Do you know Spongebob?

[Englishuser]

Hi Yankee,

You wrote:

[Yankee]

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The vast majority of native speakers of English don't dwell on trying to figure out whether or not English is someone's native language.

What's your advice to Michael, Englishuser? Is it that he should feel free to simply translate German directly into English?

By the way, is a native speaker different from a native writer? I don't believe I've ever heard the latter term before.
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Amy
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ESL teacher, translator, and a native speaker of American English

[Fan of Arabian horses]

Hi Englishuser!

You?re surely right when you say that an English native possibly could have written that controversial expression, too. But I agree with Amy saying/writing that somebody who?s proficient with both languages (English and German) easily will be reminded to a German idiom that exists in fact hearing it. I myself, although not that proficient Englishuser, thought about using the commonly recognized idioms `shed yome light on this` or ?enlighten me? . I must admit that writing down my idiom I just tried not to repeat an expression which I had used the same day yet, just a few minutes before.

Welcome back

Michael

[Yankee]

Hi Michael

I think there are probably many direct translations of some other language that native speakers of English never notice at all -- even when the words do sound a little "unusual".

But you never can tell when one of those overly direct translations might come back to haunt you. Just think about the poor German guy who walks into McDonald's and says "I become a hamburger."

OT:
Do you use the expression "So ein K?se" in your part of Germany? Man! I'll never forget the first time I heard someone say that. I thought I was doing very well in German and was thrilled that I was able to follow and understand conversations. Then one day someone suddenly mentioned 'cheese' in the middle of a conversation and I had no idea why.

Amy
_________________
Amy
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ESL teacher, translator, and a native speaker of American English

[Englishuser]

Hi Yankee,

I totally agree with you when you say that most people wouldn't spend that much time trying to figure out if someone is a native speaker of English or not. The most important thing is that you can understand each other, after all.

Translating German, or any other language, directly into English, is a practice I would strongly advice against. The best way of learning English is, in my opinion, through reading and listening to 'correct' English. People who acquire a language this way will normally become much more proficient than those who stick to the grammar-translation method. Translating idioms directly from one language to another is always a risky business, and I wouldn't knowingly do it myself. The point I was trying to make was that people shouldn't worry too much about making mistakes in their use of English since even native speakers show such great variation in their use of vocabulary and idioms.

Is a native speaker different from a native writer? Perhaps. Children start acquring the spoken form of a language much earlier than they start learning its writing system. This could make a difference. The term 'native writer' in itself is used by some linguists.

Englishuser