|
 |
Can adult learners achieve native levels? | ||
Tags: Native Fluency | ||
Share with:
| ||
 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5431 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes  Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 105 of 303 05 October 2012 at 1:55pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Although I don't think @Arekusu meant it as such, this rather snide remark illustrates the nature of this hoary debate here at HTLAL. There is this idea that if you are not interested in speaking like a native, then you must like to speak poorly or you are lazy and unwilling to make an effort. This is simply not true. The issue is all about return on investment of time and energy. Nobody is saying that bad pronunciation is good. What many people are saying is that investing in grammar and vocabulary probably gives you better results than attempting to achieve perfect pronunciation alone. Just yesterday I heard a well-intentioned musician speak some mangled French on a stage to 400 people. Ouch, it hurt my ears to hear the poor grammar. Frankly, I would have preferred good grammar and poor pronunciation. The other thing to keep in mind is that pronunciation usually takes care of itself. As @iversen points out so wisely, pronunciation improves with contact. People who have good speaking grammar and vocabulary inevitably have good pronunciation because it comes along in the learning process. I'm beginning to think that the reason some people are obsessed with sounding like a native is that it is such a rare accomplishment that it takes on great symbolic value of personal success. They can feel offended if other people don't share this same obsession. But I think most people here at HTLAL do admire and respect this accomplishment. Who would not like to speak a language perfectly? It's just that many of us don't think that native-like pronunciation is either necessary or is the best use of limited time and resources. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Марк Senior Member Russian Federation Joined 5057 days ago 2096 posts - 2972 votes Speaks: Russian* | Message 106 of 303 05 October 2012 at 2:23pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
You are wrong. There are a lot of people with good grammar and vocabulary but with very thick accents. And in oral speech pronunciation is more important than grammar. If you have bad pronunciation, it will affect your grammar. And it will affect all the words and comprehension will suffer much. 5 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5431 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 107 of 303 05 October 2012 at 2:53pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
|
I don't think anybody doubts that overall language proficiency, and speaking in particular, depends on contact with the language. We see all the time that people who spend lengthy stays in a country and who are married to a speaker of the target language inevitably speak well, or at least better than those who do not have the same level of contact.
In this vein, it is interesting to look at the language capabilities of people who have made lengthy stays in other countries. Obviously, they tend to know some or a lot of the local language, but how many speak it perfectly? For example, how many expatriates end up mastering the local language? Take for examples the thousands of young Canadians, Americans, Australians, among others, who spend years teaching English in Japan. They all learn some Japanese of course. How many come home speaking Japanese fluently? Some, undoubtedly. How many come home speaking like a native? Very few I think. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| tarvos Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member China likeapolyglot.wordpr Joined 4708 days ago 5310 posts - 9399 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, Swedish, French, Russian, German, Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Afrikaans Studies: Greek, Modern Hebrew, Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, Korean, Esperanto, Finnish | Message 108 of 303 05 October 2012 at 2:56pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
|
Is that to do with them not being innately able to or not giving a dingo's kidney?
Because, you know, it matters. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Arekkusu Hexaglot Senior Member Canada bit.ly/qc_10_lec Joined 5382 days ago 3971 posts - 7747 votes Speaks: English, French*, GermanC1, Spanish, Japanese, Esperanto Studies: Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Estonian | Message 109 of 303 05 October 2012 at 3:04pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
No, no, no. Beano said it's BETTER to speak with an accent; I never said having an accent meant you were lazy -- I simply hinted to the fact that having one can't logically be thought of as a BETTER alternative to not having any. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Марк Senior Member Russian Federation Joined 5057 days ago 2096 posts - 2972 votes Speaks: Russian* | Message 110 of 303 05 October 2012 at 3:04pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
I know at least one such person very closely. It’s more important, I think, to pronounce “il” and “elle” differently than to learn where to write “s” and where to write “x” in pl. to speak good French (I know the last point is not about grammar but spelling but I can give another example – usage of prepositions). Edited by Марк on 05 October 2012 at 3:13pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| showtime17 Trilingual Hexaglot Senior Member Slovakia gainweightjournal.co Joined 6085 days ago 154 posts - 210 votes Speaks: Russian, English*, Czech*, Slovak*, French, Spanish Studies: Ukrainian, Polish, Dutch | Message 111 of 303 05 October 2012 at 4:37pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
|
I think this discussion is getting a bit off topic. I think the question was whether it is possible to achieve a native-like pronunciation and how and not debating whether it is desirable or not. I am one of those people who would like to achieve a native-like pronunciation. I am interested in the techniques on how to do that, especially if you only have limited contact with native speakers.
1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5431 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 112 of 303 08 October 2012 at 8:02am | IP Logged | ||||||||
I don't have any particular technical advice beyond the usual stuff about lots of listening and shadowing. On the other hand, it is pretty clear that the native-like pronunciation is nearly always associated with intensive contact with native speakers and some form of corrective feedback. I believe that it is essential that you be corrected by a native speaker. This is exactly what dialect coaches and accent reduction specialists do for a living. Absent constant access to native speakers, the chances of developing native-like proficiency are frankly not very good at all. I won't say it's impossible because there are some excitable people here at HTLAL who will jump at any attempt to prove me wrong. 2 persons have voted this message useful |
|  | 
Printable version
|
| Copyright 2024 FX Micheloud - All rights reserved No part of this website may be copied by any means without my written authorization. |
