this post was submitted on 16 Oct 2026
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5
Can you tell the native language of the people from these clips? (lemmy.world)
submitted 1 week ago by nipawomset@lemmy.world to c/asklemmy@lemmy.world
15 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/53177215

I thought I might share a small phonetic game/challenge with you. All 3 individuals in the attached clips were born and raised in the same country and speak the same native language. Can you tell, based on the peculiarities of their English pronunciation, what language it is?

  1. https://vimeo.com/1205985914
  2. https://vimeo.com/1206296678
  3. https://vimeo.com/1206827782
top 15 comments
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[–] FishFace@piefed.social 3 points 1 week ago (1 children)

First one no idea, only a couple of vowels are not English-sounding.

Second, blocked in the UK

Third, Slavic - there's a characteristic touch of palatalisation/raising of her pronunciation of the "a" vowel. I would never have guessed she had the same native language as the first person though - I don't hear that in his speech.

From my own knowledge, someone with an extremely good English accent (like #1) whose native language is Slavic is most likely to be Polish, due to the number of polish people who settled in the UK, and many of them will have brought young children with them who therefore have near-native accents.

[–] nipawomset@lemmy.world 3 points 1 week ago (1 children)

spoilerCorrect, they are Polish. Except all of them moved to Anglophone countries in young adulthood - none of them is what you would call a heritage speaker.

[–] Fizz@lemmy.nz 1 points 1 week ago

All their native language is English.

[–] one_old_coder@piefed.social 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Australia?

[–] nipawomset@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago

spoilerIt cannot be Australia, since their native language is not English.

[–] ryannathans@aussie.zone 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Are they poles

[–] nipawomset@lemmy.world 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

spoilerThey indeed are! Was there any particular hint that led you to this conclusion?

[–] ryannathans@aussie.zone 2 points 1 week ago

The way the woman in the third clip make her way around the tongue twister, or made a tongue twister out of it

There's also that unusual rolling or blending of syllables that I initially thought was how some computer nerds speak, but the woman in clip two was doing it more distinctly

They have rather different accents though which made it quite hard to guess, didn't notice anything obvious in common across all three

[–] AbouBenAdhem@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Welsh?

[–] nipawomset@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago

spoilerI'm afraid not🙂

[–] Magister@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago

I'm sure Xiamoa can speak it

[–] Strider@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Well, the language would always be English, right? (You asked for it 😁)

[–] nipawomset@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Right, except I asked about their native language, which is not English 🙂

[–] Strider@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

They all speak different but excellent english. The first two on the British side, the third clearly more in the American pronunciation.

I personally can not distinguish from this what their native language would be.

By looks the third person would possibly be in eastern Europe, the others British or close.

But even that is just a wild guess