This is definitely a bit of a stupid question… but methinks this happens to a good number of immigrants. Asking because there is a bit of a funny philosophical debate here:
- Technically the second language is not “native” by virtue of you not growing up with it
- But you speak it better than your native language, so skill-wise it is “native”
So do you have “native” language skills, or would you consider yourself simply highly “fluent” at the second language?
My first language was Polish, but I’ve lived in the US most of my life and my English is better than many Americans’. So now I say that I’m a native English speaker who is fluent in Polish.
Language is defined by how it is used. You cannot be better than the natives who are using the language. You can use it correctly according to some book and often that book as written by smart people who are avoiding real issues with the language as it is used. It would in those cases be beneficial to everyone if they would follow that book, but if they don’t and you do it makes you wrong and a worse speaker.
In English there is nobody who is authorized to write such a book - many try but they don’t agree with each others. Most have little influence on the real world.
In French and Spanish (I do not know about any other languages) there are organizations who are blessed by law with the ability to define the language and they do have legal power to force how people speak. They are sometimes forced to accept a “bad” addition because everyone is using it to the point where they cannot fight it despite the power of law they have behind them.
You cannot say your English is better than many Americans. That makes no sense. Unless you specifically mean English as it is spoken in some other part of the world. There are several different major ways English is spoken in the US, Australia has their own way of speaking (I don’t know if this is shared with New Zealand or if they are different), and England has many different ways of speaking the same language. However if you are in some part of the world where a significant number of people speak a language from birth you cannot be better than them at it . India doesn’t have many native speakers, but some native speakers are raising their kids English first and so you can probably find a significant population there that is native and has very different ways of speaking.
I believe they were talking about things like knowing the difference between “your” and “you’re”
That is written language which is sometimes minimally related to spoken languge.
I imagine they’re saying that they speak/write over a 6th grade reading level for example, making them “better” at the language than those who read below their level
By your definition an english teacher also can’t be better than a 3 year-old, because they’re both native speakers. So the 3yo would babble something and by definition no one can be better at english.
And I’m not sure if you can smash your forehead on the keyboard and say, this is now an english sentence by definition… Due to lack of a state authority… It’s some consensus what is accepted as english language and what’s not.
It’s certainly correct that there are multiple variants. There is more than one english.
Your typical adult can make themselves understood by their community better than a three year old which makes them better - not until around seven are kids fully able to communicate (when their adult teeth grow in and they can pronounce all sounds)
of course some english teachers use ‘big words’ and so are not understood. in that case I’d call a four year old better. (three year olds generally are worse)