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Nonnative English speakers share their gripes about speaking English

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Re: Nonnative English speakers share their gripes about speaking English

#141

Post by gota »

ljm wrote: post #105
brk wrote: post #79

I think some of the confusion is that "pone" is not a root word or term. So, the opposite of postpone is not prepone, in the same way that prepartum is the opposite of postpartum.

I like 'sublime' for that. It sounds like an object could have three states: lime, sublime, and superlime. Something that is sublime would somehow be inferior to its lime counterpart. Like everything has an innate limeness.

Apparently it could have been like that, as it comes from 'sub'+'limen' ("threshold")

Disclaimer: I just googled "sublime etymology"

Re: Nonnative English speakers share their gripes about speaking English

#142

Post by kwoff »

pdpi wrote: post #26

As a non-native speaker, one fascinating phenomenon for me is the flip side to Uncleftish Beholding[1]. Many latinate words are considered more sophisticated, or fancier in general, than germanic words. Because I'm a native speaker of a Romance language, those are precisely the words that I reach for naturally, because they're familiar. What follows is that, past a certain threshold where your English is good enough,…

When I was learning/using French, kinda the inverse of what you said, I'd try to think of a sophisticated English word to use. It could even bleed back into English speaking, for example I would "recount" (raconter) something rather than "tell" it.

Re: Nonnative English speakers share their gripes about speaking English

#143

Post by sandworm101 »

alickz wrote: post #118
JackFr wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

'gaol' always throws me for a loop when I'm reading something British. I need to remind myself it's pronounced 'jail'. (A quick google tells me that all the major British newspapers switched over to 'jail' by the 1990's - score one for the good guys!) I remember reading 'Mutiny on the Bounty' as a child and talking about it with my father and I said something about the 'boatswain', and he (a former naval officer) loo…

I've known the word boatswain for decades at this point and never knew it was pronounced like that! Speaking of military terms, lieutenant as "leftenant" always threw me. I had just assumed they were different words.

Even worse: Try being at unit with brit/canadian/american exchange officers. Same spelling, different pronunciations depending on who you are talking about. And they really do care.

Re: Nonnative English speakers share their gripes about speaking English

#144

Post by MispelledToyota »

rocknor wrote: post #98
brk wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is such a thing as Indian English If there is one phrase that, to me, defines Indian English, I think it would be "do the needful". For American English speakers, I think the first time you hear/see that, it is totally confusing and jarring in an odd way.

Then you need to learn more about it, Indian English is more than just that one phrase. That's like saying, "if there is one phrase that, to me, defines American English, I think it would be "Howdy".

that would be a fine thing to say. Seems like everything is fine.

Re: Nonnative English speakers share their gripes about speaking English

#145

Post by hcayless »

heurisko wrote: post #49
biztos wrote: post #29

I'm a native English speaker who's lived in other countries a lot and speaks three languages, now trying to learn a fourth. The weirdness of "English" is something I think about often. For starters, you have to live in it before you can really speak it. And our spelling is the least rational, least consistent thing I've ever seen. In addition to the weird way we spell a lot of things, many of the sounds are not prono…

> And there are dialects that are pretty much incomprehensible to people who grew up in the mainstream dialect (true of many other languages as well) I think there are differences in accent, but I don't recognise anywhere as being "pretty much incomprehensible". I speak "standard" German as a foreigner, and have definitely found dialects that are "pretty much incomprehensible". I haven't found differences to such a d…

When my father (who had a Midlands-ish English accent) met my father-in-law (strong NC Appalachian accent), they could not at first understand each other. It was pretty funny.

Re: Nonnative English speakers share their gripes about speaking English

#146

Post by offtop5 »

biztos wrote: post #89
heurisko wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And there are dialects that are pretty much incomprehensible to people who grew up in the mainstream dialect (true of many other languages as well) I think there are differences in accent, but I don't recognise anywhere as being "pretty much incomprehensible". I speak "standard" German as a foreigner, and have definitely found dialects that are "pretty much incomprehensible". I haven't found differences to such a d…

If you mean in English, I would say look to the poorer corners of blighty, or deep enough into Australia, and you may find what you need. Or, if you're in Los Angeles and white, ride the bus from Santa Monica to DTLA on any given weekend and just listen to people talk: that's English just as sure as mine is, but I get maybe half. (Also, is Scots not a dialect of English? I'm not sure -- a mix at the very least. Great…

>. Or, if you're in Los Angeles and white, ride the bus from Santa Monica to DTLA on any given weekend and just listen to people talk: that's English just as sure as mine is, but I get maybe half.

Eh.

It's nothing more than repetition for the most part, along with certain parts of speech being implied. If your trying to overhear someone else's conversation you'll miss key points of context.

Having been to London , and South Central LA , I can't imagine any scenario where people from these places couldn't communicate with each other. A few words are definitely going to be different.

Re: Nonnative English speakers share their gripes about speaking English

#148

Post by InfiniteRand »

It’s interesting when a phrase has slightly different meanings between cultures. For instance, I have seen several Indians use “too many” to mean “a lot”, Americans use “too many” to mean a lot sometimes but there is a negative connotation for Americans where “too many” means “a lot and there should be less.”

Usually this difference is small enough that it doesn’t matter but there are cases like an Indian saying, “there are too many Mexicans in this neighborhood” and meaning “This neighborhood has a lot of Mexicans” in a neutral sense, but an American hearing that might interpret it as “The number of Mexicans in this neighborhood is a bad thing”

Re: Nonnative English speakers share their gripes about speaking English

#149

Post by naturalauction »

alistairSH wrote: post #57
mwcampbell wrote: post #31

As a midwestern white American, I've certainly had prejudices based on people's accents, and I've probably misjudged whether someone was a "native" speaker. Having read this article, I will renew my efforts to fight those ugly prejudices. For a few years now, I've thought that the ideal work environment for encouraging diversity and inclusion would be an all-remote team that used only written communication, preferrin…

"Native" is such a weird construct with language. I'm Scottish, and while I've lived in the US since early childhood, I still retain a few pronunciation "quirks" inherited from my parents. At least in my case, it's mostly to the amusement of friends (haha, you say "wheel" funny or "ooh, that rolled 'R' is sexy"). But still so strange, since I think my pronunciation is closer to "correct" than American's.

Yeah, I really struggle with the concept of "native" as well. I grew up in the US but the first language I spoke was Tamil. When I went to a nursery, I couldn't communicate with any of the other kids. My parents then spoke to me almost exclusively in English. As a result I can only speak/read/write English but can still understand Tamil at an elementary level.

I used to think I spoke perfect American English until someone pointed out that I say the th sound weirdly (I think it's called dental th-stopping [0]). I also spent some time in England as a child and now say some words like "rather" with the English pronunciation. I'm living in England again now as an adult and am picking up some English colloquialisms, though usually pronounced in an American accent.

I also unintentionally end up speaking in an Indian accent when I talk to speakers of Indian English, but can't put on (even intentionally) an English accent to save my life even though I had one when I lived in England as a child.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Th-stopping

Re: Nonnative English speakers share their gripes about speaking English

#150

Post by lebuffon »

david422 wrote: post #75

Reminds me of that scene from Die Hard where the non-native German speaker says "feels like it's gonna rain like, dogs and cats" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0yQbpoQ0hY Something so subtle that a "native" - or maybe it would just be American? - speaker would never say.

Or... You think I know f__k nothing, but I know f__k all!
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