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How to get a native accent | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| Zeitgeist21 Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5645 days ago 156 posts - 192 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: German, French | Message 17 of 47 12 April 2010 at 10:44pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Hehe I took my own thread of topic :D I like the direction it's going though it's interesting ^^
High IQ is kind of different though, there are people who 'achieve' great things without much intelligence, if one understands achieve as developing a skill to a level as more advanced as usually believed possible. Understanding what you are achieving and achieving are two very different things. Most people learn at least one language without having a clue about how they are learning it, without thinking about the significance of it but they still do it anyway. And then again there's also the whole idea of nurture versus nature. As you can probably tell I go down the nuture route :D But if it is nurture and not nature that creates talent then IQ should be able to grow..... 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Zeitgeist21 Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5645 days ago 156 posts - 192 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, French | Message 18 of 47 12 April 2010 at 10:50pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Wrote my post while Cainteat posted, I like the post it's interesting. And different to any of the ways I suggested aswell, that's another one on the list :P Studying the physical production of sounds and conscious analysis of it.
You can reject the natural method ways but they have been people who succeeded with them so you can argue that maybe the people who failed are those who got bored or didn't listen long enough. I've heard of so many cases of success with the natural method (mostly unintentionally done by film freaks over several years in a non-English speaking country) that I find it hard to discount. And I also find it hard to believe that there is only one way to a native accent..... 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Teango Triglot Winner TAC 2010 & 2012 Senior Member United States teango.wordpress.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5556 days ago 2210 posts - 3734 votes Speaks: English*, German, Russian Studies: Hawaiian, French, Toki Pona | Message 19 of 47 12 April 2010 at 10:54pm | IP Logged | |||||
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It's always interesting to see how other people successfully learned a language to fluency, and as discussed in this thread, were able to achieve a near-native accent (or lack of accent) along the way. I have so much respect for people who achieve this, Khatzumoto is one example that stands out in my mind right now, and there are of course many others out there too. I'd love to hear more recorded examples of people chatting colloquially in a foreign language on YouTube generally (I'm talking here about closing your eyes and they sound the real deal).
Near-native speech is not the goal of every learner of course, and sometimes communication or reading great books might be more important instead. However I for one would sure get a kick out of being confused with a native speaker or being honestly complemented on my accent being "almost native". Who knows, maybe in the future, I can but dream... :) I think the list you mention is a good list, and shows that you've researched this subject well. Exposure to lots and lots of good quality (ideally fun) native listening materials is really essential here - "exposure, exposure, exposure", the manic photographer exclaims! I guess listening to your own voice (you know, that embarrassing moment when you replay a recording and you realise what you really sound like to other people) can prove very useful too. What really stands out and defines a native speaker though (and this is the real tough cookie, long after you've surpassed C2 level in grammar, comprehension and writing), is to master real spontaneous natural native intonation and prosody and all without a foreign accent. Sure, you may be able to communicate fluently, but without any trace of a foreign accent? Now that's impressive. I do believe it's possible to achieve this goal. I'm an eternal optimist when it comes to language learning, even after the forewarned post-Genie watershed age of 13 or 14, and even beyond our mid-twenties, the age when neuroscientists reckon many lose all plasticity in the brain (which has also been rightly questioned in recent research). However, it does take a lot of effort and exposure and practice. Just look at Dashan speaking Mandarin on YouTube (he only started at 19)...this guy has really put in the effort over the years, and it shows! So what's the secret and why do so few people ever reach these sublime heights generally. I think there are plenty of reasons why people maintain a foreign accent after so many years of study and immersion and still tend towards fossilisation. We can talk about self-confidence, Krashen's theories, motivation, positive/negative feedback, regular exposure to native speakers, and even talent or acquired listening/speaking skills in your own native language. I'm sure members here could add dozens of more reasons to this list. One of them however is simply - they get comfortable. They can do what they want or need to do with the language, and so don't feel the need to strive persistently forward anymore or perhaps just don't have the time to commit to advancing their already advance language skills so much anymore. This is perfectly understandable, and I see it happening all the time around me in the community. Another reason, is down to the sheer lack of materials that offer good exposure to natural colloquial conversation from an early stage. Sure, films and TV come very close, but it's really not quite the same as chatting with locals down the pub or children playing together in school or talking with their parents, and so most courses come across a little fabricated and wooden at the best of times. I'm always looking out for courses with good natural dialogues, and although I've yet to find anything spontaneous and truly colloquial, courses such as Princeton Russian and target language soap operas do come close. Finally, the importance of some good phonetic training, with lots of emphasis on natural full-speed prosody and intonation, is absolutely key to perfecting that accent. This is often skipped over or lightly reviewed in a language programme. This needn't even be formal study, or long sessions of chorusing and/or shadowing either. Taking Dashan as an example again, it seems he really excelled his accent in Mandarin by taking part in stand-up comedy with fast-paced witty conversations between several speakers in front of a live native audience. Here's an example of him with other players, and then just performing by himself in a kind of of self-dialogue (this is a great joke by the way). What strikes me as being really important here is the great use of emotion alongside the patiently rehearsed jokes and stories. He's really got a handle on intonation and expressive flow here, and although I'm not Chinese and can't really tell for sure, Chinese friends have repeatedly commented on how very good this is in the past, and he seems to be really enjoying it too! :D Edited by Teango on 12 April 2010 at 11:13pm 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 6011 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 20 of 47 12 April 2010 at 11:38pm | IP Logged | |||||
"So many" relative to what? These people are a clear minority. The majority of the people I've personally met who have functioned well in a target-language-only classes would study their bilingual dictionaries and bilingual grammar books between-times. The bilingual materials gave them the overall structure against which they could understand the details presented in class.
But even if you can do that, you're still wasting time scrabbling about for the important information. You're still wasting time while listening to the fluff that is either irrelevant or too advanced for you to process. You can't start learning until the important information is isolated and available to you, so if you can get it prepackaged and concisely defined, that's the optimal position. You don't need to sit down and learn it all at once -- if you know in advance what you're going to need, you can learn it "just in time". For the learner, that's not normally possible, but in a taught course vocabulary can be chosen to control the rate at which new sounds are introduced. But learning an accent is unarguably about learning to move the muscles in the right way. It is the only thing in language that can be practised mechanically, because it's the only truly mechanical part of language. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| vb Octoglot Senior Member Afghanistan Joined 6422 days ago 112 posts - 135 votes Speaks: English, Romanian, French, Polish, Dutch, German, Italian, Spanish Studies: Russian, Swedish | Message 21 of 47 12 April 2010 at 11:50pm | IP Logged | |||||
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The go-to guys here must be actors and how they respond to the professional imperative of multi-accent mastery.
Regarding IQ and accent, most of the French tutors that I encountered at Oxford had somewhat dubious accents. I find that the main thing getting in the way of my speaking in a satisfactory accent is psychological weddedness to my English - I find the idea of coming across as not-English as being a betrayal of sorts. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Zeitgeist21 Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5645 days ago 156 posts - 192 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, French | Message 22 of 47 12 April 2010 at 11:50pm | IP Logged | |||||
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When I refer to the natural method, all I mean is input for a long time before output. And I've met 7 people who have achieved this through watching films in European countries. They watched the films alot, not to learn English but because they were really into films and didn't have any opportunities to speak for aaaages. All of them had perfect accents and I didn't indentify that they weren't native speakers until they told me. I've heard of many similar cases too. And again I didn't say this was the best way, just a way that seems to work.
Can you recommend any resources for studying phonetics and the production of sounds? I wanna tackle my dodgy German accent from as many angles as I can =) EDIT: Again posted while someone else did ^^ When I went to Oxford (I didn't study there :P) I noticed the strong accents too, but to be fair all the professors I met seemed heavily focused on the literature. If you learn a language for literary reasons and don't have any particular interest for accents why would you invest any effort into your accent? Or maybe as far as accents go they just suck ;) Edited by WillH on 13 April 2010 at 12:03am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Arekkusu Hexaglot Senior Member Canada bit.ly/qc_10_lec Joined 5381 days ago 3971 posts - 7747 votes Speaks: English, French*, GermanC1, Spanish, Japanese, Esperanto Studies: Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Estonian | Message 23 of 47 13 April 2010 at 12:47am | IP Logged | |||||
When I used to teach French, this was the number one problem hindering the progress of English speakers. It was particularly noticeable among English speakers (and the speakers of a few other languages/cultures) that learning a second language was perceived as a risky process whereby their superior language and culture may no longer be distinguishable. Perish the thought. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| shakir Newbie United States Joined 5340 days ago 1 posts - 1 votes | Message 24 of 47 13 April 2010 at 6:32am | IP Logged | |||||
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Learning English with native English speakers improves not only your understanding but it also help you to learn proper English accent. i have learn through such a amassing program http://www.learnonlineenglish.com/ I hope that would help you all.
1 person has voted this message useful |
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