People are shocked after video shows what speaking English sounds like to foreigners
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A bloke has revealed how the English language sounds to non-English speakers - and it’s seriously messed with our heads.
You can click here to listen for yourself:
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If you’ve ever visited a foreign country, between checking out their exciting crisp selection and discovering new beers, you may have wondered how you sound to non-English speaking locals.
Now, thanks to one TikTok user, you can wonder no longer because he’s shared how the language sounds when you can’t actually understand the words - and it turns out we sound a little bit like Sim - who’d have thought, eh?
TikToker the Language Simp - or @languagesimp - speaks several languages, including English, so is ideally placed to reveal how we sound to non-English speakers.
In a clip that’s since been viewed more than eight million times, he shares a short speech - if you can call it that - in a bizarre gibberish that sounds a lot like English but makes absolutely no sense.
The effect is a little strange for those of us who do speak English, with one person commenting: “I felt like I should understand what he was saying.”
Another asked: “You are telling me people hear me talking like a Sim?”
While someone else wrote: “I feel like I understand what he's saying, but I also don't.”
A fourth person said: “This sounds right… but it’s not… ”
Pretty weird, eh?
And if odd linguistic information is your thing, then you may also be interested to know that earlier this year a study found that the majority of Brits could end up talking like a 'roadman' within the next 100 years.
Words such as 'peng', 'wagwan' and 'bare' are part of a dialect known as 'Multicultural London English' (MLE) that could become the dominant dialect in the UK over the next century.
The dialect has grown from several languages mixing together in London and has supplanted Cockney as the main dialect among working class people in the capital.
According to Professor Paul Kerswill of the University of York, Multicultural London English is a dialect born in the British capital in the early 1980s - but traces its roots back to the Windrush generation.
With plenty of younger generations already familiar with the MLE dialect, the study predicts they will keep using it well into adulthood and pass it on to their children - meaning it could eventually become one of the most popular dialects in Britain.
Featured Image Credit: @languagesimp/TikTok
Topics: TikTok, Social Media, US News
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