A
first language (also
native language,
mother tongue,
arterial language, or
L1) is the
language(s) a person has learned from birth
[1] or within the
critical period, or that a person speaks the best and so is often the basis for
sociolinguisticidentity. In some countries, the terms
native language or
mother tongue refer to the language of one's ethnic group rather than one's first language.
[2] Sometimes, there can be more than one native or mother tongue, (for example, when the child's parents speak different languages). Those children are usually called
bilingual.
First language - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia