Do you think it's different for ASD *non-native* speakers?

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Mootoo
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22 Oct 2012, 9:06 am

I'm assuming most of you are native speakers of English living in Anglophone countries... well, I'm asking this to be approached from all perspectives, as we can only know our own situation. But how different do you think it would be if, say, a non-native speaker with AS lived in an Anglophone country?



ChrisP
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22 Oct 2012, 10:15 am

I'm a native speaker of English living in a non Anglophone country - so far I'm finding it easier, because there is less expectation that I will be spontaneous in my conversations in my (third!) language: learners are allowed to be a bit 'wooden', and people are just pleased to be able to understand what you are saying!



helles
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22 Oct 2012, 10:40 am

It is easier!


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YellowBanana
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22 Oct 2012, 10:47 am

ChrisP wrote:
I'm a native speaker of English living in a non Anglophone country - so far I'm finding it easier, because there is less expectation that I will be spontaneous in my conversations in my (third!) language: learners are allowed to be a bit 'wooden', and people are just pleased to be able to understand what you are saying!


I am a native speaker of English and a couple of years ago spent several months living in a non Anglophone country. Like ChrisP, I found it a lot easier - people had lower expectations of my communication skills, and that was helpful.


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CyclopsSummers
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22 Oct 2012, 11:18 am

I'm non-native, but worked in a factory where English was the main language spoken among people (next to Tagalog... Akane... Cantonese... Sranan..., but I'm rusty in those languages, so I settled for English :wink: ).

There was honestly no difference. I managed to get along with a number of people, but in general I remained socially awkward, which expressed itself in some strained relationships with certain co-workers. My English is conversational, and I was able to express many of my thoughts in words. Language was not a problem in that environment.

I think going to a native Anglophone community would be a different beast altogether. At my work, there were different registers/varieties of English being used, even if my Nigerian, Ghanaian, Filipina etc. coworkers were all fluent in English. So you still had to compromise between those variants.


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littlelily613
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27 Oct 2012, 12:07 am

ChrisP wrote:
I'm a native speaker of English living in a non Anglophone country - so far I'm finding it easier, because there is less expectation that I will be spontaneous in my conversations in my (third!) language: learners are allowed to be a bit 'wooden', and people are just pleased to be able to understand what you are saying!


Similarly (I think), I've often felt more comfortable around immigrants. I also find that they have different expectations, so they are often easier to connect to.


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izzeme
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27 Oct 2012, 5:11 am

i'm a non-native speaker, in a germanophone country.
however, my interests had me watching discovery and national geographic all the time, instead of our countries own "childrens tv", so i picked up on english quite quick and have become almost undetectable as a non-native; when i was in london for a week, i often got mistaken for a local, based on my way of speaking and lack of accent, even by americans and other english.



Khyrean
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27 Oct 2012, 6:55 am

I am a non-native English speaker living in London and I do think it is easier here.
But perhaps this is because in London you can always find someone that more peculiar than you are so the overall tolerance might be higher than in the small Bavarian city where I come from.
I also have less trouble with language; no one expects me to know proverbs, understand rhetorical questions and even if I miss the irony it can be blamed on my language skills.



kotshka
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27 Oct 2012, 7:12 am

English speaker living in a non-anglophone country here. It's far easier than it was living in America. Expectations are different. Customs and even body language vary from place to place, so anything unusual I do is generally attributed to me being a foreigner.

On the other hand, I find that in this country, people are generally more accepting of difference than Americans are anyway. I have a lot of friends and all of them are strange in one way or another that they would be persecuted for in the USA, but here everyone can just be themselves and there's not really pressure to conform to any "norm." In America I always found that if you don't fit the cookie cutter mold, you're automatically an "outsider" and it doesn't take asperger syndrome to ruin your social life. Just a different dress sense, showing genuine emotion instead of having a smile plastered on all the time, or disagreeing with the prevailing local political/religious opinions is enough to ensure you don't fit in.

I guess basically I think whether you are a native speaker of the local language is a far smaller consideration than how the local culture treats difference.



jk1
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27 Oct 2012, 10:30 am

I am a non-native English speaker living in an anglo-majority country.

As well as the language, the cultural difference seems to be blamed or taken into account when someone behaves a bit differently from the rest. However, whatever the difference (culture, language or anything), people who fit in do fit in and someone like me (weird) don't, especially in a long term. So, I conclude that my yet-to-be-diagnosed AS is really what's isolating me. So language or culture doesn't seem to cause much of a barrier between people if they are all "normal" people.

Having said that, I still find it easier to be isolated here in this foreign country than in my native country. In my native country I stood out even more because there was no other obvious difference (such as language or culture) between other people and me.



Yuzu
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27 Oct 2012, 6:36 pm

I'm a non-native English speaker living in the US.
It's harder living here mostly because of the cultural differences.
People here love sarcasm, and the fact that I tend to take things literally doesn't help.
It's not that I cannot detect sarcasm, but rather I often find it unhumourous, so I don't know how to react appropriately.



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05 Jan 2013, 1:59 pm

How about native English speaker not in their home country?

I love going to the UK (live in Australia) as everyone treats me normally as they can't spot my aspergers immediately, however in Australia my differences (aspergers) are seen immediately. In the UK they assume my differences are cultural... Instead of saying how wierd/antisocial they say how Australian. I'm guessing they don't see too many Australians in their day-to-day lives (outside of London that is), and assume the differences are cultural not me.

I love it so much that I spend about 3-4 months a year there now and considering living there. Anyone else had this?



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05 Jan 2013, 2:35 pm

I have a somewhat distant cousin with athetoid cerebral palsy who lives in France. Mom has a theory that it's because it's easier on him to be in a non-Anglophone country, because of his very significant speech impediment.


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naturalplastic
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05 Jan 2013, 2:49 pm

So aspies are like the Conehead family of space aliens who lived in American suburbia on SNL. They would just tell their neighbors that they were "from France" and the nieghbors would just accept that as an explaination for all their alien wierdness.



Tequila
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05 Jan 2013, 2:52 pm

ChrisP wrote:
I'm a native speaker of English living in a non Anglophone country - so far I'm finding it easier, because there is less expectation that I will be spontaneous in my conversations in my (third!) language: learners are allowed to be a bit 'wooden', and people are just pleased to be able to understand what you are saying!


I can second this. I live in the UK, so getting around Europe is fairly easy enough for me and can back up. English speakers generally get a lot of leeway by people in other European countries, and Asperger's Syndrome can be quite effectively masked that way as just being a rosbif/gringo.