Arekkusu Hexaglot Senior Member Canada bit.ly/qc_10_lec Joined 5380 days ago 3971 posts - 7747 votes Speaks: English, French*, GermanC1, Spanish, Japanese, Esperanto Studies: Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Estonian
| Message 17 of 62 28 January 2011 at 3:26pm | IP Logged |
s_allard wrote:
I had a look at this this video and after listening to Carl teaching English, the thought occurred to me that I'm not sure that as a learner of English I would want to sound like Carl. I'm not sure where his accent is from, but I would certainly not recommend it as an ideal for most learners, especially for people who intend to interact with North Americans. There's nothing wrong with his accent of course, but it is a very localized British accent. Should learners of English strive to sound like Carl? |
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I understand your concern, but the point is only valid if determining what constitutes an ideal accent is a difficult thing to do and it usually isn't. Even beginners are usually aware that there are various accents and can tell when the speaker is very different from other accents they've heard -- of course, though, they can only tell when it's very different. Then again, that's the kind of accent one would want to avoid.
Various languages and cultures also have different levels of tolerance towards foreign accents. I think English is particularly diverse and forgiving.
Edited by Arekkusu on 28 January 2011 at 3:31pm
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slucido Bilingual Diglot Senior Member Spain https://goo.gl/126Yv Joined 6674 days ago 1296 posts - 1781 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Spanish*, Catalan* Studies: English
| Message 18 of 62 28 January 2011 at 3:44pm | IP Logged |
An article written by Luca. It is about accents:
Native accent in foreign languages
http://thepolyglotdream.com/2011/01/20/native-accent-in-fore ign-languages/
Edited by slucido on 28 January 2011 at 3:45pm
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bob_26782 Triglot Newbie United Kingdom Joined 5782 days ago 7 posts - 12 votes Speaks: English*, Arabic (Written), Turkish Studies: Finnish, German, French
| Message 19 of 62 30 January 2011 at 6:23pm | IP Logged |
For me, by far the best 'YouTube polyglot' I've seen is Huliganov (I think a member of this forum). For a native English speaker to achieve that level of proficiency in Russian pronunciation is to me worthy of endless amounts of praise!! My girlfriend, whose native language is Russian and who has come across countless learners of the language, couldn't believe it when I said his native language is English (if I'm wrong and he was born bilingual please correct me) - she said it was completely flawless. Respect!
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stmc2 Diglot Groupie United Kingdom Joined 6250 days ago 45 posts - 58 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: German
| Message 20 of 62 30 January 2011 at 7:35pm | IP Logged |
Is this the same Huliganov that you mean?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qSPFB4D01Lk
I think you made an error because he souns like a Russian when he speks English, not a native English speaker.
I like the man very much and am using his Gold List Method at the moment. Just pointing out an error that you may have made.
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bob_26782 Triglot Newbie United Kingdom Joined 5782 days ago 7 posts - 12 votes Speaks: English*, Arabic (Written), Turkish Studies: Finnish, German, French
| Message 21 of 62 30 January 2011 at 8:15pm | IP Logged |
OK done a bit more digging - his profile on here says that his native language is English, and if you look at this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=um0Qm00x4lw , he's definitely English!
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Thuan Triglot Senior Member GermanyRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6929 days ago 133 posts - 156 votes Speaks: Vietnamese, German*, English Studies: French, Japanese, Romanian, Swedish, Mandarin
| Message 22 of 62 30 January 2011 at 8:49pm | IP Logged |
Huliganov is a native English speaker, he just enjoys speaking English with a Russian accent while teaching Russian.
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