Re: How would you define "native speaker of english"?

Anonymous — Sat, 06 Oct 2007 10:24:57 GMT

In my opinion the phrase 'native speaker of English' gains more relevance when referred to in a specific context such as that of a non-native speaker of English like me, who lived for two thirds of my working life in a non-English speaking country, and all of a sudden my life changed dramatically in the 90s, after the 'Romanian revolution', when I ended up living in UK. I'd started learning English in secondary school up to a graduate level in Romania, and at the age of 25 I followed a career as a successful English linguist, i.e. teaching, translating and interpreting in and out of English. However, when in my early 40s I moved to UK with the intention of settling here, I was faced with a language barrier I'd never anticipated, simply realising that my level of English was not high enough to satisfy my high linguistic needs and aspirations.

At present, despite recently obtaining an MA in English, the language barrier between my mother tongue and English seems to be more present than ever, and I have the feeling that I'm stuck in a no return situation. There is only one hope for me, and that is to continue to study English, and this is actually why I'm writing to this forum: I'd like to do some research on 'How to become a native speaker of English' by challenging anyone who's interested to take part in.

Here I am speaking about launching a study in Englishness at the same time, as, in my opinion, one cannot speak the language of a people without actually becoming one of the people of that country. From my own experience, it is not only the language that poses a problem to me, it is the Englishness itself that is part and parcel of the whole thing, i.e. that state which the native speakers have acquired together with the language and which has shaped them into what they are as a result of acquiring their mother tongue. A language is not only a set of rules, it is a way of thinking and behaving in a particular way, using certain native phrases, idioms and collocations which make sense only in a certain linguistic context, and to which the English speakers are exposed to since the moment they were born. Therefore, if anyone has any illusion that they can 'become' English without mastering those 'charming' idioms and collocations, they will be in for the shock of their lives when they find themselves in a native English society, for example, and they open their mouth for the first time: they will be automatically classed as 'foreign', and there will always be an unsurpassable barrier between them end the English.

Maybe many of you wouldn't mind living in a state of marginalization for the rest of their lives - after all there are people and people, and many non-native English speakers are successful honourable citizens living, working and bringing up their children here in UK, and I respect and admire them for their successful lives. However, I haven't reached that level of happiness yet, and maybe there are many others like me who would like to speak English almost, if not at the same level with the native speakers. I know this may seem idealistic and impossible to attain, but at the moment I feel that there's no other way of finding my happiness than pursuing my linguistic career in English and in UK, and attaining a level of English according to my high standards.

So if you are interested in taking English as a foreign language up to English native speaker level please help me with your ideas, suggestions and English language learning experience after postgraduate level. At the moment I have gathered some learning materials such as: 'Cobuild Dictionary of Idioms', 'Cobuild Dictionary of Phrasal Verbs', 'Oxford Collocations', 'Longman Language Activator', etc,, which I'm going to start studying on my own and see if I can 'push' my English any further, and then write a book about it.

All I need is to find people interested in studying the same materials at the some time with me, and to see if we can take English to a level where we can express our ideas as freely and as naturally as in our native tongues. To me this is the challenge of my life, and I'd like to know that there are other enthusiastic non-native postgraduate students of any age who are ready to embark on, let's say, a one-year self taught course in Englishness.

Re: How to have a confident in speaking English?

Mslavender — Sun, 20 Nov 2005 09:59:18 GMT

Anonymous wrote:

Hello!

You should read more books. This way you can build up your vocabulary as well as idiom, phrasal verb and the like. I usually spend 1 hours everyday reading book or short stories that I have bought from bookstore. My favorite books are Thoughts and Notions, Cause and effect and Tooth and claw (short story).

You ought to speak English with your family members, watch English movie....

This is just my personal opinion. Hope it answer your question.

Thank you very much for the information. Im really appreciated it a lot. I admit that I seldom reading English books^ ^

Thank you again.

Re: How to have a confident in speaking English?

Anonymous — Sun, 20 Nov 2005 03:23:12 GMT

Hello!

You should read more books. This way you can build up your vocabulary as well as idiom, phrasal verb and the like. I usually spend 1 hours everyday reading book or short stories that I have bought from bookstore. My favorite books are Thoughts and Notions, Cause and effect and Tooth and claw (short story).

You ought to speak English with your family members, watch English movie....

This is just my personal opinion. Hope it answer your question.

Re: Phrasal Verb of the day

chris — Sun, 25 May 2003 18:22:36 GMT

Malta has two official languages, Maltese and English. Maltese is a mixture of Italian and Arabic - not the easiest language to learn and is extremely consonantal.

Kids in Malta learn English and Maltese, Italian through television and school and have to choose either French or German in secondary school.

I'm not Maltese and therefore can only speak English and a little broken French and German.

With only one university in Malta, children are pushed to study hard from an early age and language acquirement is becoming increasingly important.

Search results for 'tag:Phrasal verbs tag:Speak english' matching tags 'Phrasal verbs' and 'Speak english'

Re: How would you define "native speaker of english"?

Re: How to have a confident in speaking English?

Re: How to have a confident in speaking English?

Re: Phrasal Verb of the day