What language related questions would you need to ask to tell that a person is not a native english speaker?
September 2, 2025
Apparently when I insert the "what" mid-sentence, it becomes way too confusing, I had to repost this.
28 comments
Not sure, never been motivated to do so. 95% of the time, it’s due to accent, which would come across fairly quickly; sometimes, accent might be faint but word choice or rhythm might reveal it.
If they are coming from a language without ~~prepositions~~ articles like Russian they’ll slip up with those all the time.
Sometimes it’s just using a bit of slang. “What up, Dawg?” Can get interesting looks from non-native speakers.
I think the previous post I made I wrote “when not knowing which words you can assume that a person is not a native speaker?”.
I split the words right in my mind, so I saw no problem…
“When (not knowing **which** words) – you can assume (that the person is not a native speaker)”
Now I see the “when not knowing, which words you can assume that a person – is not a native speaker”, sounds funny.
I just need to hear them say, “How do you call ____.”
Normally, we wouldn’t need to ask questions. Listening to you speak would almost always be enough, either because of an accent, incorrect pronunciation of certain letters or letter combinations, incorrect word choices, or direct translation of phrases from other languages that are wrong or awkward in English.
Usually I wouldn’t need or expect to ask someone if they’re not a native speaker. Frankly, I would actually worry that I was being rude for even bringing it up first, unless they did.
It’s just something that you just… hear. Whether it’s by an accent, or if there’s an odd sentence structure or misused word.
Probably the use of idioms. Even a native English speaker from a different country in the aglosphere might struggle with idioms from other countries.
If they could correctly identify the conjugation and use of the present subjunctive, they are not a native English speaker.
For Arab speakers, the key is the use of the verb to be. It doesn’t really exist like it does in English, so they say “I born in 1984.”
Nice try, scammer man
The ability to fool a native speaker that you’re also a native speaker is incredibly rare.
Adjective after a noun is a dead giveaway.
If they say yes or no at the end of the sentence. Like
“You went to work today, yes?”
“You didn’t eat breakfast, no?”
Actually saw a meme about this recently. Source aside, I suspect that only native speakers will really be able to correctly identify what is dogshit, horseshit, batshit, apeshit, dipshit, hot shit, and the shit or whether and why they are different from dog shit, horse shit, bat shit, ape shit, dip shit, hotshit or theshit.
In person, non-native speakers usuallly (but not always) have an accent.
In written language, there are often some interesting word choices that reveal the person is probably not a native speaker. Even if the writer is very fluent, there is often (but not always) a giveaway. One that I notice occasionally online is mixing American and British word usage/spellings in a way that native speakers probably aren’t going to – it tells me that they are picking up new words and phrases from the internet and media, but aren’t necessarily distinguishing the sources.
For example, one of my best friends is French and she speaks *excellent* English. Her English usage is very American (gained from her life in the US, which is how we know each other) but she *spells* using British rules (which she learned in school as a kid). This combo might not be noticeable in a short email or say, a short post on Reddit, but over time, can be a clue that the person is a non-native speaker.
I can tell you definitively, I know exactly how to unearth secret Germans, however good their English is…
I ask them to say “squirrel.”
I can typically tell someone is ESL within a few sentences or minutes. I think word choice and cadence is the biggest giveaway.
You wouldn’t need to ask any questions. Just listen to them and have a conversation.
Depending on which language group their native language is in, it’s usually pretty easy to tell that someone isn’t a native English speaker without asking any questions.
For me, some instant giveaways include:
– odd tonal shifts (common with people from India)
– emphasizing the wrong syllable or word in a sentence
– coming from a language with no equivalent sound (or the equivalent sound being used very sparingly) and thus substituting for the nearest thing (English r vs Japanese r, which sounds more like an L to English speakers)
– adding unnecessary syllables (like adding vowels at the ends of words)
– the way people hold their face when they speak; different languages are spoken with different parts of your face. English is pretty physically “closed” and involves most of the movement being at the front of the mouth, so when someone is using the back of their throat or their entire cheek structure more, it means they’re coming from a language that uses those facial features more.
– dropping articles (common/steteotypical with Russian speakers)
– gendering things unnecessarily (English is actually very big on the neutral and objective pronouns compared to many other languages)
– correctly enunciating every letter (most dialects of English will have shortcuts that mean certain sounds are muted, merged, or dropped, but someone who is mindful about speaking the language “correctly” won’t use those shortcuts.)
– inconsistent contractions (usually someone will be pretty consistent in whether or not they use contractions, and in English, if you’re generally using contractions then it’s a deliberate emphasis on certain words when you don’t use them; a non-native speaker might switch back and forth without factoring in that changed meaning. There’s also situations where abruptly switching to the long/separate form of words sounds unnatural.)
– switching adjectives and adverbs (it’s common for people whose first language is Spanish to use “no” instead of “not,” for example- there are certain English accents and dialects that do this too, but it’s a matter of consistency and whether they’re speaking one of those dialects or with one of those accents.)
I have a friend who moved to the US from Russia when she was about 10 years old. The only ‘tell’ is a very slight nasal or flat quality to her vowels. Her grammar, sentence structure, etc is totally like a native speaker.
For native spanish speakers, it’s obvious when they insert “it” after a verb to describe a thing in the same sentence in which that thing is the object of the sentence. Like “I am going to go pick it up the food” is one I hear a lot.
“Yesterday night…,” or “Thank you.” (Anything with “th,” really.”
There’s certain grammatical tells depending on what their first language is. One of the most common one I hear as someone saying “close/open the lights” which are verbs a native English speaker would never use in that sentence. A very specific clue that someone’s first language is Spanish is adding the word “no” instead of “right” at the end of a question asking for confirmation. For example, they would say “you’re going to the store, no?” instead of “you’re going to the store, right?”
What you, u/Ier___, are asking about is called a *shibboleth*. Strictly speaking, it’s a term that only native speakers can say correctly.
In the past, shibboleths were used as passwords on battlefields, to detect infiltrators.
A somewhat artificial example would be:
>Is your birthday party going to be a lollapalooza?
If you can answer the question and pronounce lollapalooza correctly, you’re probably a native of the U.S.
None, it’s usually pretty obvious. We just won’t rag on someone or call attention to it for being a non-native speaker. We’re not German or Fr*nch.
28 comments
Not sure, never been motivated to do so. 95% of the time, it’s due to accent, which would come across fairly quickly; sometimes, accent might be faint but word choice or rhythm might reveal it.
What languages did you grow up speaking at home?
It is not 100% but the answer may uncover a lot.
[](https://alb.reddit.com/cr?za=UOnJyKHS2KDtJ3lGP6887DMG8SiP1aQ6BYQyQJwee9rkMEuE0r5klZfnkS4Aszi4kBz1oh6A_qmOrEeo9X6ueuUBOM-zvlKE0h0amvI0WjZvMN7dBliMMC3Qz73TsIRu55xf3SDOTr1xfZgz1cUkFN1cLA_dxKhhFrB1p7FydH9kh89o8QYbSMrw8OHxRTN2c6AOrEcUZapKuNm8Mwb16oT8-dL0Jn0qW9TaPD_RYttW_nYfnBtMjKd8FUL9UI4A9vSOSI4BV9fny4otYo7_3zfw7gEu4uOcaJDN5oV-p_R8LciR8bvqhLQFy2PoyBCwuceCHJN_kK49NZBsgxxWHjJWgNpiQfiTfnPVAK059b_j40VREuvBzIBvMtT79lVu0Rgr2anwlE4_rfDL9xZ1qVyFYy7Mwtg241fo0OB0I9nVOj1QDbUF8-ab8KLeFtsNWU_5VR1vCuBTMs5kYXjZX1c4Jk3G_9rLybP_9fginfEuoIfo9WQQS76pYSD7icYX_ChQVMAEwPmxsg7oGbpbBTHKWhCZHrWayzwy6h3_fSBxG-aGj_ahltMfBFLaO0x9malC1PV1Bc2FIIQQ1N0QDp3GJ4k8ucsTJsDpRO0fBw&zp=MuxjOenzaT0kLzzuPKZHax_4E8i3ja7m56yVvstv4X7iiOsC6zOdgU6lsQgimCCAt_suzoXsY_C7vWAHfI2zNKnKeAxDZRAD3EqADE4_vm4Aenbv7IwGNwjTZygZQu6IW5q7EasRUFWvW5ahkGFzUe2ByKqqfB-v1ozFewhkbYMdq-ftQ2dG_-HmWqsZ3ChCZrvPmhdXVT7_XVqY-CrFLnkTjnyXYTkxdkL1RPsOUvClFYQ3wKEQ2_pGpXdpQu-y-z46Xk49_-kcqIr4AonhcFU2fqg331DzsXtgTxCdL-Qtjrxy8LcnE_rOrplO5LnrvfmENMcAVieRWWEGk6AFQn7aQ-BAsnUH3kIgD7kJAdjuk7VqO8KYE1s2d8dDTkRTZ3a7HD1JMVpXIaox01tVjGXm-R6Isn3xsRtDYekDEIfAdak2BAv6wX-XIDFLpKxCyLUGCJA&a=58318&b=58310&be=58310&c=58310&d=50103&e=50102&ea=50102&eb=50102&f=50102&r=6&g=1&i=1756842871629&t=1756843036630&o=1&q=1&h=203&w=732&sh=768&sw=1366&va=1&vb=0&vc=0&vd=0&ve=0&vg=1&vh=0&vi=0&vs=0&vt=0&vu=0&vv=0&vx=0&vw=0&vq=0&vr=0&vy=0&xe=0&vz=0&xa=0&xf=0&xb=0&vf=0&xc=0)
I have no idea why I would do that.
If they are coming from a language without ~~prepositions~~ articles like Russian they’ll slip up with those all the time.
Sometimes it’s just using a bit of slang. “What up, Dawg?” Can get interesting looks from non-native speakers.
I think the previous post I made I wrote “when not knowing which words you can assume that a person is not a native speaker?”.
I split the words right in my mind, so I saw no problem…
“When (not knowing **which** words) – you can assume (that the person is not a native speaker)”
Now I see the “when not knowing, which words you can assume that a person – is not a native speaker”, sounds funny.
I just need to hear them say, “How do you call ____.”
Normally, we wouldn’t need to ask questions. Listening to you speak would almost always be enough, either because of an accent, incorrect pronunciation of certain letters or letter combinations, incorrect word choices, or direct translation of phrases from other languages that are wrong or awkward in English.
Usually I wouldn’t need or expect to ask someone if they’re not a native speaker. Frankly, I would actually worry that I was being rude for even bringing it up first, unless they did.
It’s just something that you just… hear. Whether it’s by an accent, or if there’s an odd sentence structure or misused word.
Probably the use of idioms. Even a native English speaker from a different country in the aglosphere might struggle with idioms from other countries.
If they could correctly identify the conjugation and use of the present subjunctive, they are not a native English speaker.
For Arab speakers, the key is the use of the verb to be. It doesn’t really exist like it does in English, so they say “I born in 1984.”
Nice try, scammer man
The ability to fool a native speaker that you’re also a native speaker is incredibly rare.
Adjective after a noun is a dead giveaway.
If they say yes or no at the end of the sentence. Like
“You went to work today, yes?”
“You didn’t eat breakfast, no?”
Actually saw a meme about this recently. Source aside, I suspect that only native speakers will really be able to correctly identify what is dogshit, horseshit, batshit, apeshit, dipshit, hot shit, and the shit or whether and why they are different from dog shit, horse shit, bat shit, ape shit, dip shit, hotshit or theshit.
In person, non-native speakers usuallly (but not always) have an accent.
In written language, there are often some interesting word choices that reveal the person is probably not a native speaker. Even if the writer is very fluent, there is often (but not always) a giveaway. One that I notice occasionally online is mixing American and British word usage/spellings in a way that native speakers probably aren’t going to – it tells me that they are picking up new words and phrases from the internet and media, but aren’t necessarily distinguishing the sources.
For example, one of my best friends is French and she speaks *excellent* English. Her English usage is very American (gained from her life in the US, which is how we know each other) but she *spells* using British rules (which she learned in school as a kid). This combo might not be noticeable in a short email or say, a short post on Reddit, but over time, can be a clue that the person is a non-native speaker.
I can tell you definitively, I know exactly how to unearth secret Germans, however good their English is…
I ask them to say “squirrel.”
I can typically tell someone is ESL within a few sentences or minutes. I think word choice and cadence is the biggest giveaway.
You wouldn’t need to ask any questions. Just listen to them and have a conversation.
Depending on which language group their native language is in, it’s usually pretty easy to tell that someone isn’t a native English speaker without asking any questions.
For me, some instant giveaways include:
– odd tonal shifts (common with people from India)
– emphasizing the wrong syllable or word in a sentence
– coming from a language with no equivalent sound (or the equivalent sound being used very sparingly) and thus substituting for the nearest thing (English r vs Japanese r, which sounds more like an L to English speakers)
– adding unnecessary syllables (like adding vowels at the ends of words)
– the way people hold their face when they speak; different languages are spoken with different parts of your face. English is pretty physically “closed” and involves most of the movement being at the front of the mouth, so when someone is using the back of their throat or their entire cheek structure more, it means they’re coming from a language that uses those facial features more.
– dropping articles (common/steteotypical with Russian speakers)
– gendering things unnecessarily (English is actually very big on the neutral and objective pronouns compared to many other languages)
– correctly enunciating every letter (most dialects of English will have shortcuts that mean certain sounds are muted, merged, or dropped, but someone who is mindful about speaking the language “correctly” won’t use those shortcuts.)
– inconsistent contractions (usually someone will be pretty consistent in whether or not they use contractions, and in English, if you’re generally using contractions then it’s a deliberate emphasis on certain words when you don’t use them; a non-native speaker might switch back and forth without factoring in that changed meaning. There’s also situations where abruptly switching to the long/separate form of words sounds unnatural.)
– switching adjectives and adverbs (it’s common for people whose first language is Spanish to use “no” instead of “not,” for example- there are certain English accents and dialects that do this too, but it’s a matter of consistency and whether they’re speaking one of those dialects or with one of those accents.)
I have a friend who moved to the US from Russia when she was about 10 years old. The only ‘tell’ is a very slight nasal or flat quality to her vowels. Her grammar, sentence structure, etc is totally like a native speaker.
For native spanish speakers, it’s obvious when they insert “it” after a verb to describe a thing in the same sentence in which that thing is the object of the sentence. Like “I am going to go pick it up the food” is one I hear a lot.
“Yesterday night…,” or “Thank you.” (Anything with “th,” really.”
There’s certain grammatical tells depending on what their first language is. One of the most common one I hear as someone saying “close/open the lights” which are verbs a native English speaker would never use in that sentence. A very specific clue that someone’s first language is Spanish is adding the word “no” instead of “right” at the end of a question asking for confirmation. For example, they would say “you’re going to the store, no?” instead of “you’re going to the store, right?”
What you, u/Ier___, are asking about is called a *shibboleth*. Strictly speaking, it’s a term that only native speakers can say correctly.
In the past, shibboleths were used as passwords on battlefields, to detect infiltrators.
A somewhat artificial example would be:
>Is your birthday party going to be a lollapalooza?
If you can answer the question and pronounce lollapalooza correctly, you’re probably a native of the U.S.
None, it’s usually pretty obvious. We just won’t rag on someone or call attention to it for being a non-native speaker. We’re not German or Fr*nch.