Possible to confuse English?
What language does English sound the most like, to people that speak other languages? Does anyone confuse English with any other language? For example, to me (a monolingual native English speaker), the Slavic languages all sound the same. If I hear someone speaking say Russian, I can easily identify with certainty that they are speaking a Slavic language, but I would not have any idea if it was Russian, or Polish, or Ukrainian, or even Czechoslovakian. Greek also sounds sort of like a Slavic language to me, as does Romanian. I also can recognize the Scandinavian languages--Norwegian and Swedish sound identical to me, but Danish and Icelandic sound very different. I can also recognize Arabic and Hebrew--and they both sound very different. Many English speakers can't hear the difference between Chinese and Japanese and Korean. However, I never get Chinese confused with Japanese and Korean (except for dialects like Shanghaiese), as I think that it sounds very different. I can usually tell Japanese and Korean apart, but not always. I can also tell apart French, Spanish, Italian, and they all sound quite distinct. Sometimes I can't tell whether someone is speaking German or Dutch though. I've heard Frisian, and even though it's the closest language to English, I don't think it sounds anything like English.
So, how does English sound like to foreigners, especially those that have had little exposure to it? Is it like the Slavic languages in that when you hear it you think it could be one of several possibilities, or does it have such a unique sound to it that it would never be confused with another language?
I think it sounds very unique among languages, especially American English. And I suppose even between the closest Germanic languages you can find few similar phonological features.
I think it sounds a lot like Faroese and Icelandic.
Dutch, yes.
Working class accents from the North and Scotland sometimes remind Dutch in some way, with similar rough sounds. But still, the difference is immediately obvious.
It may take a few seconds to tell Italian from Catalan or Spanish, a somewhat longer delay to distinguish Polish from Russian, but English can't be confused with anything else.
Oh yes, sometimes, Welsh as well as Gaelic. Those languages sound like English because even native speakers have been heavily contaminated with a British accent. Same phenomenon with Frisian sounding absolutely like Dutch, or Breton sounding just like French.
Chinese and Japanese are completely different.
I consufe Mongolian and Korean.
"I can easily identify with certainty that they are speaking a Slavic language"_Guest
This means that you are ahead of the game in regard to what your peers (also monolingual) can do.
I'm not sure when it "kicks in", but eventually if you hear enough languages and study them, you'll be able to identify the big ones, imo.
One trick is to ask the speaker of the target language how to say something you know in the language and see if it is the language you guessed. There are a couple of games buried here on Antimoon on one of the threads, where you can see how many languages you can identify. Or you could try "How many languages can you identify?" on google.
One way not to get confused is to find the shibboleths in every language that interest you. Find the words and phrases that are different in languages that have trouble distinguishing and learn those key words.
"That YOU have trouble distinguishing." Okay. I'll see If I can find any of those games.
How Many Languages Can You Identify by Sound? Quiz | Antimoon Forum
This is one of the threads.
Hahaha, so nice!
I had problems recognizing most of the Slavic languages, written in both latin and cyrillic alphabet. :-/
>> Scots <<
Seriously? I think that standard Scots vs. say RP English sound very, very different. Even German and English sound more similar to me. However, Scots does sound a lot like a strong Scottish accent on English.
<<I consufe Mongolian and Korean. >>
yes, and I am Korean
very similar, if not identical, sound inventories between the two
RP English and German have a similar sound quality to them, although English lacks some of consonant and vowel sounds found in German.