A person who doesn't speak even one language fluently!

tarikur   Fri Jul 03, 2009 4:39 pm GMT
It is same case with me. I moved to USA when I was around 7 years old from Bangladesh. My family spoke a dialect of Bengali. At home, I spoke Bengali and at school I spoke English.

After 20 years, I still have an accent when I speak English and i can not pronounce all the English word correctly and therefore, lot of people think English is my second language. My family and people from my former village in Bangladesh, now speak the standard Bengali and I never learned to speak the standard Bengali fluently and my pronunciation is different different than the standard Bengali. Now, when I speak Bengali, I struggle, almost everyone think I was born in America because my Bengali language is so weak and lot of people do not understand me since I speak a dialect that is extinct. Only things I can say in Bengali are simple everyday materials; I do not have the vocabulary words to express complex thoughts in Bengali.

The good news is my English is becoming stronger with each passing day and I can pretty much express myself very well in English.
That's strange!   Sun Jul 05, 2009 6:46 pm GMT
@ tarikur
If you moved to the United States at the age of 7, you should speak English like a native speaker.
antihero   Sun Jul 05, 2009 7:31 pm GMT
I moved to US when I was 9. I'm 20 now, and I still have an accent (but I do speak and write well in my maternal tongue).
guest   Sun Jul 05, 2009 7:31 pm GMT
It's because he crippled himself by avoiding speaking English.
tarikur   Sun Jul 05, 2009 9:33 pm GMT
<<<<<@ tarikur
If you moved to the United States at the age of 7, you should speak English like a native speaker. >>>>

Nope. When I first moved to USA, I spoke English only at my school. I was very quiet in school and did not have much friends, so I did not talk much in school.

Right now, I can speak English fluently and do not have much accent in English as before; even though people still can tell from my accent that English is not my first language.
That's strange!   Mon Jul 06, 2009 7:28 am GMT
<I was very quiet in school and did not have much friends, so I did not talk much in school.>

Your writing has an error, too.
You did not have "MANY" friends. not "much friends".
tarikur   Mon Jul 06, 2009 1:52 pm GMT
Yeah, my grammar is bad too.

I do not see how "i did not have much friends" is grammatically wrong. Go to google and type in "i did not have much friends" with the quotes and you will get like 90,000 hits, then type in "i did not have many friends" with the quotes and you will only get 10,000 hits.
tarikur   Mon Jul 06, 2009 2:03 pm GMT
My grammar is bad only when I am writing but I do not have any grammar mistakes when I am speaking. strange but true.
Commonaswhole   Mon Jul 06, 2009 3:07 pm GMT
It's your share of influence to the everchanging English language.
Davee   Wed Jul 22, 2009 4:25 pm GMT
I am a born colombian, moved to Germany at age 2 lived there till I was 16 and now I am living in the states, I would consider myself fluent in all 3 languages.
I work as part time interpreter for all three languages.
Honestly I don't understand how that can happen.
By the way I am 18
Missing Articles   Thu Jul 23, 2009 7:19 am GMT
@Davee

Your spoken English might be fluent but your written English doesn't seem to be qualified enough as an interpreter.

You missed "the" and "a" a lot when they were needed.