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Acquiring accents - funny questions | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Questions About Your Target Languages |  | |
| fairyfountain Senior Member Zimbabwe Joined 6136 days ago 254 posts - 248 votes  5 sounds | Message 1 of 20 01 July 2009 at 4:20am | IP Logged |
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Okay, here's a question related to accents, and some funny suggestion. I've been wondering about how one's accent can change throughout the years ... but I'm talking about native languages only, here.
A relative thinks that my last tutor sounded "American in French" - she went to the US once, and stayed there for a year or so. The girl was French, with an Arabic background. An American friend, who teaches French, says that her students sometimes don't believe her when she tells them that she's American... because of her accent in English. My friend from New York apparently sounds completely Texan after living in Texas for 2 days. She has to fight the accent for several days before it goes away. Last, but not least - I thought some of my college professors were English because of their French, and when they weren't. Most of my friends can spot an English teacher before knowing what he teaches... because of his accent in French. Okay, what the heck people? Why does that happen? Will it happen to me eventually? And here's a question/suggestion. Let's take a random person and let's feed him/her recordings of some foreigner speaking accented English/French (his native tongue). These recordings are easy to find - you have librivox, speech archive... Anyway, if said person listened to the accented recording on a daily basis, would it affect his/her French/English/Urdu/whatever? I actually thought about conducting the experiment on myself, because I think that a better understanding of the speakers of your target language's accent in your native language can help you nail the pronunciation of your second language. That said, I haven't looked for a lot of recordings yet, and the experiment would only be effective if one could find heavily accented but understandable recordings that would be representative of the group of speakers. Anyway, you can call me crazy if you want, but I'd like your opinion on that one :-p 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| CaoMei513 Senior Member United States Joined 6853 days ago 110 posts - 113 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Mandarin, Korean | Message 2 of 20 02 July 2009 at 6:58am | IP Logged |
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Well, I am American, but I know that after watching Harry Potter movies I always want to use a British accent :) ...maybe if all I heard for a while was British English, I would really have to fight not to use the accent.
Sorry, thats the only example I have. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| fairyfountain Senior Member Zimbabwe Joined 6136 days ago 254 posts - 248 votes 5 sounds | Message 3 of 20 02 July 2009 at 10:26pm | IP Logged |
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Well, it seems like a really good example.
I guess it's got to do with how sensitive you are to accents. If I watch British television, it doesn't do anything to my English. My French-British tutor hardly has any influence over me. However, while watching shows with actors from New York in them doesn't do anything to my English, talking to people from the South does tend to make my accent shift a tiny bit. I believe that Canadians could also change my English to a certain extent. That said, your example is much more striking than mine. You seem to have a natural tendency to adapt yourself to whatever person you're listening to, and I don't. I don't think it's got to do with how good your ears are, but that's definitely something that's worth looking into. I believe there's a reason why some people say that if you can imitate an accent in your native language, you can nail it in another language. I read stories of Americans who managed to sound near-native because they practiced their French accent in English. I do have a Texan friend who used that method (she loves acting, and does voices and stuff), and she sounds native in French at times. That said, I had a teacher who had the mother of all American accents, and we had her for 2 hours straight every Friday. While my friend couldn't refrain from doing an American accent at the end of the class, I couldn't have imitated the teacher for a million dollars. I think the whole thing's pretty interesting - if you want your impression to be believable, you have to use real sounds of your second language, so it may be good practice. I don't know, I never tried that before, but I guess that starting out with your native language is always easier, or is it? 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| mrhenrik Triglot Moderator Norway Joined 6087 days ago 482 posts - 658 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, English, French Personal Language Map | Message 4 of 20 03 July 2009 at 2:49pm | IP Logged |
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Accents definitely change, but I guess how long they stay like that depends on the continued exposure of the source of the accent change.
An example: a friend of mine studied a year in the States. When he returned home and came straight from the airport to a party to say hi, everyone was quite puzzled. He had been living in the States for a year with almost no communication in Norwegian, and as a consequence, his Norwegian accent sounded like a eastern European guest worker. His accent is normal now obviously, but I doubt you can say the same about his English. It was fun while it lasted. ^^ 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 6019 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 5 of 20 03 July 2009 at 4:45pm | IP Logged |
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If you use the muscles in your mouth differently for long enough, it take a bit of exercies to get back to moving them in the old way again.
So obviously if you speak another language for a year you're forced to do that. If you move to another region where your mother tongue is spoken, picking up the accent or not is an individual thing. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| dmg Diglot Senior Member Canada dgryski.blogspot.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 7019 days ago 555 posts - 605 votes 1 sounds Speaks: English*, French Studies: Dutch, Esperanto | Message 6 of 20 04 July 2009 at 1:03am | IP Logged |
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Living in Quebec and listening to Quebecois TV and Radio has certainly shifted my French accent from being mostly European (with an anglo undertone) to being a European/Quebecois mix (with an anglo undertone..). All the course materials I used were for international / "standard" French, so clearly living here is what has affected me. I've studied Quebecois phonology, but only from an intellectual point of view and not with an eye towards consciously shifting my pronunciation.
1 person has voted this message useful | |
| CaoMei513 Senior Member United States Joined 6853 days ago 110 posts - 113 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Mandarin, Korean | Message 7 of 20 10 July 2009 at 2:50am | IP Logged |
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Thanks for the feedback on that fairyfountain! I had never thought that I might be more sensitive to accents. I also remembered another example... when I was in China I would always hear Chinese speaking English to me, but with the Chinese accent. I swear it took a ton of effort not to use the Chinese accent and broken sentences when replying to them in English!
1 person has voted this message useful | |
| fairyfountain Senior Member Zimbabwe Joined 6136 days ago 254 posts - 248 votes 5 sounds | Message 8 of 20 11 July 2009 at 5:16pm | IP Logged |
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http://www.livemocha.com/submissions/review/8043043
I swear that the American tutor who posted some feedback on the girl's French sounds French in English. My theory's been backed up by 3 American friends who don't even believe that she is American. It's pretty obvious. I don't know how that happened. The thing is, she sounds near-native in French, and sort of near-native in English. Some people may just not be able to handle two accents... Edited by fairyfountain on 11 July 2009 at 5:20pm 1 person has voted this message useful |
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