Native or not?

need_some_help   Sat Aug 16, 2008 6:27 pm GMT
The story goes like this: A person claims to be a native speaker of American English. She posted a voice recording on the Internet to prove it. Regrettably for me, I'm not a native speaker thus I can't decide explicitly whether she really is a native speaker.

To all of you, English native speakers (esp. the American ones) :): if you could help me settle this matter, I'd be grateful.

Here's the recording: http://www.zshare.net/audio/170757653b8dbb09/
And the transcript: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080815/ap_on_re_eu/italy_unknown_leonardo;_ylt=Amr4_Jbh2CPVXhSuMNa9YQ90bBAF.

Also, any comments concerning sounds she may have gotten wrong would be welcome.
Jasper   Sat Aug 16, 2008 6:35 pm GMT
There's no way she's native; the inflections (not necessarily the pronunciation) is all wrong. She sounds Chinese to me.

To be fair, she speaks very good English. I would never want to discourage anybody from improving their already-good English, so please don't take my comments as criticism, only analysis.
Jasper   Sat Aug 16, 2008 6:36 pm GMT
Rather, the inflections ARE all wrong. I really need to proofread my sentences before posting, huh?
Jasper   Sat Aug 16, 2008 6:39 pm GMT
I goofed again. (pause for laughter) Boy, I'm on a roll, huh?

I should have said the "intonation is all wrong". Mea culpa.
Guest   Sun Aug 17, 2008 3:58 am GMT
She is you, right?
Why didn't u just say it was ur recording?
need_some_help   Sun Aug 17, 2008 2:19 pm GMT
Guest: Nope, she isn't me. I am a 'he', not a 'she'.

Jasper: Thanks.


Any other comments? I realize the intonation is all wrong, but what about the sounds themselves?
Jasper   Sun Aug 17, 2008 5:00 pm GMT
Need-some-help, I'm listening under the handicap of an older computer with not-so-good speakers; I have to turn the volume all the way up just to hear her, so it's difficult for me to hear the individual sounds.

However--based on what I CAN hear--her pronunciation is excellent for a non-native; in fact, she might even fool a native, if the listener didn't listen too closely. It is even possible that she has lived here many years, if the language spoken at home is Chinese and the language spoken at school is English.

Specifically, however, there is some monophthongization of certain vowels. In other words, sounds such as the long "O", which is really a mini-dipthong, are spoken as a pure monophthong. Allow us more time, and we can come up with other examples.

Overall, her intonation is a bigger problem than her pronunciation, in my opinion.
Caspian   Sun Aug 17, 2008 7:54 pm GMT
She's not native, but her English is still good.
Guest   Sun Aug 17, 2008 8:36 pm GMT
she sounded to me like a black teenager

her intonations are kind of like what happens when some speakers of AAVE recite a standard English text
Robb   Sun Aug 17, 2008 9:50 pm GMT
To me, she sounds like a young black or Latina woman who was raised in the United States.
beneficii   Mon Aug 18, 2008 3:13 am GMT
First, you should let her know that the recording of her is too quiet. She should post a louder version.

Second, there are some parts in it where her intonation sounds off from the rest.

Third, if she's a native speaker, she speaks African American Vernacular English. If she's not, then she is aiming for that accent.
Lazar   Mon Aug 18, 2008 4:21 am GMT
She's definitely a native speaker of English (probably AAVE in particular). I'm really surprised that so many people think she's non-native.
Lazar   Mon Aug 18, 2008 4:30 am GMT
<<There's no way she's native; the inflections (not necessarily the pronunciation) is all wrong. She sounds Chinese to me.>>

A lot of people have awkward intonations when reading texts (especially when reading them the first time). Her "too early" sounds a bit awkward - and I bet that that phrase alone is 90% of the reason why people think she's non-native -, but aside from that I have no clue how anyone could think that she sounded Chinese.

I'd find it really disheartening to have to prove my English-language nativity, and then have people say that my recording sounds clearly non-native when it clearly doesn't.
Jasper   Mon Aug 18, 2008 6:07 am GMT
Lazar, I submit that perhaps you're parsing the sample too closely. It might be interesting to you to turn down the volume low enough to the point where you cannot hear the words any longer, and listen to the tones--the music of the spoken text. Listening to these tones, it's rather difficult to believe she is completely native, but I concede that it's possible she came here at the age of 6 or 7, spoke Chinese (or other Asian tongue) at home, while speaking English at school.

However, the sample is recorded at an extremely low volume, unsuitable for complete parsing. Until such time that we can be blessed with a better sample, I must respectfully disagree with you.
Guest   Mon Aug 18, 2008 6:10 am GMT
It's really NOT a Chinese accent... my goodness...