ABSTRACT

This study investigates what characteristics are considered important for a hypothetical multilingual person to be perceived as a “native” speaker of English. The data was collected from 521 participants from the United Kingdom, Singapore and South Korea, responding to a survey comprised of 30 questions with opportunities for qualitative comments. Several empirical statistical methods of analysis were employed to compare the data of three groups. The results indicated that expertise in the English language via education, self-perceived native speaker competence and a home language were the three most significant factors while ethnicity and nationality were the least important considerations for participants when perceiving multilingual speakers as “native” speakers of English. In this study, the stereotypically portrayed characteristics of “native speakers of English” as “innate,” “fixed” and “monolingual” were not significant. These findings can contribute to discussions about “native speakerism” and what constitutes a “native” speaker, which has no sign of abating.

摘要

这项研究调查了对于假设的多语言人士被视为英语“母语”来说，哪些特征被认为是重要的。该数据收集自来自英国、新加坡和韩国的 521 名参与者，他们回答了一项由 30 个问题组成的调查，并有机会进行定性评论。采用几种经验统计分析方法来比较三组数据。结果表明，在参与者将多语言使用者视为英语“母语”时，通过教育获得的英语专业知识、自我认知的母语能力和母语是三个最重要的因素，而种族和国籍是参与者最不重要的考虑因素。在这项研究中，对“英语母语者”的刻板印象“天生的”、“固定的”和“单一语言”的特征并不重要。这些发现有助于引发关于“母语”以及什么是“母语”说话者的讨论，这种现象没有减弱的迹象。