Not being sure about my first language

Discussion

I lived in various countries till I was 18 and I came back to my home country the same year and I'm living here up till now. I was raised in a family where my parents are both non-English speakers but me myself used English at school and with my friends. In casual talks, I'm okay with both. I am more comfortable studying and giving public speeches in English. Technically, if I go by order, English is my second language. But I started feel a discrepancy between my first language and my second language ever since I came back to my home country. I realized when it comes to academics English is my dominant language. So if I consider speaking both languages in both casual and formal settings, English would cover both while my first language would only cover the first case. But I am not quite familiar with idioms or colloquialism in English. I always identified myself as a native to my country and I am quite sure I also culturally align with my country as well. BUT I consider my language identity is English for I am more comfortable expressing and organizing thoughts. in it.

In an effort to seek an answer to this, I asked ChatGPT to evaluate my language proficiency of both languages. It said that based on the conversations we had for the past two days, it came to a conclusion that English is NOT my first language (ofc I shouldn't trust it completely). But the thing is that it made the judgement based on the fact that I spoke too formally and directly in a manner that native speakers wouldn't do in a casual conversation. But wouldn't the level of formality further prove that you are more proficient and fluent in that language? Do you think this is a valid reason to judge whether certain language is their mother tongue or not? As I mentioned in the earlier paragraph, I don't use many idiomatic expressions when I use English. But just because of that, does that make English my second language? What do you think?

in languagelearningby Rosybara718

77%

14d

witchwatchwot

nat🇨🇦🇨🇳|adv🇯🇵|int🇫🇷|beg🇰🇷

14d

English can be both your second language and your dominant (stronger) language.

Fluency, "native-ness", etc are all nebulous concepts of language proficiency. Our proficiency in any given language is dependent on the domains in which we have experienced our languages. For example, I have bilingual friends who are highly proficient in both their languages, but may be more formal with one over the other because that's the language they have most of their work experience in. On the other hand, there are monolingual native speakers of English who may not be proficient with certain turns of phrases and idioms because of the communities in which they operate, their education level, their vocation, etc.

Do you accomplish what you want in your languages? That's what's really important at the end of the day. I wouldn't agonise so much over labels or AI evaluations.

Rosybara718

14d

Wow it eased much of the frustration I was going through the past two days :D. I am in a field where language really matters because I provide services related to language. I'm still in the training process and I keep comparing myself to those who perform better than me. Trying to figure out their strength, I thought knowing exactly what my first language would help me excel more. Your comment kind of helped me get over those thoughts cuz I was falling into an overthinking spiral.

SchoolForSedition

14d

I don’t think it would necessarily be wrong to call yourself bilingual or to pick whichever as your first language.

I say this partly because I have met people who have a C1 certificate and can barely make themselves understood.

Snoo-88741

14d

You can have multiple native languages.

Stafania

14d

Language skills are like that. I think you describe your relationship to the languages pretty clearly.

Why not just focus on continuing developing your language skills? Learn more of the formal school language by reading books and learn more of spoken language by getting friends that are native in English or by watching media like tv-series that use the type of language you’d like to improve.

You cannot avoid being shaped by your language exposure, so just go with it and make sure you supplement whatever you feel is lacking.

Fhaid_Alajmi

12d

Your native/first language is the one you dream with.

FeJ_12_12_12_12_12

Nederlands, N / English, C1-C2 / Français, B1-B2/ Deutsch, A1-A2

14d

You're (very) good at English, but it is certainly not your first language. A reddit post is not something to decide it upon, but when I read your text, I feel the little, grammatical devil on my shoulder.

I might push the enveloppe by guessing/asking this, but is it possible that your native language is part of the Romance family? (I would put my money on French. Your sentence structure almost "betrays" an influence from another language family. It also makes your structuring slightly more formal.)

Again, very well written. I don't want to sound rude. It's clearly not your first but that does not, in any shape or form, diminish your current linguistic skills.

Rosybara718

14d

I'm quite surprised that I gave you the impression that my native language could be French. I'm from one of the East Asian countries (btw not offended.) About the structuring part I understand how that could have gotten to you because I am aware I use more formal language in causal settings too (for this, smone said I sound educated.) Can I ask what are the specific cues that you caught in my sentences? Just curious of whats making my English sound that way. ChatGPT said the exact same thing and won't tell if I ask 😅

FeJ_12_12_12_12_12

Nederlands, N / English, C1-C2 / Français, B1-B2/ Deutsch, A1-A2

13d

I don't know why I'm being downvoted, as I specifically stated your English is very good.

Anyway (This might sound as if I'm hunting for the French. I want to remind everyone that I'm not British and I will not lower myself to that level of national rivalry.):

"me myself used"

This is a structure that suggests "moi-même" or reflexive pronouns (e.g. s'appeler). I haven't seen any English speaker make this specific "mistake". It's the only language I know that uses this.

But the thing is that it made the judgement based on the fact that I spoke too formally and directly in a manner that native speakers wouldn't do in a casual conversation.

French and English are related with each other, and English still uses words with French roots in very formal or archaic contexts. (e.g. "gay" = "happy") Aside from that, the (specific) sentence structure is closer to a Romance language than a Germanic one. I can't quite put my finger on it but the specific phrase feels directly translated from French. (It might be the verb "do" after "wouldn't".)

Do you think this is a valid reason to judge whether certain language is their mother tongue or not?

This hints at using a condition similar to how the French do it. If I wrote this, I would've used "might be". If this were the only "mistake" (it's not really a mistake; I would place it closer to a "nuance"), I wouldn't have caught it. But it does give me a slight suspicion of you being French.

In French, AFAIK, they use their if-statements similar to this:

"Si tu me vois, j'y suis. => If you see me, I'm there."

You use sentences long enough to have been written by Dickens, which doesn't help at diminishing the formal tone, and your usage of the tenses suggests you likely aren't a native speaker of a Germanic language. As you can see, I'm victim of this syndrome as well. It might be a clear indication of my (our?) love for classic literature and our eternal bane of not being a native in the beautiful tongue of Shakespeare. But always remember: There's a certain beauty in formality and being educated.

Rosybara718

13d

I appreciate your effort for listing all the things in detail :D. It's quite interesting to see what "vibes" I give out when I use English. And as someone from Asia, figuring out my language stucture is closer to that of the Romance family is quite surprising in a good way. But if any, I thought East Asian language structure would be the strongest one you could have noticed. Those are the things that never came across to me when using English (perhapse because I don't know any Romance language I can compare to). I guess it's inevitable to have that "nuance" considering how I learned English and what environment I was in. Your anlysis provided me with information that those from the same or a similar culture of mine cannot. It's always interesting to know about myself more :)

FeJ_12_12_12_12_12

Nederlands, N / English, C1-C2 / Français, B1-B2/ Deutsch, A1-A2

13d

I don't know any East Asian languages, so that might have been why I linked it with the Romance languages. Is it possible they put more emphasis on politeness, subordinate clauses and formality?

"Nuance" is a hard thing. It's something that a textbook will never be able to teach you. It differentiates us from the animals:

We can communicate and use language, with which we can add a certain tone to the produced sounds. If I use the expression "I would love to see him try", I can make it sarcastic.

But a dog, while he could communicate through barking, will never be able to "sarcastically" bark. Just imagine a witty, British bulldog that passes an elegant, elitist French poodle and a sturdy, almost stout German shepherd. All we need to finish the start of this typical jest, would be a fat, lazy American Golden Retriever that.😉

The way I (and any other human) adds nuance to our communication, immediately brands us as a certain person. It shows what our native language is and where we are from. (Which is a fun game to play if you have a good grasp of the language: Is this person a native or not? Where does he come from?)

A simple way to add nuance to your language is 1) using it often, 2) studing the history of said language/country and 3) reading (modern) books in it. That's all you can do if you truly want to reach the level of English with which you can taunt the others all day long. AKA become English with flying colors on a certain flag (how about a white cross on a blue field?) ;)

Rosybara718

13d

For my native language I think we tend to beat around the bushes when trying to be polite dunno if this is true to other East Asian countries. I beleive politeness has to come along whenever you are conversing but my native language does put more emphasis on it. But in my case, I heard that I speak more directly than others from my culture. I don't think I can give you a detailed answer cuz as stated in the post I haven't lived in my home country for a long time 😅 so my understanding of the language falls short compared to the natives. Hope that gave you a rought idea tho.