Finally my obscure experience may be relevant! I'm an American who lived in Geneva (French-speaking side of Switzerland) for a while. One night I was watching a

Finally my obscure experience may be relevant! I'm an American who lived in Geneva (French-speaking side of Switzerland) for a while. One night I was watching a talk show on France 2 (TV channel): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tout_le_monde_en_parle_(French_talk_show) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tout_le_monde_en_parle_(French... After the Iraq invasion they had an American diplomat on, not sure which one. He spoke French fluently, but with a no-fucks-given American accent. But the thing is, I was able to understand him so well! After that, I tried speaking French (in private) without regard to accent, and found I also could do it much more fluently than before!