# Tell signs of someone who speaks Hebrew as a 2nd language?



## Malki92

I want to know what some tell signs are, of someone who speaks Hebrew as a second language. Like, how are you (as a native Hebrew speaker or someone completely fluent in Hebrew) able to tell that someones' native language is not Hebrew, when they are speaking to you in Hebrew? I am sure it differs from whatever their first language is, so lets say that their first language is English and this person makes aliyah and learns Hebrew, what are some common things you notice in their beginning stages, some signs perhaps. Is it pronunciation? If so what letters? Is it speaking too slowly? Is it not being able to understand people completely? What is it?

I am sure it differs for each person but I am just asking for common signs.. I am sorry if I worded any of this wrongly, I hope you guys understand my question and if not please let me know what to clarify. Thanks so much, God bless you all.


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## tFighterPilot

Obviously it depends on his native language. Most of the second language people I hear have Russian as native language. As for Americans, the main signs, I think, are the English R which is quite different than the Hebrew ר and the vowels which are not the same either.


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## Egmont

People whose first language is English tend to run vowels together even if their Hebrew is good, even if they've mastered the "r." For example, take the word שואל (present masculine singular of "to ask"). In Hebrew, the vowels "sho-EL" are quite distinct. There's almost a glottal stop between them, but not quite. An English speaker will often run them together, as in "show-WELL." 

(I should update my native language to list two of them, but I procrastinate ...)


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## Malki92

tFighterPilot said:


> Obviously it depends on his native language. Most of the second language people I hear have Russian as native language. As for Americans, the main signs, I think, are the English R which is quite different than the Hebrew ר and the vowels which are not the same either.



How do Palestinians/Israeli-Arabs pronounce Hebrew differently than Israeli-Jews? How do they pronounce the ר? Is it like the Arabic ر or is it identical to the Israeli-Jewish way?

I am pretty sure they keep the ع sound for ע but other than that is anything else really different?


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## Tamar

I agree with Egmont. Also, Americans can't pronounce ח, the L is different, I think T and P would be different as well (the american ones are more aspirated that the hebrew ones).

Russians would have a difference in t/d (also with ts/dz if there's such in the word). The vowels, the L, the R. The ח is different and they would use it where you have ה.
Speaker of Ukrainian would pronounce a G where there's a ה. 
Spanish speakers have a problem with ח, their ר is different. Between vowels - they pronounce D as DH (like in English) and B is like BH (these are stops that become fricatives). Also צ may be pronounced as an S (like a freind of mine who once wanted to say סדק /sedek/. She pronounces it as [sedhek] which also how she would say צדק. 
Portuguese (Brazilian) - a problem with ח, ר, L at the end of a word, ם (final mem), ן (final nun). 

And that's only the accent. 
If you're having a conversation you would find grammar mistakes as well (depending on the level of Hebrew, of course). 

Some Israeli Arabs have perfect Hebrew 
Some who have an accent, I guess maybe they do have the ע, but don't forget that some Jewish Israelis still have it too. Same about ח, so maybe they have it in Hebrew. 
They also don't have a P, so they pronounce a B instead. 
And their R is also different, but again, I'm not sure if they pronounce it in Hebrew. 
And once I heard an Arab girl who had perfect Hebrew, besides her intonation.


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## arielipi

In words, they usually have number faultecy(invented it now) with accordance to subject and verb, although we israelis have that too, americans tend to have that as a tell sign.
Words, accordance of sex with subject is often too a tell sign.


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## JaiHare

arielipi said:


> In words, they usually have number faultecy(invented it now) with accordance to subject and verb, although we israelis have that too, americans tend to have that as a tell sign.
> Words, accordance of sex with subject is often too a tell sign.



We had a speaker come to my work a few weeks ago, and her Hebrew was perfect. I had no idea that she was American until about half way into her presentation when she mixed the gender of a noun and matched it incorrectly to a verb. (I think it was a feminine noun for which she used a masculine verb, but I can't remember now.) After that I started to pay attention for minor differences, and I noticed that she threw a few English terms in from time to time that were unnecessary.

I think Israelis botch the number thing more than Americans who have learned Hebrew as a second language. I know that I don't generally mix up masculine and feminine numbers, so that I actually say שלושה עשר אנשים and שלוש עשרה בנות (yes, עד כדי כך), but I don't know of ANYONE who is Israeli who says the former unless they are speaking in public and have prepped the work ahead of time (and probably with the help of a grammarian who checked it for them!). Americans do naturally mess up on gender - and I sometimes stop mid-sentence and ask someone, for example, if you say כנפיים יפות or כנפיים יפים - but if they know the gender and have learned Hebrew well, I don't see that they make as many mistakes with the numbers as Israelis do, who tend only to use the feminine forms (especially above ten - but even for single digits). I almost _never_ hear an Israeli, for example, properly distinguish between שני and שתי. It seems that they say שתי for _everything_, including people. They should say שנינו and שתינו, depending on gender, but they always say שתינו. I don't think Americans tend to make these mistakes in Hebrew.

American commonly have problems with lexical stock, especially when there are words like לנעוד and ללבוש and לחבוש and לנעול and the slew of words that mean "put on" or "wear," since we only have the one sense in English. I think most tend to eliminate these words and say לשים or ללבוש in their place. (For example: "שמתי את הנעליים שלי" *במקום* "נעלתי את הנעליים שלי".) 

Another problem is the use of prepositions where we don't use them in English. For example, they might say אני משתמש *את* העיפרון instead of בעיפרון, or they might say עזרתי אותו instead of עזרתי לו. This is really common, and it's the opposite with ESL learners in Israel, who tend to say "I called to my mother on the phone" and "he helped to me with my homework." It's a two-way street. 

When you learn a verb, you have to learn it with an example if possible. This eliminates the problem of preposition governance and helps you sound more authentic when you speak in the second language. It's a common pitfall, and I was lucky to have an ulpan teacher who made it a point to give prepositions (and examples) with the verbs as we learned them in class!


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## arielipi

Great explanation Jai.


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## ramariel

Besides the accent, I think that the most difficult thing mastering a second language is the use of articles and prepositions. For Russian speakers this is a main problem because there are no articles in their mother tongue. They would say אני לוקח ילדים when they mean אני לוקח את הילדים (I take children instead of the/my children). I've heard many people say, for instance, כואב לי את הראש or אני מנגן חצוצרה or  אני הולכת עם חצאית instead of מנגן/הולכת ב.


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## anipo

Besides the accent, Spanish speakers have difficulties with the ם (mem sofit) since there are practically no Spanish words that end in m. Besides the different r, they also have difficulties with shvah, segol and tzere and there is a tendency to pronounce them all as a long e. Isolated words like b'seder or sefer can disclose Spanish speakers in Hebrew.  Another problematic letter is ז (zayin), which does not exist in Spanish, and is often pronounced as ס (samakh). (BTW, and on the other hand,it is quite funny to hear Israeli reporters on radio and TV pronounce Spanish names).
And naturally, as with any and all languages, there is the universal problem of prepositions!


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## Egmont

anipo said:


> ... Another problematic letter is ז (zayin), which does not exist in Spanish, and is often pronounced as ס (samakh)...


Good point. Spanish speakers have this problem in many languages. The letter "z," which is the usual Latin-alphabet equivalent of ז, exists in Spanish but is pronounced the same as "s." An English speaker who doesn't also speak Spanish will pronounce the common family name Gonzalez as גונזלז, but a Spanish speaker will say גונסלס.


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## tFighterPilot

Actually this name is usually written and pronounced גונזלס


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## ramariel

tFighterPilot said:


> Actually this name is usually written and pronounced גונזלס


Not quite. Nowadays Gonzalez and other spanish words with z are more and more transcripted as pronounced. eg Felipe Gonzalez, the Spanish ex president, is written ,גונסאלס putting an aleph where the stress is. But if the name is Spanish, but the person american or french, like the french football coach Louis Fernandez, then his name will be transcripted as said in French: פרננדז and not פרנאנדס


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## tFighterPilot

Well, גונסאלס sure is less common (judging by amount of Google results). I think גונזלס makes sense because even though Spanish officially doesn't have /z/ I suppose it would likely to occur when attached to a voiced consonant.


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## anipo

There is absolutely no ז sound in Spanish. In Spain there is a distinction between z and s, that does not exist in Latin America, but the z in Spain does not sound like ז in Hebrew or the soft s in German. It sounds more like th in "think".


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