karena
New member
But what if the person doing all the correcting was a non-native speaker as well? That's what gets to me!!
Don't you sometimes find that there are people who are not native speakers who are so interested in English, have studied it so thoroughly that they know it better than you? I have had grammar questions from non-native speakers that there's no way I can answer, or questions about the nuances of words which I can't answer. So whilst the native speaker can do things 'naturally', but perhaps without understanding, the non-native speaker has the dimension of looking outside and trying to understand. Some native speakers can of course do this too and vice versa. Your category is not the only deciding factor. I think both are powerful, but in different ways. For me, you need both. But to rely on one rather than the other means you will become more of one than the other. So you can speak in nothing but slang or nothing but perfect English. I would rather do what is appropriate for the situation and know the difference.