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Non-native English speakers and dialects | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| tractor Tetraglot Senior Member Norway Joined 5455 days ago 1349 posts - 2292 votes  Speaks: Norwegian*, English, Spanish, Catalan Studies: French, German, Latin | Message 17 of 28 05 February 2010 at 8:13pm | IP Logged | |||||
I've always thought that it was the Spanish of Nothern Castille that was more prestigious; the Spanish of Valladolid and Burgos. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| michamotor Tetraglot Newbie Germany Joined 5442 days ago 23 posts - 31 votes Speaks: German*, Czech, French, English Studies: Hungarian | Message 18 of 28 07 February 2010 at 12:55am | IP Logged | |||||
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Astrophel wrote
"I have the same issue with German! For some reason, the Swiss German accent is very easy to understand, one of the easiest in fact (as long as it's just an accent and not full of regionalisms). It seems like they enunciate the important words more." Where did you learn Germany? I think, spoken Swiss Germany is not only an accent but a complitely different language. Dutch is sometimes easyer to understand for me. When I´m in Switzerland, in Thun, and my swiss friends talk to each other, I hardly understand a word. Edited by michamotor on 07 February 2010 at 12:59am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| victor-osorio Diglot Groupie Venezuela Joined 5434 days ago 73 posts - 129 votes Speaks: Spanish*, English Studies: Italian | Message 19 of 28 08 February 2010 at 4:10am | IP Logged | |||||
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About the Spanish accents, I have to say:
I have noticed that most of you see Spanish as a language whose core is in Spain. Remember that Spanish is a language that is speak beyond Spain. In fact, in Spain are only about 46 millions of speakers, whereas outside from Spain are 283 millions of speakers. That means that more than the 80% of Spanish speakers are not from Spain. Most of them are in Latin America. The reason why the Real Academy is in Spain is historical more than logical. In fact, in every country whose inhabitants speaks Spanish as a major language there is an Academy that represents the Real Academy. So, the Spanish from Spain it may be the most prestigious, because it was the Spanish from classic literature like Don Quijote, but it's in no way a standard Spanish. Nowadays, is not even the dialect of most literature masterpieces (Gabriel García Márquez, Pablo Neruda, Julio Cortázar, Ruben Darío, Borges, were all from Latin American countries). For most of Spanish native speakers, the Spanish from Spain is a hard dialect, i.e., sometimes most speakers of Spanish would have a hard time trying to understand the speech of a Madrid speaker of Spanish because of its use of the fricative sound "z". Furthermore, speakers of Spanish from the south of Spain speak in a way very similar to that of Latin Americans (especially those from Andalucia). I know the word Spanish make most people think about Spain, but we have to remember that Spanish is a language shared by several countries. The name Spanish does not mean "the language from Spain" as the name English doesn't mean "the language speak in England". When we talk of English we don't assume that the "ideal" or "standard" English is that from England, do we? So I think it should be the same with Spanish, why do we always associate Spanish with Spain if Spanish is mostly speak outside of Spain? It was the language from Spain centuries ago, but is not their exclusive property anymore. The Spanish speak right now in Spain is not the Spanish they brought to America neither, it evolved through the last centuries, so don't expect Spanish from Spain to be more "authentic" than Spanish from Latin America. In fact, Spanish from Latin America could be sometimes considered old-fashioned by an actual Spain speaker, because of words like "amarrar" instead of "atar" and its large collection of old, 16th century words. About standard Spanish: there is an Standard Spanish for Latin America that's use for dubbing movies and television series. Is a mixture of Mexican, caribbean and South American accents which is believed to be neutral. Even if it was mean to be used while dubbing movies from the Latin American market, it might be most near to an standard Spanish (in proportional terms) than any accent from Spain. Edited by victor-osorio on 08 February 2010 at 4:21am 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| tractor Tetraglot Senior Member Norway Joined 5455 days ago 1349 posts - 2292 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, English, Spanish, Catalan Studies: French, German, Latin | Message 20 of 28 08 February 2010 at 10:45am | IP Logged | |||||
I don't think anybody hear has claimed that Spanish is the exclusive property of Spain. When I referred to "the most prestigious" accent or dialect in an earlier post I did this in the context of Spain and Peninsular Spanish. The Spanish spoken by the middle and upper classes of Castille serves as a model when Peninsular Spanish is taught to foreigners. It is also the Spanish that is normally used by news readers in Spanish national television. It is also what many Spaniards think of as an ideal. This is not much different from the role that RP has in a British or English context. It doesn't mean that other accents and dialects of Spanish or English have less value, have no prestige, are less important and so on. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| victor-osorio Diglot Groupie Venezuela Joined 5434 days ago 73 posts - 129 votes Speaks: Spanish*, English Studies: Italian | Message 21 of 28 08 February 2010 at 5:51pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Tractor, I wasn't refering to your post, but to the previous one, which says:
"Yet the ideal Spanish accent is considered to be from central Spain where they talk very, very quickly!" What I wanted to point out is that that's the ideal Spanish accent, but just in Spain. By the way, this other member I think was speaking from his own experience (as we all do) so I wasn't saying he's wrong, I just wanted to introduce my perspective about that statement. Spanish speakers often argue whether that statement is true or not, possibly coming up without any conclusion. It was not my intention to offend anyone, just to discuss about that matter which I found interesting. Peace.- 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| tractor Tetraglot Senior Member Norway Joined 5455 days ago 1349 posts - 2292 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, English, Spanish, Catalan Studies: French, German, Latin | Message 22 of 28 08 February 2010 at 6:05pm | IP Logged | |||||
OK, I was afraid you was offended. :-) 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Frenchpro Triglot Newbie United States francetravelandfood. Joined 5404 days ago 29 posts - 38 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Korean | Message 23 of 28 09 February 2010 at 4:54pm | IP Logged | |||||
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In the end, though, when you have trouble understanding a particular accent of the English language, or any language for that matter, it really means that your mastering of the language is not quite there yet.
If you master the language, you will most likely understand 99.9% of the language hidden under any kind of accent. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Frenchpro Triglot Newbie United States francetravelandfood. Joined 5404 days ago 29 posts - 38 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Korean | Message 24 of 28 09 February 2010 at 4:57pm | IP Logged | |||||
1 person has voted this message useful |
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