Native Speakers Puns

One example:

Any non Catalan speaker, when hearing the word paella will think of this dish, isn't eat? Well, any native speaker, in any normal day, when using the word paella will most probably be talking about this implement. Because paella, literally, means frying pan. And, in a paella you can cook rice, which is called arròs a la paella, or «paella d'arròs». In short, «paella».

Anyway, as you use the pan (paella) for a lot of things but you'll only cook a paella (arròs a la paella) once in a while, most of the time paella just means pan.

What about your languages?

Is «robot» the same for Czech speakers, for example?

I keep on seeing posts of people taking jabs at native English speakers (most especially Americans) for not being able to speak an additional language and not making an effort to learn one, compared to non-native English speakers who usually speak their language, some English, and maybe a language or two.

But what many people fail to realize is that unless they plan to live abroad, there's little to no incentive for someone who speaks English to learn another language.

I mean, why should they? English is literally the "language" of the world. It's like the Latin of our time. Not to mention that most people grow up watching English movies or shows, so it's quite obvious why non native English speakers are able to speak some English, and native English speakers not being able to speak some language like German. English speakers are advantaged in the sense that most people already speak their language.

Really curious about this. Couldn't find much on this topic elsewhere, so I thought I'd ask you guys.

I am bald and I just realized I don't know a good English word for this. I bet there a better ways to call a bald head? Thanks!

Edit: Thanks for dropping so many good names! I will go for 'solar panel for a love machine' and when it's supposed to be more formal I will say 'Chrome dome'! I love it!! 😊

I know there are some I have for English, just curious since I wouldn’t know not being native and speaking Spanish. I just assume everyone that knows Spanish better than me is fluent lol.

Don't get me wrong, I have spoken with a bunch of natives through this year but only on the internet. I'm living in a small town in the middle of nowhere in Colombia and I'm probably the only person who speaks English here. I met a Australian guy who has been living here with his girlfriend since the pandemic started. I understood everything he said because he had a very americanized accent. The locals were amazed by hearing a foreign conversation, there were around ten people around us including my family and I was nervous asf but fortunately everything went perfect. I'm really proud of myself because I've been studying just for one year and a half.

I'm still learning and this is my first time on Reddit, but this site seems a good resource for my learning.

Please correct me!

Edit: This is in unbelievable! I don't know enough words to describe how happy I am after reading all your messages. Thank you so much for all the complements and of course for correcting some of my sentences. It's been a day and this post has more than 60 comments!

I'd like to tell the story in more detail.

I was with my family in the car and we saw this white guy (obviously a foreigner) walking to a shop so my family immediately start pushing me to speak with the guy because they knew I was putting a lot of effort in learning English, so after like 3 minutes of hearing my family say "vaya hablele al gringo" I finally got out of the car with my whole family behind me like body guards and I said to the guy "hey! I just want to practice English" and he said "oh you speak English!" and I start having the most exciting conversation I've ever had in my 18 years on this planet. I asked basic questions like "where are you from", "what the hell are you doing in the middle of nowhere" or "how's your Spanish" and we laughed of his terrible Spanish and other things. He also told me about his Colombian girlfriend and how they couldn't go to Australia due to COVID restrictions. At the end he congratulated me on my accent (I've been talking with Americans on discord for months) and we said "chao" in Spanish and that was all.

I hope my story motivates you guys to learn a new language. I had to learn English by my own because the education system in Colombia is less than deficient and I wanted to have access to a good part of the educational content on the internet and English is the key. I want native English speakers to know how lucky they are.

Thanks for reading ❤️

Is there anyone who has mastered a foreign language to the point where you can't tell that they are not a native? Like ik ppl who got extremely close, but if you listen very closely you can still tell that they don't speak that language natively.

Has this happened to anyone else before? You sign up for a language buddy program that your college/institution took great pains in organising only for your partner to snub you because they “only want to speak to native speakers”. Sure, speaking to a native speaker can be fun and beneficial to your language learning experience—perhaps more so than learning with other language learners. It’s your prerogative. But when you insist on doing so on a program designed for language learners—not cultural exchange, mind you—maybe consider not signing up in the first place?

Most of my pleasure and motivation in language learning is derived from knowing that others like me are committed to the same goal, to put it in broad terms. Language learning communities like r/learnjapanese and this one are great for such reasons. That’s why when people actively put themselves in language learning spaces only to insist on speaking with the much coveted “native speakers” at the expense of other learners piss me off so much.

“ごめん　日本人だけと組み合わせたいので、プログラムから退勤します。”

Well, you (and your Japanese) aren’t exactly hot shit yourself buddy.

Edit: I guess the Japanese text my assigned partner above (from a program where the goals are clearly stated to be language learning with other learners) wouldn’t sting that much if it wasn’t so blunt that it reads as rude in Japanese. I come from a place with few Japanese native speakers, so the possibility of not getting one as a partner was to be expected. If it helps clarify the situation, I am an N1 speaker of the aforementioned language.

My issue is not with the preference for native speakers, but the attitude of insisting on doing so to the point of snobbishness and inconveniencing other learners.

For instance, there’s the concept of degrees in humour in French. Quickly explained : First degree is when what you say is what you mean, it’s not humour. Second degree is when you’re being ironic. Third degree is absurd humour. Then it gets darker and more offensive basically.

Someone who takes everything too literally may be told “Stop taking everything to the first degree!” by someone making an ironic joke. Or you can say it yourself when people think you’re kidding but you’re not. Regarding something you say you like that others might find ridiculous for example. “No but for real, first degree, I do like it!”

Is there anything similar that can confuse non-native speakers of your language?

Obviously I know that someone from the US or Australia might use different expressions but that's about regional/national differences in English and you can still identify it as "English from a non-UK country".

I'm from Italy and for example in Italian we usually "go to the sea" on hot summer days, yet I've never heard a native say that and my friends would probably say something like "go to the beach" instead. I've had a British friend of mine telling me that "go to the sea" would sound like you're heading to the middle of the sea with a boat or something.

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I've noticed I need to watch some German programs on high volume cause it doesn't seem as clear as say Spanish or my natives English. I think obviously its cause I'm not a native speaker but then I think its also the German language. Some sounds a really soft there's a lot of s and sch sounds so German native speakers do you have to higher the volume sometimes higher than if you were watching something in English?

An english speaker once told me they could hear a difference between 's' and 'sc' in 'seen' vs 'scene'. I don't know whether that's true or imagined. I'm curious about native spanish speakers' opinions of 'y' vs 'll'

I'm a native English speaker and I am currently studying Spanish.

I still have a ways to go before I reach fluency but after spanish I wanted to learn French. Now since spanish is not my native tongue and never will be, will picking up French be easier/quicker for me nevertheless?

I've looked it up before and everyone just says that you already know what to expect, etc etc when it comes to conjugations, gendered words...

I know a lot of Grammer rules in spanish but if you told me to speak to a person in spanish, it would sound terrible.

So learning a second romance language, does it come easier even for non native speakers of the first?

As the title suggests, I speak English very well (English being my language academically and professionally for a decade now). However, I've noticed that my advisors usually don't like my style of writing, which I've managed to discover is because I write in Spanish, my native language. That is, even though I think in English, I structure my sentences in the way I would if I were thinking and writing in Spanish (e.g. with long clauses between commas in the middle of sentences). I guess my question is twofold: 1) what's up with that? 2) why is Spanish littered with such incredibly long sentences while English is much pithier (a trend I've noticed in academic and fiction writing).

Happy holidays!

Edit: A big part of the answer can be found here. Thank you u/erinius for the tip!

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/305373742_Rhetorical_incompatibilities_in_academic_writing_English_versus_the_Romance_languages

Every word's first/primary definition is "very unpleasant" (All of them are adjectives)

Please tell even if there's a very little difference or detail, I'm really wondering.

• Hideous
• Disgusting
• Foul
• Obnoxious
• Odious
• Skanky
• Horrid
• Revolting
• Repulsive
• Repugnant
• Loathsome
• Abominable
• Detestable
• Grotty

I’ve noticed something. As a non-native speaker of Chinese, I can understand other foreigners’ attempts at Chinese better than a native Chinese person trying to understand a foreigner.

For example, I have a real easy time understanding John Cena speak Mandarin. I remember I had a Chinese friend who said he had a hard time understanding his Chinese because of the accent.

Another example that comes to mind is when my fellow foreigners try to say 谢谢. I’ve notice people tend to say “shay shay”, but I completely understand that they’re trying to say “xie”, and I feel a native Chinese person (minus a Chinese-language teacher) would be scratching their head.

Anybody else notice this?

Edit: I should’ve put this a better way… when I say “than a native person’s Chinese”, I should’ve said “than a native person trying to understand a non-native speak Chinese”

Obligatory on mobile so forgive me.

English is not my first language, but I happen to notice that a lot of native speakers make spelling mistakes and I just can't wrap my head around it. While learning the language I've learnt how to write it and even the way I phrase things is not the most "English" way I almost never make spelling mistakes... Or at least I'm aware of them. We learn that pronunciation is very different from writing in English, so we learn how to write. At the same time I can write in my native language without struggling, and same goes for almost everyone: the ones who can't write correctly are mostly not educated people, or very old ones. But what I'm noticing is that young educated English speaking people have an hard time with spelling as well. Why is that? Is it a school thing? Like, you don't focus on the writing?

Some examples of mistakes I keep on seeing: your/you're, should of instead of should have, their/they're, ...

P.s. I don't mean to be offensive in any way, so sorry if I come across as judgemental. I'm genuinely baffled and I would like to understand.

They'll apologize for potential mistakes after 10 paragraphs of perfect english

A few weeks ago, I wrote this reply to a question about the subjunctive. My write-up turned out to be pretty well-received. I've since given it a little more thought and decided to make a post in case anyone finds it useful.

If you're a native speaker, I'd really appreciate it if you could correct me or point out any major mistakes you find. Feel free to add any thoughts or cases I haven't considered.

This post will most likely be useful to you if any one of the following describes you:

• You're somewhat familiar with the most common "triggering rules" for the subjunctive, but have trouble remembering them or using them correctly consistently.
• You often find yourself confused about why a native speaker chooses to use the subjunctive in some specific situation not mentioned by your textbook.
• You have trouble deciding when to use the indicative or subjunctive in cases where both could be used, but would slightly change the meaning of the sentence. Examples: cuando, mientras, aunque, etc.
• You're a native/fluent speaker of English. This matters because I'll be using examples of the English subjunctive to explain how the Spanish subjunctive works.

This is not an introduction to the subjunctive. If you're completely new to the Spanish subjunctive, I don't think this post will be super useful to you right now, but feel free to come back later after learning a few "triggering rules."

Occam's razor suggests that we shouldn't be memorizing 20 different rules for using the subjunctive; instead, we should try to understand its usage by following only a handful of underlying principles. I hope that the 2 main points below will help you understand the subjunctive at a much more intuitive level.

Point #1:

(Copied from my previous post.) Grammar books like to teach that the subjunctive is about uncertainties, wishes, doubts, etc. They're not wrong, but I prefer to think of it from the opposite angle: you're only allowed to use the indicative if (you believe that) what you're saying is true. The indicative indicates facts. There is some kind of responsibility and accountability that comes with using the indicative. Anything that isn't a fact doesn't deserve the indicative.

Point #2:

If you're a native English speaker, the following sentences should immediately sound v

So I’m an artist from the US and I notice that a lot of the comments I get on instagram (presumably from non-native speakers) use “congratulations” when giving compliments on my work. If it were one or two people I wouldn’t really notice but this happens ALL the time, for example I just got one that said “This is amazing! Congratulations, I adore it!” So I’m just wondering why this happens because I’ve never heard native english speakers use congratulations in this context - only if someone achieves a big milestone, like getting married or graduating. Is that something that people learning english are being taught, or is it just them confusing the meaning of the word, maybe from its equivalent in another language? Interested to hear peoples’ thoughts on this

Its a dumb request, but I play on an english minecraft server (yup), and I want to gift a dragon egg to my friend.

I want to write a 'serious' letter where I hand it to him, it should sound like something written long time ago.

it should go somewhere along the lines of:

''I, XYZ inform you, that I hand you the most valiable of all items, the last dragon egg. I trust you with it, and I believe you will display it and give it the respect it deserves.''

yes, we are all adults, yes, we all act like kids.

I have been learning Tukrish for 7 months.

I am at the stage where I can understand pretty much every word individually, but my slow old brain takes so long to peice the words together into a sentence I can understand.

And by then the conversation has moved on.

In all honesty this part of my language development is more fustrating than knowing nothing at all. Its fustrating to understand, but still unable to join in on any conversations.

When will my brain catch up? I should have started learning way before this. I live in Turkey, my in-laws are Turkish, and the social isolation is crippling, I need to learn asap!

I'm a viewer from Asia and I didn't find it too jarring, although I liked Walt's narration more. But some people in this sub found it so bad that it apparently ruined entire scenes for them. I usually check the respective reddit discussion thread after finishing each episode and each of those threads had at least ten highly upvoted comments complaining about her accent. What am I missing?

Fate/Stay Night is considered to be a mildly difficult VN to read in Japanese. How accurately can native speakers read it? gambs investigates.

I'll go through the first few minutes in this playthrough of Fate/Stay Night, read aloud by a native speaker of Japanese and annotate the text with mistakes made (other than simple slips of the tongue or inserting words that don't drastically change the meaning or reading).

>それは、稲妻のような切っ先だった。

>心臓を串刺しにせんと繰り出される槍の穂先。

>躱そうとする試みは無意味だろう。

>それが稲妻である以上、人の目では捉えられない。

>だが。

>この身を貫こうとする稲妻は、

>この身を救おうとする月光に弾かれた。

Native speaker slips up a bit pronouncing 捉えられない (toraerarenai), but other than that no issues

>しゃらん、という華麗な音。

>否。目前に降り立った音は、真実鉄よりも重い。

>およそ華やかさとは無縁であり、纏った鎧の無骨さは凍てついた夜気そのものだ。

>華美な響きなど有る筈がない。

>本来響いた音は鋼。

>ただ、それを鈴の音と変えるだけの美しさを、その騎士が持っていただけ。

Native speaker seems to misread 華麗 (karei, meaning "brilliant" or "splendid") as 可憐 (karen, meaning "pretty" or "cute"). Kinda a big mistake.

Native speaker inserts a character into 目前 (mokuzen), changing it to 目の前 (me no mae). It means the same thing.

Native speaker stumbles on 夜気 (yaki, meaning "the aura of night") but eventually corrects himself.

Native speaker initially misreads 鋼 (hagane, meaning "steel") as 銅 (dou, meaning "copper") but eventually corrects himself.

>「問おう。貴方が、私のマスターか」

>闇を弾く声で、彼女は言った。

>「召喚に従い参上した。

>これより我が剣は貴方と共にあり、貴方の運命は私と共にある。ここに、契約は完了した」

>そう、契約は完了した。

>彼女がこの身を主と選んだように。

>きっと自分も、彼女の助けになると誓ったのだ。

Minor slip of the tongue but other than that no issues.

>月光はなお冴え冴えと闇を照らし。

>土蔵は騎士の姿に倣うよう、かつての静けさを取り戻す。

Native speaker misreads 冴え冴え (saezae, meaning "clear" or "crisp") as saesae. They don't correct themself.

>時間は止まっていた。

>おそらくは一秒すらなかった光景。

>されど。

>その姿ならば、たとえ地獄に落ちようと、鮮明に思い返す事ができる。

Minor slip of the tongue but other than that no issues.

>僅かに振り向く横顔。

>どこまでも穏やかな聖緑の瞳。

>時間はこの瞬間のみ永遠となり、

>彼女を象徴する青い衣が風に揺れる。

Native speaker reads 聖緑 as "seien" which is a good guess but no one actually knows how to read this or what it means since Nasu appears to have completely made this word up.

Native speaker inserts a particle into the third line, I think expecting it to say "時間はこの瞬間のみを永遠として" but was tripped up by how the line ended. I believe what they said was actually ungrammatical.

>差し込むのは僅かな蒼光。

>金砂のような髪が、月の光に濡れていた。

>それは、今から十年前の話。

Native speaker reads 金砂 (kinsha, meaning "golden sand") correctly but then d

I am interested in learning the Russian language as I have an interest in Russian culture, my question is that a person who has learned Russian from English native what was your way you learned.

Tips etc, dedicated to this.

Also has anyone tried babbel, Duolingo or mondly and did they work?

hello,

i am from germany and i want to read the wheel of time in english. as i said i am not a native speaker but i am able to understand everything and i can say what i want to. i have tried to read lotr (in english) and i thought it was kinda hard to read (even in german) but a lot of people say that wheel of time is much easier to read. so, can you recommend wot for a non native speaker or not?

First time posting here, hopefully all goes well. In short, I have an online friend in Hokkaido who is really sweet and is looking to make friends around the world.

She's posted a video on YouTube after a lot of work (she's blind) and I'm simply doing my bit by sharing with this community. At the very least, I think it is good listening practice as she speaks slowly and clearly. video here

Hi there! I'm just looking for the people with at least intermediate English level who want to practice English by participating in Online Meet-up talking about interesting topics in small group.

The session will be via Zoom and will be organized by Certified native English teacher from U.S.

We have several native speakers who come to know how people think with different cultural background!

For me it is really enjoyable that i can talk with different people changing the members every 20 minutes! (The session is 1 hour)

Just let me know if you are interested in joining us!

Of course the Meet-up session is FREE OF CHARGE!

Are there words that you know that even native speakers might not know?

I remember that once a native English speaker told me that he has a word he's sure I won't know. He was right. And it wasn't a rare word, it was "famished" (now I know)

So I wonder if you also know some words that even native speakers won't know