This was one of your best interviews. This perspective was very unique. It was interesting to hear a phonetics researcher as opposed to the people studying vocab or grammar.
This is an excellent video, very informative. For a long while when I tried to produce a French accent, it felt as if I was trying to betray my roots, to pretend to be something that I’m not. In other words, it felt dishonest and not authentic. I found that listening to a large number of speakers allowed me to discover the common features, and to understand how the accent worked. I could then produce the accent naturally without sounding as if I was trying to immitate someone. One important aspect was to understand the timing of French, and how it differs from English. I now notice that English and German speakers usually cannot get the correct timing in French. I doubt very much that I would be mistaken for a French person, but they would not know which country I come from as I speak a sort of international French with no obvious regionality although seven years ago one of my French speaking bosses thought I had a Quebec accent in French. I did live there 30 years ago. I have since lost my Quebec accent as a result of listening to European French. PS Thompson is pronounced Tompson, that one is a nice gotcha for non native speakers!
The longer I study the more I am convinced that extensive listening is NOT the key to listening fluency. At least with what I study but maybe not all languages like Chinese. I actually think reading and speaking(imitation) are the key. I analysed a lot of audio and realized messages are compressed in real life therefore what you need to get good at understanding the way the language is templated/chunked. By that I mean, when you hear some sound your brain will "search" for the closest matching template/chunk and map that across as the meaning. Just listening does not work when the information is missing. You need that knowledge about templates/chunks. I found it best to build that up by active practice of immitation and reading. Of course to imitate you need to listen, but just listening alone is not sufficient.
I used to listen to French podcasts, and progress was slow. Later on I changed to include reading a transcript while listening, and progress was much better. As you say, real speech includes lots of contractions and deviations from careful speech, making it very hard to decode if you do not know these contractions. Reading a transcript allows the brain to learn those changes.
This one was so good! Thanks so much! (also, your English accent is so good that I truly would have never guessed you are a native French speaker. Lol like the gentleman mentioned, yes I can hear hints of pronunciation differences in your accent that don't exist in a native English speaker's accent but it's so small that I personally can't pinpoint what is the native language)
If you take the average non native speaker of course that is the case, but if you take an opera singer or british actors using am American accent. I do not believe this persons statement. It is just wrong because even though it is the case for the majority that have not changed to a fully native pronunciation. I myself learned Chinese and don’t really have an accent. I feel like this person only knows what is likely not what is possible.
Hier soir, j'ai essayé d'impressionner mon mari avec une danse sexy. Disons que je m'en tiens à mon travail de jour. Qui aurait cru que j'avais le rythme d'une machine à laver en panne 💕
This was one of your best interviews. This perspective was very unique. It was interesting to hear a phonetics researcher as opposed to the people studying vocab or grammar.
This interview was very insightful. I agree with the comments saying that it's useful also listening to people specialized in pronunciation.
I'm glad you interviewed someone who specializes in pronouncation. Hopefully we see a few more of these from you.
Great interview, very insightful. Thank you.
This is an excellent video, very informative. For a long while when I tried to produce a French accent, it felt as if I was trying to betray my roots, to pretend to be something that I’m not. In other words, it felt dishonest and not authentic. I found that listening to a large number of speakers allowed me to discover the common features, and to understand how the accent worked. I could then produce the accent naturally without sounding as if I was trying to immitate someone. One important aspect was to understand the timing of French, and how it differs from English. I now notice that English and German speakers usually cannot get the correct timing in French. I doubt very much that I would be mistaken for a French person, but they would not know which country I come from as I speak a sort of international French with no obvious regionality although seven years ago one of my French speaking bosses thought I had a Quebec accent in French. I did live there 30 years ago. I have since lost my Quebec accent as a result of listening to European French.
PS Thompson is pronounced Tompson, that one is a nice gotcha for non native speakers!
That was a good one!
The longer I study the more I am convinced that extensive listening is NOT the key to listening fluency.
At least with what I study but maybe not all languages like Chinese.
I actually think reading and speaking(imitation) are the key. I analysed a lot of audio and realized messages are compressed in real life therefore what you need to get good at understanding the way the language is templated/chunked.
By that I mean, when you hear some sound your brain will "search" for the closest matching template/chunk and map that across as the meaning.
Just listening does not work when the information is missing. You need that knowledge about templates/chunks. I found it best to build that up by active practice of immitation and reading. Of course to imitate you need to listen, but just listening alone is not sufficient.
What happened to your last sentence? It makes no sense
@@James_zai_dongbei fixed
I used to listen to French podcasts, and progress was slow. Later on I changed to include reading a transcript while listening, and progress was much better. As you say, real speech includes lots of contractions and deviations from careful speech, making it very hard to decode if you do not know these contractions. Reading a transcript allows the brain to learn those changes.
This one was so good! Thanks so much! (also, your English accent is so good that I truly would have never guessed you are a native French speaker. Lol like the gentleman mentioned, yes I can hear hints of pronunciation differences in your accent that don't exist in a native English speaker's accent but it's so small that I personally can't pinpoint what is the native language)
If you didn't know about Kiwi or Aussie accents, wouldn't you think they have a foreign accent ?
Cats in the background 😂❤
If you take the average non native speaker of course that is the case, but if you take an opera singer or british actors using am American accent. I do not believe this persons statement. It is just wrong because even though it is the case for the majority that have not changed to a fully native pronunciation. I myself learned Chinese and don’t really have an accent. I feel like this person only knows what is likely not what is possible.
Paul Nation has a terrible foreign accent.
And he is an English teacher.😮
Hier soir, j'ai essayé d'impressionner mon mari avec une danse sexy. Disons que je m'en tiens à mon travail de jour. Qui aurait cru que j'avais le rythme d'une machine à laver en panne 💕