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Do you speak it like a native? | ||
Tags: Native Fluency | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5430 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes  Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 57 of 58 17 April 2010 at 2:10pm | IP Logged | ||
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In my experience of oral testing for French, I have noticed that I can usually form my opinion of the level of performance of the candidate within the first few seconds of the test. Actually, much of the initial impression comes from the pronunciation. It's something akin to what we experience when someone answers the telephone and with just one word is able to convey the impression of being a native speaker.
Going beyond the initial effect of good phonetics however, I have found that two things, inter alia, really distinguish high-level speakers. Firstly, their speech is full of idioms and rich in collocations. English is said to be particularly idiomatic; that may be the case, but I believe that all spoken language is highly idiomatic. Certain word combinations go together so well that we can usually fill in the blanks when items are missing. Especially when the utterances are well linked with the appropriate connecting devices. This is what gives the feeling of "flow" when I'm listening to a candidate. I hear syntactic formulations that fit into common patterns. Small grammatical errors can go nearly unnoticed because the overall effect is so good. What really impresses is the ability to quote a popular saying or proverb. Wow! That is the hallmark of a native speaker. Secondly, I've observed that high-level speakers have a good command of synonyms. They know how to vary their speech according to the situation and the effect intended. If they don't know the exact word that they are searching for, they can quickly find something else that can do the job. This is very important because lower-level speech gives the impression of being repetitive and limited in nuances. Let me give an example. In a previous post, I stated that most native speakers could fill in the blank of the expression: "He doesn't know his ___ from his elbow". The answer of course would most likely be "ass". However a native speaker could just as easily have said: butt, arse, backside, booty, rear end, posterior. One could even add "you know what" to that list. The great challenge with so-called synonyms is how and when to use them appropriately. Again, this is what distinguishes a native speaker from a non-native. A native speaker can use euphemisms to talk about delicate subjects. The other day I heard someone say: "She's an effing witch. Sorry, I mix up my b's and w's." There is nothing more jarring than inappropriate language. It may be grammatically perfect but it is not right for the situation. The big no-no here of course would be street language in a formal situation. But it also happens the other way around; expressions that are too formal or literary for the occasion. This is not a problem for native speakers, but non-natives who pick up expressions and words without a sense of language register can easily make this kind of mistake. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Splog Diglot Senior Member Czech Republic anthonylauder.c Joined 5669 days ago 1062 posts - 3263 votes Speaks: English*, Czech Studies: Mandarin | Message 58 of 58 17 April 2010 at 3:03pm | IP Logged | ||
Absolutely. This is xxxxx to my ears! 1 person has voted this message useful |
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