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Focus Spanish learning on one region? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| buhrahyun Newbie United States Joined 5354 days ago 24 posts - 25 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 1 of 22 02 April 2010 at 5:24am | IP Logged | ||
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So, as I'm learning Spanish, my aim is to sound like my wife and her family. I started with Pimsleur, but then I picked FSI partly because someone said the voices are from Mexico. (The other strong factor being that it's free.) When I listen to the radio or TV, I look for stations from Mexico City or even better, Veracruz. When I look for movies, I'm looking for something made in Mexico, which definitely limits my selection. My reading ideally will consist largely of local Mexican publications.
I'm sure it's much too early to worry about dialect right? However, it's fun for me to do this and I feel like I'll be learning about my wife's heritage. So, what do you think? Is this a great idea or will it lead to my certain demise? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| buhrahyun Newbie United States Joined 5354 days ago 24 posts - 25 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 2 of 22 02 April 2010 at 5:26am | IP Logged | ||
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Ah! I'm so sorry I posted to the wrong section. I started to post about something else and the changed it completely on the fly. Feel free to move it to the appropriate location.
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| 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 3 of 22 02 April 2010 at 6:17pm | IP Logged | ||
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I chose material by quality, not region.
Spanish is such a regular language that once you learn the basic structure and sound system, mapping local differences onto it is dead easy. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| datsunking1 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5585 days ago 1014 posts - 1533 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: German, Russian, Dutch, French | Message 4 of 22 02 April 2010 at 9:10pm | IP Logged | ||
Very good post and I completely agree. I can pick out accents quite well, it just develops after the basics like you said. Go for the quality, and regionalisms will come later. (A couple Street Spanish books will do the trick :D) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| victor-osorio Diglot Groupie Venezuela Joined 5432 days ago 73 posts - 129 votes Speaks: Spanish*, English Studies: Italian | Message 5 of 22 02 April 2010 at 9:21pm | IP Logged | ||
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I agree with Cainntear when he says that Spanish is regular enough just to make you
able to comprehend any dialect once you have a grasp on the basics. It seems you're basically learning Spanish to communicate with your wife and her family, is that true? Because if that's your goal you're doing ok prefering Mexican material to learn. But as everybody has said at this point, DON'T discard any material that's not Mexican. Take advantage of any Spanish material you find. You will learn from it as well, and it will be useful. PS: if what you want is to sound like a Mexican speaker, i.e. imitate their accent, I think you should wait a little until you are able to imitate accents. Focus on pronunciation (not accent), the sounds you have to make in order to construct the words so they can be understood by a Spanish speaker, and later on you will be able to pay attention to the Mexican accent. Edited by victor-osorio on 02 April 2010 at 9:26pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Johntm Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5422 days ago 616 posts - 725 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 6 of 22 03 April 2010 at 5:05am | IP Logged | ||
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It'll help to start early with whatever dialect you want, but it doesn't matter too much, Spanish doesn't vary to much between countries. I'm kind of trying to keep it neutral, maybe with a little bit of Mexican Spanish influence, mainly because it's closest to the US (not the best reasoning, but meh).
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| buhrahyun Newbie United States Joined 5354 days ago 24 posts - 25 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 7 of 22 03 April 2010 at 5:08am | IP Logged | ||
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Thanks DK and Victor. I'll focus on quality for now. I know that my American accent is the overwhelming factor at this point. Also, I can still only pick out words and phrases on the radio at this point so I have a lot of work in front of me.
The great thing is that there's so much choice of material now with quality options for streaming radio from all over the world. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| datsunking1 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5585 days ago 1014 posts - 1533 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: German, Russian, Dutch, French | Message 8 of 22 03 April 2010 at 8:55pm | IP Logged | ||
You can REALLY learn to model accents after interviews or famous speakers/people that you know. I learned early on to model my accent after the Reggaeton rappers Daddy Yankee (puerto rico) Calle 13 (puerto rico) and Tego Calderón (PR) It was just the music that I listened to, and I eventually picked up on their accent enough (you know, the extremely slurred "cool" way of speaking) because that's ALL I listened to or heard. I actually got so good that I've fooled a native and a few teachers. If you're around it enough, you'll catch on easily. Best of luck to you :) try NOT to be content with your American accent, try your best to model someone else, and the better your Spanish will sound. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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