Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth proudly and embarrassingly declared that he only "speaks American" while in a room filled with leaders from Latin America.
You’re the best kind of correct - technically correct.
And yet, if you happened to be a speaker of Navajo, Sioux or Algonquin, you’d say just that. You wouldn’t say “I speak American”, just like a speaker of Flemish, Albanian or Finnish would not say “I speak (Indo-)European”. It’s a description of the geographic origin or the broader language family, but not a category useful to indicate any specific language like Drunk Pete is trying to do here.
You’re the best kind of correct - technically correct.
And yet, if you happened to be a speaker of Navajo, Sioux or Algonquin, you’d say just that. You wouldn’t say “I speak American”, just like a speaker of Flemish, Albanian or Finnish would not say “I speak (Indo-)European”. It’s a description of the geographic origin or the broader language family, but not a category useful to indicate any specific language like Drunk Pete is trying to do here.
That’s a fair assessment.