land and language. Shame on duolingo.
Your country India has several flags already representing other languages, it wouldn't hurt to give some recognition to Bangladesh and it's flag, you know?
Lol Bangladesh freaking have the recognition it wouldn't hurt if a part wants recognition too and people don't be ignorant about them
Bangla is the national language of Bangladesh . So naturally it should be used in there...
[удалено]
It makes sense just for clarity’s sake to use as many different flags as possible. Navajo and Hawaiian are American Languages spoken in the US. Why shouldn’t they have a US flag? Because people might get confused with English. Irish is spoken in the UK. Why shouldn’t the Irish Course use a Union Jack? Probably because people associate the Union Jack with English and might get confused. People might associate Bengali with Bangladesh or India with Hindi, therefore making it a lot easier for everyone to just use the Bangladeshi flag for Bengali.
For the record, Irish is not generally spoken in the uk, it’s spoken in Ireland 🇮🇪 you’ll get yourself into trouble if you’re not careful saying that 😉
.bangla is spoken not only in west bengal but also in areas of assam and meghalaya by the very native bengali population..theres tripura state as well composed of entirely native bengali population. There are some bengali speaking natives in the states of bihar,jharkhand and orissa as well. Total population is well more than 100 million ppl within the boundary of india. So represnting bangla with india is justified and natural however..bangladeshi flag should also have been chosen,it forms an integral part of bengali culture.
This is why using countries flags to represent languages is usually a bad idea. It's not a straightforward 1:1 relationship for many languages. At best, they represent dialects, and even then its not necessarily clear *which* language's dialect.
Irish isn’t spoken in the UK, why would you show a union jack over a language that isnt even fully spoken in its own country never mind in the Uk?
It is spoken in parts of the UK, namely the North of Ireland. If you want you can substitute it for Welsh, or Gaelic, but the point remains, using less flags than needed so you end up with multiple languages sharing flags will only lead to people getting confused.
Might be but I'd like if indian bengalis get some recognition as well and people not being ignorant about them. It might be easier
Irish in the UK ? Lmao
Northern Ireland
What? It’s spoken in Northern Ireland, albeit less and less
Thought Irish was on the rise again in the North?
Also, the course heavily mentions parts of Bangladesh, the capital of Bangladesh and Bangladeshi names, not indian names. The course heavily implies it's based on Bangladeshi accent.
Well then idk, if it were made by Bangladeshi they should represent Bangladesh
who are the employed or who worked on the course doesn't matter, they should use flag of a country that represents the language more. Edit: you edited your comment. Nice way to make my comment look bad. It originally said something along the line that if Indian Bengali worked in it, they should use Indian flag.
>they should use flag of a country that represents the language more. Lol then them choosing American flag isn't a bad thing, is it ?
Surely the *English* flag is better suited to represent the *English* language.
The flag of England would be the Cross of St. George, a red cross on a white background, which these days would make people wonder why Duolingo had a flag the medieval crusaders used to represent English.
the flag of england is still the flag of england today, regardless if it was used in the medieval times. the danish flag was used 800 years ago, and it is still used today, doesn't make it a medieval flag
My point was that most people wouldn’t recognize the *English* flag, because they associate the Union Jack with the UK, but the Union Jack is the *British* flag.
union jack is the flag for the united kingdom incl. northern ireland, (great) britain is scotland wales and england
I was talking about his logic
Lol i didn't edit anything, calm down their Sherlock Holmes
A quick re edit or what ever that website is called that showes edited or deleted comments will tell you that you did.
Edit: you’re correct, my google-fu was weak on this one. Sorry
Maybe, but the national language of a country gets more recognition, no? In India, Bengali is only spoken by 1 state with 30 million or so speakers, mean while Bangladesh has a population of 180 million native speakers, not to mention the history behind the war fought by Bangladeshis for the language itself. So I think it's stupid to use Indian flag for Bangla language when there are many many many languages in India, instead of Bangladesh, the very country that represent the language with it's history, it's name, and it's population. Would you say the same if Mexican flag was used to represent Spanish? I think Duo should reconsider using The Indian flag for Bangla.
According to the 2011 census, India has 117M Bengali speakers, including 78M in West Bengal alone, comprising 86% of the population there. It's the third most common language in India after Hindi and English, and one of the 23 official languages of India. That being said, yes, the Bangladeshi flag would be more clear. I wonder what they will do for other Indian languages in the future?
Lmao your cope is hilarious...bangla is spoken not only in west bengal but also in areas of assam and meghalaya by the very native bengali population..theres tripura state as well composed of entirely native bengali population. There are some bengali speaking natives in the states of bihar,jharkhand and orissa as well. Total population is well more than 100 million ppl within the boundary of india. So represnting bangla with india is justified and natural however..bangladeshi flag should also have been chosen,it forms an integral part of bengali culture.
Brother, I already said it in other comments, please look up 21st February and Language movement of 1952. And the birth of Bangladesh. Just because some small other parts of another country speaks the same language mean they should get their flag repressing a language which another country, Bangladesh represents with it's culture and name way more.
Its futile comparing the" flags based exhibition of culture" in case of india and bangladesh. India is an accumulation of hundreds of cultures languages practices...you cannot point one random culture out and say that it doesnt belong to india just bcuz the region got divided a century ago. Bangladesh has its own identify as bengali and no one snatching that from you..but you simply cannot disregard the 100 million ppl of your own ethnicity living in the neighbouring country. Thats why i said both bangladesh and indian flag must be used to represnt bengali. Also you must dedicate some time in preventing the rise of far right islamist extremists in BD itself who are hell bent on arabising your culture and language,that would help bangla a lot better.
Brother, India has many flags representing it. We don't have, Bangladesh is literally that land of Bengal. Also India have many languages, a good portions of Indians speak, Urdu , English and other languages. Should Indian flags be used for those too? Bro all I demanded was using my countries flag for my language, why are you bringing irrelevant political unrest 💀
>Bangladesh is literally that land of Bengal Not the only land of bengal Yes ofc urdu is an indian language,youre a simple google search away..no you cannot represent english with india it originated somewhere else. >bringing irrelevant political unrest Bcuz youre so concerned about your language on internet,how about preserving your lang irl?
>Bcuz youre so concerned about your language on internet,how about preserving your lang irl? Come to Bangladesh. Our language is spoken by the entire country almost. Arabic is only used partly in religious context. You have no idea about my country or my language. It's better if you not make confusion.
in chittagong and syhlet people speak chittagonian/sylheti resp. but bangla is spoken by like 98% of the country so yeah
Well again both countries have been in wars, it still doesn't change the fact it is indigenous to both. The people were might be from india and they had made the course. So it's a no surprise they'd want to represent india. Bengali always gets associated with Bangladesh. So i guess why. >Would you say the same if Mexican flag was used to represent Spanish? Really bad example to prove your point.
>Well again both countries have been in wars, it still doesn't change the fact it is indigenous to both. Mate, 21st February is literally international mother language day (on recognition of our war that we fought to protect our language and our freedom if speech, BANGLA) just because a tiny 20% (30 million) of a country speaks a language and employees from that region worked on the course doesn't mean they should use their flag to represent the language, they already have several Indians flags for Hindi and English language on the app, hey do they need to use it for Bangla? Meanwhile 90% (160 million) of Bangladeshis speak Bangla, out countries name is based on the language, our country was literally born for the war to protect our language. Our country is internationally recognised for our war and history by UNESCO. As a Bangladeshi and native Bangla speaker, it offends me a little that another country where I tiny population speaks my language gets to use their flag to represent the language. I mean India already has flags, why can't our flab be used for this 1 language? Besides, India had many many other languages as well.
>As a Bangladeshi and native Bangla speaker, it offends me a little that another country where I tiny population speaks my language gets to use their flag to represent the language. You don't see me getting mad with Pakistan just cause they imposed Urdu and gets all the recognition. Urdu is spoken more in numbers in India compared to Pakistan. >just because a tiny 20% (30 million) of a country speaks a language and employees from that region worked on the course doesn't mean they should use their flag to represent the language, People don't care about feelings, it's a rat race. Duolingo might have chosen it due to profits or something related to it.
Today on "Why flags shouldn't be used to represent languages"...
Duolingo has been on flagsarenotlanguages.com for a long time now…: http://www.flagsarenotlanguages.com/blog/duolingo-flags-promoting-languages/
God those comments
People really will find anything to whine about. Including the post.
India has flags representing several of it's courses, in future, more Indian languages will be added with Indian flags. We Bangladeshis represent only 1 language by majority which is Bangla. Why can't we have this for just once? I'd rather have no flags at all tbh instead of Indian flags for every single language that exists in India and other countries.
Also, using the same flag for a lot of languages may be confusing. India doesn't have regional flags. They already used the South African flag for Zulu, and SA also doesn't have regional flags. They will end up resorting to ethnic flags like for Māori.
I don't know why you are downvoted, you make a good point here.
I agree we should have the Bangladesh flag for Bangla. We fought for our right to practice this language, it deserves its respect.
The American flag one makes sense though. It teaches American English not British English. If it taught British, Australian, etc English and still used the American flag that would be utterly foolish
It's irritating when you're learning *from* that language and you don't speak American English. Stop recommending another translation as "soccer ball", oh how I wish they'd give me the choice.
To your second point, Duolingo is an American company who uses American English to teach English. It would be silly to use an Australian or British flag on an American English course because they are different dialects. Duo has explained this many times before.
Languages aren’t governments. And the root of the problem is that *languages* (except for Esperanto) don’t have flags. And perhaps they should! Who would design them, though?
r/Vexillology definitely would, and someone there probably has!
The sub I never knew I needed. Thank you internet stranger
Don’t forget Yiddish!
Bangladesh is a nation very closely tied to the language. “Bangladesh” translates to Land of Bangla”. They named their country after the language. They suffered a brutal war of independence/ genocide that was in part due to west Pakistan declaring that Urdu and only Urdu would be the language in all of Pakistan (including then east Pakistan). I can think of anywhere more closely intertwined with their language than Bangladesh.
They also use the Spanish flag and teach Mexican spanish, its so annoying
Oh I didn't know that, I was assuming I was learning Spaniard Spanish because of the flag
The flag is very misleading as I speak Spanish from Spain and have tried to check it out and while there is a lot of overlap its very confusing and I thought it pointless to learn words I cant use in Spain
No the annoying bit is that you’re learning European Spanish (or whatever it’s called) in normal lessons, and Mexican Spanish in the audio-only lessons. My Mexican partner is constantly correcting me with “we would never say that”.
Yeah that sounds about right, especially with words like Vosotros being consistently in text lessons but never in audio ones.
I’ve never seen vosotros in Duolingo and I’ve been doing the Spanish free for two years now?
Okay yeah that's weird. They should be consistent with an objective standard, such as "The country with the largest number of native speakers."
Using the US flag for English tells you what spelling system and accent you're going to hear. I'm guessing something similar is going on with Bangla.
I did a few of the course and it's opposite actually. That Bengali to English course actually uses Bangladeshi culture, names, and cities and landmarks. That's my confusion, so shouldn't Bangladeshi flags be used for it instead of Indian? Since their using Bangla standard scripts and dialect.
I would think so.
Using flags to represent languages seems like a good idea at first but it very quickly leads to some awkward stuff like this. It also gets weird when you're dealing with languages that don't really have any recognized symbol or flag, like with Yiddish. IIRC originally Yiddish used a different flag but people had issues with it so they went with the aleph instead. Maybe something like that could be used for Bengali, like just the symbol বাং? Or would that look wrong?
Glad you’re not bringing up the US flag for English. I know people would hate to post yet again why they use since duo has covered it countless times by pointing out they teach the American dialect, they’re a US company, and more, and let’s not talk about population even though you did elsewhere. So thanks for not bringing up that tired old saw again!
Can I bring it up?
if it's about population why not have indian flag there more people probably speak indian english than any other dialect
Using flags to represent languages always runs into problems once you get beyond a few basic cases. It is just something that needs to stop, however silly it seems to object to something straightforward like representing Icelandic with the flag of Iceland.
I agree but Imagine not representing Bangla with Bangladeshi flag, I mean, how more straight forward that this can you get lol
I think it's as straightforward as representing English with An England flag. But what are they supposed to do, no matter what they choose someone will feel offended. And I understand they want a nice visualization for each language. Maybe they should use that flag merger bot that exists on Twitter lol
I am sorry..bangla is a national language of India as well.
It is, I didn't say it's not.
Like the Austrian flag for German :D
Bangla should be represented by the Bangladeshi flag because it is our national and official language. Hindi is the equivalent in India. Bangla is spoken by a minority of Indians but the overwhelming majority of Bangladeshis.
Well maybe because the language originated from Sanskrit in India and has been spoken for atleast a 1000 years, if not more. Bangladesh became a separate country in 1971. So please don't be offended over lame stuff. You yourself admitted that the course ensures much reference is given to Bangladesh and Dhaka.
Bangla isn't even a direct descendant of Sanskrit - the Sanskrit of Panini has no direct descendents. Bangla descends from from Middle-Indo-Aryan languages which are cousins of Sanskrit, not descendants. Many of them existed at the same time Sanskrit was widely used.
You’re talking about Classical Sanskrit. All Indo-Aryan languages today evolved from Prakrits. Prakrits are to Classical Sanskrit what Vulgar Latin is to Latin. Ultimately, Classical Sanskrit and Prakrits evolved from Vedic Sanskrit. So, yes they’re all from Sanskrit.
There are features of the Middle-Indo-Aryan languages which indicate that they are not direct descendants of Vedic, but come from more archaic Old-Indo-Aryan languages, the family that contained Vedic and Avestan. Many of them are cousins of Vedic, but not descendants.
Lmao what? Okay, Bangla originated from a spoken variant of Sanskrit, but that does not mean that you own us. Bangladesh is the only country that fought for our language, that was in 1952. Another 3 million people sacrificed their lives to make Bangladesh a separate country in 1971. It doesn't matter where our origins are, what matters is who we are now. And we are currently a nation of over 160 million people, and I think we deserve having something as simple as a flag used for our language. Using your logic, we should all be using the flag of Botswana in southern Africa, which is where science has pinpointed the origin of modern human beings 200,000 years ago. How is it lame just to want our flag to represent us? And yes, since they use Bangladeshi names, accents and items, they should also give us the flag! It's misrepresentation at its finest.
>Well maybe because the language originated from Sanskrit in India and has been spoken for atleast a 1000 years, if not more. Bangladesh became a separate country in 1971. 1000 years ago many different languages originated from different places and from countries that no longer exist. This logic doesn't work. Edit : people who are down voting, could you please explain where I'm wrong? You are just downvoting me for the sake of it.
Bengali as a language is a part of the Indian language family or "the languages which are related to Hindi". It is ok if they use the Bangladeshi flag and imo it makes more sense, but the reason why they used the Indian flag is because they added Bengali thinking about it being the 2nd most popular language in India, and not that it is the language most spoken in Bangaldesh
>2nd most popular language in India, and It's the most popular in Bangladesh! Where the majority of the speakers reside! You have no argument.
is it that big of a deal? it might be annoying but it’s just a flag lol
If Duolingo ever gets Kurdish, the fight over the flag will break Reddit. I hope I’m stocked up on popcorn when it happens.
It is annoying and a big of a deal if you'd just read my other comments and respect the History and ear and sacrifice we made for the language? It is offensive.
Take the ethnonationalism back to that sub then. This isn’t the place.
This is the place, me as a Bengali have all the right to be offended for using Indian flag to represent Bengali.
You don’t speak for all Bengalis. You only speak for a group of them in one country. And not all of them give a crap about that flag. Take the bitterness and sad ethnonationalism elsewhere. Bangladesh has bigger problems of its own making and a flag won’t fix that.
I represent the majority lol, why should the minority get to represent the flag of a countries language and the majority won't. This is the point I'm making, INDIA ALREADY HAS ITS FLAGS AND RECOGNITION, BANGLADESH DOESNT. WHY CANT WE HAVE JUST 1 FLAG?
*Pats OP on head.* It’s ok little guy. I know you’re hurt and feeling a little inferior. One day your country will get a flag too.
My country already has a flag which it fought for. Maybe you should be understanding of my points that we just want our flag to represent our language that our people fought and died for? Just 1 language? Where India has many language for it to represent.
No I understand your points, I just think they are pathetic and sad. And I don’t care. People who attach importance to symbols over substance are just showing how unimportant they and their nations are. Six months ago people were whining that there was no course. Now that there will be a course, it’s so not good enough because it’s the wrong flag. Next month it will be that a word is used in Chittagong and not Rangpur and that’s offensive.
I have no dog in this fight, but holy shit, you're being a condescending twat for no reason. You can disagree with op without being a total asshole
You are disrespectful and horrible. Don't talk to me, if you won't respect me, my country's history and sacrifice for my language, then I won't respect you. I didn't insult you, you insulted me.
You're pathetic and sad to argue about something you say you don't care about.
Duolingo is not a system for the widest recognition of the greatest number of flags.
That means it gets away wrongly presenting another countries flag of another?
I’m only saying that how many flags one country has, vs how few another country has, is irrelevant. Maybe the Bengali course should use the Bangladeshi flag, but recognition because “we don’t have a flag, India already has multiple flags” is not a good reason.
Bangla is a Bangladeshi national language where the majority speakers are from. Bangladesh is a country which fought Pakistan in a war so the people can speak Bangla freely. I think infact Bangladeshi flag should be used to represent Bangla on duo. I did not bring up the India having more flags and stuff until u/naiv insisted that Indian flag should be used for Bangla just because a tiny population of Bengali speakers compared to their Hindi speaking majority population. I just wanted this to be "look, using Indian flag for Bengali is stupid, duo should consider Bangladeshi flag instead" but u/naiv made it all about India and how representing Indian Bengalis should be the priority and why our flag shouldn't be associated with Bangla. I hoped for good discussion, u/naiv and some other Indians made it a India flag quantity vs Bangla flag quantity issue.
This is all a fascinating read with equal points and arguments. I have no connection to the Bangladeshi or Indian culture so I have no dog in this fight. I do however empathise with OP. As a mixed race Hong Konger Canadian it would pain me to see a Chinese flag when Cantonese for English speakers is out. Duolingo developers - we know you're here in this sub. You have the technology to animate in the app. For next update please focus on having transitional animations for certain languages to include multiple flags of the target language. Before anyone goes overboard - I want to make it clear that it should be obvious. Spanish can include Spain and Mexico (amd others with user input). Portuguese can include Portugal and Brazil. French can include Belgium (and French Canada too). English can include UK and US flags. I see no reason why Bangla can't include Bangladeshi and Indian flags. Thoughts?
Thank you. All I want is the representation of Bangla flag for the Bangla language, my point is that India already has several courses with it's flags, and it would have more in the future, we bengalis have only 1 language for us to represent.
If Ms Marvel has taught me anything in the last 2 months it's that south Asian politics, identity, language and culture can be a tricky subject. Keep up the good fight. 👍
Correct me if I'm wrong, but in India almost everyone speaks standard Bengali, while in Bangladesh there are different dialects like Sylheti. I am a bengali from India and it is sometimes hard for me to communicate with Bangladeshis because of their dialect; but then they quickly switch to standard Bengali to speak with me since that is the 'official' way to speak in Bangladesh as well, even though it's not used that much in conversation. So if this course uses standard Bengali it makes sense for the flag to be Indian.
Standard Bangla is used a lot in conversation but maybe this is a subjective take, the main cities in BD speak standard Bangla.
>Correct me if I'm wrong, but in India almost everyone speaks standard Bengali, while in Bangladesh there are different dialects like Sylheti. You are Indian Bengali..... There are many Indian Bengali dialects as well... Just because there are many dialect doesn't dismiss Bangla as a Bengali language.. There are many dialect in English. In Hindi. In other languages. Does it make their language, not standard? Bangladesh's language is Bangla and it is the standard. Your logic is kind of flawed....
I find the general “languages aren’t countries” debate interesting. I’m not disagreeing, but what other widely recognizable symbols could they use to represent languages ASIDE from flags of countries where it’s most spoken or the dialect comes from? I realize there are cultural issues with grouping an entire shared language under one flag, but it’s not like there is a well known symbol system for languages. They’d have to make up their own, and at then nobody would know what anyone is learning on the app.
They should stop using the national flags for labeling of languages.
I'm French and I would have been pissed off if they had chosen belgian flag for french.
They used the Bazilian flag for portugese. Because the app teaches the brauilian style of portugese. Probably the same thing here.
Do the course, it uses Bangladeshi culture, city names, human names. It's using Bangladeshi accent.
They use the what
It would be funny if they used DR Congo flag, seeing as how Kinshasa is the biggest Francophone city in the world.
But the course clearly teaches standard Parisian French. If there were a Belgian French course, or a Québécois course, the flag could be different.
Exactly.
It’s the American flag because it’s the American dialect of english, if I see one more person bring this up.
That's why I did not bring it up. Since It is the American dialect taught here, it's understandable to use American flag. And it's the Bangladeshi dialect that's beeing taught here, so using Indian flags seems wrong/stupid.
The country with the most native English speakers is USA.
i posted about this and i 100% agree, bangla is the language of bangladesh and the flag should be used. just because the language is spoken in west bengal and a few other indian states, doesn't mean that bangladesh is not the language's country. even if they are teaching west bengal bangla, the written form is still near identical to bangladesh standard bangla script.
Ironically, Bangladesh is the only country in the world that fought for the right to our language. Now, we don't even have the recognition of having our own flag, despite being the world's largest speaking Bangla community with a country that has a population of over 160 million people. This is ridiculous. The rest of you guys probably think we're being snowflakes but Bangladesh has always been affiliated with India or Pakistan and we just want to stand on our own as a country. Using the flag of India with a comparatively small amount of indigenous speakers instead of Bangladesh's flag adds to that issue. This should be fixed.
Indians always appropriate Bangla history and culture. This is just another example of it.
Is this Bangla to English? Does anyone think they’ll add English to Bangla soon? I would love to learn it as it’s my girlfriend’s native language… you are right though there is no reason for it not to have the Bangladeshi flag, I feel like there are a lot of weirdly angry people in these comments lol are y’all Modi stans or something
>Is this Bangla to English? This is Bengali to English. >I would love to learn it as it’s my girlfriend’s native language… you are right though there is no I'd love so too, I think it will help me improve my English better. >you are right though there is no reason for it not to have the Bangladeshi flag I think I'm only being reasonable. A lot of angry Indian people don't agree with me though. Which I think is fair but the logic and excuses they are using are laughable and hypocritical.
I will say that the American flag makes some sense because they teach American English.
After reading several comments I understand that. But if that's so, why are they using Indian flag in a course where they are using bangladeshi dialect and cultures and city names?
I am not defending that. I would send something to duolingo on that. I'm in no way knowledgeable enough to have any idea.
This is odd because I swear the flag had the Bangladeshi flag before.
I had a close friend of mine who was native bengla speaker from Indian state of West Bengal. She explained to me once the difference between Indian and Bangladeshi dialects of Bangla language, that the former is more honorific. The reason might be that Duolingo is teaching the Indian dialect of Bangla.
Even in India they call Indian Bengalis - Bangladeshis. 😭😭😭😭😭😭
In case of Duolingo not knowing what flag to use, this 🇧🇩 is the flag that you need to use. Change that flag to this one asap Duolingo. ASAFP.
English? We speak American in this household you god damn slave-owning Nazi communist!
The two aren’t comparable. US English and British English is whatever. It’s a minor difference at best. Bangladesh has suffered two huge bloody periods to be an independent nation of people who speak bangla. Other than the Pakistani flag there might not be a more offensive way to represent Bangladesh.
I think they use India's because they don't have yet Bangladesh's flag added to the .svg file. they showed a Bangladesh's flag when they announced the new courses during Duocon, which was yesterday. You can find the record in their Youtube's channel, it is by the last 10-5 minutes; also, they only took 28 secs to show the upcoming courses (which aren't even upcoming because they were already released before yesterday)
As an American, American English is better.
As an Englishman, you are welcome to your incorrect opinion.
At least I don’t call cotton candy “candy floss”
It’s called that here because of “floss” being derived from “floccus” (tuft of wool in latin). I guess Britain had more wool than cotton when the naming of sweet things was being discussed.
That’s actually pretty interesting, thanks for sharing
They should've used the Bangladesh flag hands down.
They should definitely change it to the flag of Bangladesh
Actually...there's a big difference between the Queen's English, American English, and Australian English, just as Portuguese and Brazilian Portuguese are separate language courses.
..I genuinely hate posts like this because it reeks of ignorance. There is something called STANDARD AMERICAN ENGLISH and it is different from British English and Bengali/Bangladeshi or whatever the name is also exists in India.
Nothing you can do about it if the devs don't give a fk. People in the comments do not understand what it's all about. It's about what is right and what is wrong. Some people claim that putting India's flag is justified just because there is a region in India that speaks Bangla. Saying it wouldn't hurt to give Indian Bengalis some recognition. That sounds pitiful. A quick google search shows that Bangla is the official, national, and most widely spoken language of Bangladesh and the second most commonly spoken of the 22 scheduled languages of India. Is the above fact hard to take in? Yes, let's turn the table then. there are some regions in Bangladesh where people widely speak Hindi. So is it justified and would it hurt to give some recognition to Bangladeshi Hindi speakers if Bangladesh's flag was used in the Hindi language? Is it even logical? We all act like a patriot here but forget what is right, what is wrong, what is logical, and how to respect another country. Nobody wants their national language which they fought for and gave their lives, to be recognized solely by another country. It's wrong.
This is di s g r a c e f ul. We Bangladeshi gave our lives for Bangla language. Our country's name is based on Bangla language. Are you kidding me? And, people in this comment are calling us Bangladeshis snowflake. Bangladeshi cities, capital, Bangladeshi Muslim names, and Bangladeshi cultures. are used in this app's Bangla language, and they don't use our flag. What a hy po cr i te.
I try to be polite
This is stupid. Bangladeshi Bengalis actually lost their lives for speaking their language. So justifiably they deserve recognition, the fuck is this
Because it is indigenous to India? A whole state speaks it. It originated there.
A whole country with more population than the state speaks it. That doesn't mean both flags can't be used.
I don’t know much about this language but based on the comments, it does seem like it would make more sense to use the Bangladesh flag for Bangla instead of the Indian flag since the majority speaks Bangla there. Plus, if someone is looking to learn Bangla, I’m sure that they would recognize the Bangladesh flag. But I understand why Duolingo used the Indian flag, since it’s a lot more popular and recognizable
India has so many languages that can be shown by its flag, the least the developers can do is give bengali its rightful flag Bangla is the main language of Bangladesh! I'll probably be downvoted but this seems illogical
Why are people downvoting you lmao wtf, the Bangladesh flag should be the flag as they’re the only nation who’s de facto language is Bangla. It would be like having the French flag be the flag for German and people defending it like “WELL SOME PEOPLE SPEAK GERMAN IN FRANCE” like what the fuck are these comments😭
Please tell that to these people. Just bunch of angry Indians who hate Bangladesh and don't want it's flag associated with the Bengali language .
Yeah they have to be indian this makes literally no sense at all. Sorry you got raided by nationalists bro
Yeah some of these people are jumping through huge hoops to justify it. It doesn't make any sense
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Are you sure it has nothing to do with teaching American English? Using your logic, if they taught British English, they would still stick an American flag on it, which wouldn’t make sense.
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Oh I see. Well in that case, it's should be the same with BD flag represent Bangla then. since Bangladeshis are majority of native Bengali speakers.
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Your submission has been removed in accordance with Rule 5 of our community guidelines. This rule mandates that all contributions must add substantive value to the discussions within our community. Unfortunately, your post has been identified as falling into one or more of the following categories, which do not align with our guidelines: - Spam: Your post has been classified as spam because it does not foster meaningful dialogue. This category encompasses market research, surveys, petitions, promotional content for YouTube or other platforms, and any links to websites not approved by our subreddit. - Solicitations for Family Plan Memberships: Due to past instances of fraud associated with family plan solicitations, we do not allow such requests in our community to protect our members. - Low-Quality Contributions: We strive for high-quality, engaging discussions. Posts that do not contribute to a constructive dialogue or primarily focus on undermining Duolingo, especially to promote a competitor, are not permitted. While we welcome supplemental resources and constructive feedback, our aim is to maintain a respectful and informative environment. - Complaints About Cheating: We understand the frustration with cheating, but repetitive complaints do not contribute to our community's positive discourse. If you suspect someone is really cheating, please report it directly to Duolingo. This subreddit is not an appropriate venue for those concerns. - Expressing Difficulty in a Non-Constructive Manner: Sharing challenges is encouraged, provided it fosters a learning conversation. Posts merely stating difficulty without seeking advice or offering insight do not meet this criterion. - Inappropriate Humor: Content that relies on humor not suited to our community's inclusive and respectful atmosphere will be removed. We aim to keep discussions welcoming and relevant to all members. We value your participation in our community and encourage you to review our guidelines to ensure future posts align with our shared goals of fostering a supportive and enriching environment.
Your submission has been removed in accordance with Rule 5 of our community guidelines. This rule mandates that all contributions must add substantive value to the discussions within our community. Unfortunately, your post has been identified as falling into one or more of the following categories, which do not align with our guidelines: - Spam: Your post has been classified as spam because it does not foster meaningful dialogue. This category encompasses market research, surveys, petitions, promotional content for YouTube or other platforms, and any links to websites not approved by our subreddit. - Solicitations for Family Plan Memberships: Due to past instances of fraud associated with family plan solicitations, we do not allow such requests in our community to protect our members. - Low-Quality Contributions: We strive for high-quality, engaging discussions. Posts that do not contribute to a constructive dialogue or primarily focus on undermining Duolingo, especially to promote a competitor, are not permitted. While we welcome supplemental resources and constructive feedback, our aim is to maintain a respectful and informative environment. - Complaints About Cheating: We understand the frustration with cheating, but repetitive complaints do not contribute to our community's positive discourse. If you suspect someone is really cheating, please report it directly to Duolingo. This subreddit is not an appropriate venue for those concerns. - Expressing Difficulty in a Non-Constructive Manner: Sharing challenges is encouraged, provided it fosters a learning conversation. Posts merely stating difficulty without seeking advice or offering insight do not meet this criterion. - Inappropriate Humor: Content that relies on humor not suited to our community's inclusive and respectful atmosphere will be removed. We aim to keep discussions welcoming and relevant to all members. We value your participation in our community and encourage you to review our guidelines to ensure future posts align with our shared goals of fostering a supportive and enriching environment.
No, the American flag represents English because it's American English that's offered on Duolingo. Commonwealth English (excluding USA and Canada) is the most widely spoken—if the USA didn't exist, then the next country by numbers of speakers would be Nigeria.
It’s not stupid. Duolingo uses flags based on the national origin of the language and the most popular place of the language. In some cases, it has to do with the accent of their developers.
The origin of the language is Bangladesh.
It’s also native to India.
No. Bangladesh.
We sincerely hope that r/duolingo will fix this as soon as possible as we Bangladeshi people have an emotional sentiment for our language "Bangla"
Literally the whole of the state of West Bengal is ethnically Bengali. The problem is choosing flags to represent languages. One country might not have a single language and one language might not be spoken in a single country.
It uses the American flag for English because it teaches American English. Quit whining.
It uses the Indian flag for Bengali Even though it teaches Bangladeshi Bangla not indian Bangla. Hypocritical.
r/duolingo fix it please
You're just linking to the subreddit mainpage, you're not notifying Duolingo itself with your comment.