You combined the first sentence part with the second sentence part with a connective, "along with". Hence you created a causal relationship between parts I and II. Therefore my complaint about the utterance of "knowing at least two languages" is still completely valid. I appreciate your concerns about my reading comprehension, but as an English teacher, I can assure you that I can fully comprehend whatever you write just fine.
Aside from that you most likely did not understand (or didn't care about) the implications of my previous posting. Since Carlsson is Swedish, he also falls right into the category of Europeans who have to have two foreign language classes at school, and therefore the astonishment proclaimed by you about him overcoming stuttering problems *in at least two languages* is only partly understandable, since the two-languages-part applies to pretty much the whole continent.
Sweden has, by the way, a higher level of English education than the US itself, and people there tend to commit less mistakes both grammatically as well as orthographically than Americans on average.
I believe we're misunderstanding one another. You believe most Americans are not monolingual. I do not. I stated not everyone in America thinks the rest of the world is monolingual, implying that many others do think English is the only language learned. The rest of the world caters to the English language, so it's much easier not to emphasize learning a second language fluently as a nation.
Sure, Spanish is taught at the high school level in America, but it's far too late to introduce learning a language so that one can communicate fluently or fluidly. A majority who are multilingual in America have English as their second language, but they represent the minority of Americans. English is my fourth language, but English is my strongest language as I was taught it from before pre-school because that was the design my parents. Of course, when one's young it's all one big language and you don't realize it until you're older that you know more than one language. When I realized it during grade school, I was in the minority of knowing more than one language once we moved states side.
Let's look at baseball. Most Japanese players have interpreters. Most players coming from Latin countries not named Mexico have interpreters. Why aren't Japanese players speaking fluently in English? Why are players from Latin countries not speaking fluently in English? America is bookended with the French language above them and the Spanish language below them. Why does an MLB telecast need interpreters for Spanish speaking players since, by your own account, Americans are not monolingual? Similarly, why does an NHL game not be broadcasted in French in all American stations? Surely using you as a standard might be an exception than standard.
Overcoming stuttering is an impressive feat. Learning two languages well enough to communicate is an impressive feat. Using your own self as an example does not equate to "most Americans knows another language well enough to communicate fluently nor fluidly in that secondary language". While you aren't impressed, I am impressed and this is me having English as my fourth language. Learning math is actually learning another language that's more universal than English. Learning anything is difficult. Why put down a person who is impressed with someone overcoming stuttering on top of learning at least two languages? Are you trying to flex your exceptionality as a standard?
