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There's something slightly irritating about German or Dutch people trying very hard to have that perfect British accent. I can't really tell why, but it always
by bafe 3y ago
There's something slightly irritating about German or Dutch people trying very hard to have that perfect British accent. I can't really tell why, but it always seems affected and pretentious. I much prefer the "wooden" (Holzern in German) accent of the Swiss
- ehnto 3y agoYour opinion is common in language learning it seems, as most people praise a perfect accent but some get very offended by it. I couldn't tell you why, maybe it's a feeling of lack of authenticity? I find it impressive when someone has acquired a good accent personally since it's quite difficult to do.
- tarkin2 3y agoI'm impressed but it's weird to compliment a non Brit on their perfect British accent when they don't sound like you, a British person...
- bafe 3y agoIt sounds too studied, almost a mockery of real native speakers, there's always too much of perfection in the way these learners speak that makes it sound uncanny
- ehnto 3y agoInteresting, yeah I can see that. A lot of modern language learning tries to get you to sound natural, but the question becomes, natural where? You start to delve into dialects, when I meet people who learned English naturally from TV and media, they often have a weird blend of dialects that constantly switches, it's kinda fun actually. One minute they have American inflections, next they're Australian etc. When learning Japanese I was encouraged to pick a person with a dialect I prefer and listen to them a lot, as I'll likely pick up their accent and mannerisms.