I’m writing about a character who doesn’t have English as her native language, although she’s lived in London long enough for English \u00c2\u00a0not to be accurately described, perhaps, as her second language — more her first through usage and acclimatisation.<\/p>\n
I’m therefore always interested in the\u00c2\u00a0idiosyncrasies\u00c2\u00a0of how non-native speakers construct their English speech. Germans, like Kim, are generally very precise — although they often literally translate German grammatical construction (quite often possessives — like ‘the department of Mr Schulze’) and occasionally get tripped up on word genders (talking about inanimate objects as he or she).<\/p>\n
But most young people who have constant exposure through living in this country will tend to speak very fluently — picking up English figures of speech and phrasing. They might sometimes want to draw attention to their ‘otherness’, though, as Kim does — which sometimes comes across on the page as inconsistency — although it’s deliberate on my behalf.<\/p>\n
So I think Kim would have been more than bemused by this shop window in High Wycombe — on the main shopping street too. I’m sure she’d be horrified — \u00c2\u00a0she’s a cultural snob and very proud of her own language abilities.<\/p>\n
It’s hard to know where to start in terms of listing the errors in the huge poster — but, despite its mistakes, it makes itself understood — in a similar way to how very limited English speakers often get their message across — perhaps one of the reasons why English is such a ubiquitous language?<\/p>\n I’m writing about a character who doesn’t have English as her native language, although she’s lived in London long enough for English \u00c2\u00a0not to be accurately described, perhaps, as her second language — more her first through usage and acclimatisation. I’m therefore always interested in the\u00c2\u00a0idiosyncrasies\u00c2\u00a0of how non-native speakers construct their English speech. Germans, like … <\/p>\n![\"We](\"https:\/\/www.macnovel.org.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/We-Can-Unlocking.jpg\" "\\"We-Can-Unlocking\\"")
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