Near-native speaker

In linguistics, the term near-native speakers is used for people who are "highly proficient speakers who are distinguishable from native speakers, but only in small ways."[1] Analysis of native and near-native speakers indicates that they differ in their underlying grammar and intuition, meaning that they do not interpret grammatical contrasts the same way. However, this divergence typically does not impact a near-native speaker's regular usage of the language.[2]

Examples

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  Henry Kissinger, a near-native speaker of English
  Henry Kissinger[1]

References

1. Gass, Susan; Glew, Margo (2008). "Second Language Acquisition and Bilingualism". In Altarriba, Jeanette; Heredia, Roberto R. (eds.). An Introduction to Bilingualism: Principles and Processes. Taylor & Francis. pp. 267–268. ISBN 9780805851342.
2. Coppieters, René (1987-01-01). "Competence Differences between Native and Near-Native Speakers". Language. 63 (3): 544–573. doi:10.2307/415005. JSTOR 415005.

Bibliography

• Montrul, Silvina; Slabakova, Roumyana (2003). "Competence Similarities Between Native and Near-native Speakers: An Investigation of the Preterite-imperfect Contrast in Spanish". Studies in Second Language Acquisition. 25 (3): 351–398.
• White, Lydia; Genesee, Fred (1996). "How native is near-native? The issue of ultimate attainment in adult second language acquisition". Second Language Research. 12 (3): 233–265. doi:10.1177/026765839601200301.
• Coppieters, René (September 1987). "Competence Differences between Native and Near-Native Speakers". Language. 63 (3): 544–573. JSTOR 415005.
• "Who Is a Native Speaker of American English?". American National Corpus. In contrast, a near-native speaker usually acquires language skills after childhood, and relies less on family and social immersion to learn the fundamentals.