@@marcelosilveira7079 especially if both non-natives have the same origins and make the same mistakes :)

yeah we're more straightforward when we speak another language

I don't like this statement, i mean it's true but everyone always says the same thing. I think one should aim to get comfortable and find your own style of speaking/writing/communicating. What i mean by that it's that when you're speaking to someone in your native tongue, depending on the formality level or way of saying certain things could affect your relation with whoever you're talking to. So if you are not good enough in a language you could be speaking like someone you don't want to be. Remember that communication is mostly non-verbal so, in the end in order to make real bonds with new people, depending on how you say things will be crucial. I hope i made my point clear, it's kind of hard to explain concepts like this when english is not my native language :)

​@@Forka137 you speak very good english, it's concise and to the point.

Agree, its not like "impossible" like Steve said, however then it requires a lot of effort as well as the natural talent of the imitation skills... which is usually super-hard in a lot of cases. and i agree to the part of what Steve said in this video, that the imitation skill is not so important compare to things like the cultural understanding while having OK level of accents and pronunciations... especially cultural understanding, as it affects the word choices, the way of its representation can be so much different to the one based on your culture, causes misunderstanding etc

When did you start learning them?

I've been mistaken for a German and I don't even speak German

and it's not the first time. check it out

Indeed.

Yeah it's happened recently twice in a row!

I totally agree.

You are totally right!! This makes the process of learning new languages so interesting in my opinion!

Just because you sound like a native , you don't miss out on these situations. If you're having a conversation with a person and then after some time you tell them "I am actually from XYZ and English is not my first language and I've never even been to your country" it creates even more interest, as it leaves them wondering as to how and why you got to this level. And you can still discuss culture after that.

True. I don't mind having a foreign accent generally. But if learning a minority language I feel it's very important to have an authentic accent and pronounciation modelled on it's genuine native speakers. Because there tends to be far more learners and second language speakers of those languages than native speakers and the sound and music of those languages tend to be in great danger of being lost to the sounds and music of the nearest majority language. (examples: New Breton speakers sounding like they are speaking French, New Irish speakers sounding like they are speaking English, etc.)

I think the novelty of those conversations dissipates quite quickly.

C C Really depends. Some contries that have lots of accents make it pretty easy to get by as a native. Also, if you have practiced the language and getting a native accent a lot, and I mean a lot, you can get a perfect accent no matter the language. It is just a skill after all. You probably can’t get to this level with more than a handful of languages, maybe 3-4 max.

I have fooled English native speakers from the US into believing I was American as well several times, even in longer conversations. So I don't think that this is necessarily true.

Dominik L They noticed it but didnt point it out cuz there’s no need to. I always spot some giveaways at least when speaking with people who have good accents but obviously not from here. But I just tell them they sound american anyway cuz theres no need to give negative comments and risk harming the relationship. They think they’re perfect but nope.

Dominik L Youre most surely delusional or in denial if you think you have 100% of the accent nailed down

@@trollforaliving6857 People can and have done it though. Natives weren't born speaking as a native of their countries language either. They developed it over time obviously. The reason it's more difficult for a foreigner is because they have to undo their native language. In order to get the native sounds in a foreign one. Natives don't they start from scratch with no previous language. If that makes any sense.

I have been learning English for almost 4 years now, started when I was about to turn 16, yet I have remained my foreign accent even tho I have been watching a lot of content in English

That's a bad excuse. You just have to immerse yourself in this language like a freak. Matter fact as a child. Just repeat sentences while your in the shower alone walking on the street on the train in bed and wherever people think you're crazy, literally as a child. Sing songs and repeat even videos/movies you're watching after. Don't think about what you're coming across. Get rid of your sense of shame and stupidity. That's why children are geniuses in learning they don't hesitate. Maybe it'll take years but it'll work.

I think people never complimented your English because they thought/knew you were a native speaker. I do hav

Exactly. They already can fluently speak English so they aren’t really gonna get complimented on learning English since they already speak it fluently. People who regularly speak English don’t get complimented when speaking English well. Though it is true people are gonna assume whether or not you know English well based on your accent.

LingQ is fucking GENIUS. if only more people asked experts (polyglots) how they ACTUALLY learnt before creating textbooks, subjects and websites (duolingo) dedicated to teaching.

That's so cool! Let me ask you, do you know a Romanian writer called Emil Cioran?

@@fabricio_santana Salut! ...I just looked him up because of your response. I am not much into nihlism I am on quite the other side actually

@@jerryreed2050 I understand! He is not really a nihilist though, as in someone who advocates this attitude. What he writes is more of a poetic prose that has "nihilism" as its theme.

So tempo and intonation?

@Michael I am such a person haha. How many people do you actually think have a deliberate bias though? I mean, I think that WANTING to sound like them and LISTENING TO THE ACTUAL SOUND YOU HEAR is 80-90% of the job, but for me the last 10-20% is hard. Most Swedes are impressed that I've done to 80-90%, I think because most people never even listen in the first place.

Who's this guy?

People think it's not possible because it's so rare. The reason why is no one really focuses on seriously trying to sound like a native. It's definitely possible if you put in the years of work.

Martín yo soy portugués y la gente me confunde con un español. A mi, personalmente no me gusta. Awesome 😎 será para ti, para mi no.

Yeah Martin... I am with you.

Did you grow up in Northern Ireland ?

How did you manage to pull that off?

Aline that is weird. What do you mean? You spot her accent just when she pronounces the letter r. Without that rolling r she will sound like a real native speaker.

😂😂 I bet that sounds weird, the French famously do not pronounce their Rs

She could be from Southern France :D

@@angelsjoker8190 Could be indeed :)

@@Theyoutuberpolyglot Exactly, and she speaks French very well.

very much like, no doubt, but even then, these are few and far between

Dougen’s Japanese is pretty much perfect. Although, Kaz from eigonodo has nitpicked his Japanese those nitpicks are very few. The hard work put into it and the amount of time it took is unfortunately many can’t do especially for polyglots who focus on many languages. I still love Dougen though XD

Dogen spends hours rehearsing and cutting those videos. In a real conversation Matt VS Japan sounds better. (Also I think Japanese is among the easiest languages to sound native in)

I was born and raised in London, to me Luca sounds like an Italian who has probably lived in England or America for 20+ years.

Yeah but to me as an American Steve sounds like a Canadian not an American. There is a difference!

Ted C I just listened to the new video by Luca. He does a great job of speaking English, but during his nine-minute video there are a number of places where he uses the language and grammar (incorrectly) in ways not like a native American speaker does. But I love to listen to him. He’s amazing. Overall, I agree with Steve. I’d rather learn more of a language than use the same amount of time to try to sound almost exactly like a native speaker.

@@jazzyeric21 It's weird that you should say that because I was speaking to American Pronunciation coach on the train the other day. A complete stranger and we started talking and I asked her about the difference between Canadian and General American speech and she told me it's really difficult to tell because it sounds almost the same. The only way she was able to tell was how they drew certain words and prounciate certain words.

I have great respect for Luca but I didn't know he had done a video on the subject.

@@Thelinguist O.K! There's a saying, "Great minds think alike." I guess that was the case!

@@Thelinguist He did. kzfaq.info/get/bejne/gN5lkpVksZ-bqmg.html

Keep learning

It is possible. You needn't know the culture of the target language to learn that language. I am learning Turkish by reading and listening The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes in Turkish. Some people enjoy Harry Potter in different languages. But later on, I am of course going to read some famous Turkish writers.

What's an example of an unappealing culture? You may think a certain culture is unappealing, but other people may think it is interesting, including the people associated with the culture. People create culture, and it plays a large role in international business, so to say a culture is unappealing is disrespectful to the people associated with it and those who actually like it. If you don't like the culture, don't bother learning the language, and don't bother wasting time and money on a country whose culture you don't even like. Whether you're think Japan or not, many of us are sick and tired of closed-minded people arrogantly believing Japan has the best culture and is the only country worth working in, living in, investing in, etc. and all they think about is it's paradise on Earth without knowing what they're getting themselves into. Want to invest in an Asian country? You're better off with Korea. Don't like the culture? Either learn to respect it, or choose another country. Without respecting the culture, your business options are more limited.

Sounds interesting. Can you tell me where you get these audio books and e-books and Turkish please.

@@Thelinguist The Adventures of Sherlock, turkish sound: kzfaq.info/love/6e5CW_FLlrtqXY5NaLmFtg text: tr.pdfdrive.com/sherlock-holmesün-maceraları-e59361424.html Ücretsiz E-Kitaplar - free of charge, kostenlos Звук і переклад для деяких творів не співпадають. Але в цілому звук ідентичний тексту, наприклад, Mazarin Taşı, Üç Garrideb, Zümrüt Taç(BERYL CORONET) and some others. No problem to convert .pdf into .doc

Thank you very much. I will be exploring this starting tomorrow.

Yeah... Steve uses a sample size of ONE Italian guy (who happens to speak like, what, 11 languages or something) and says "Well he doesn't sound native, so no-one can... Like and subscribe."

@@Quazimotoboy That Italian guy says the same kzfaq.info/get/bejne/gN5lkpVksZ-bqmg.html

With the nordic cultures generally tending to provide subtitles rather than dubbing into the original language, she would have had an awful lot more exposure to the English language than just the year spent in Australia.

@@12jnixon But not Australian English. That's rare enough anywhere, letalong Norway, and that almost always means that Swedes and Norwegians who come here never sound Australian, because their accent for English is already formed. Sounding Australian is no mean feat, it's extremely hard to do (possibly harder for native English speakers than for foreigners).

@@tschewm1353 You don't seem to have listened to Luca carefully. Luca just says that you are NOT a native speaker no matter what you do. He doesn't say that you can't sound like one. By the way, French people often take Luca for a native speaker. I saw this myself when I sent a French friend a video of his, and she thought that Luca must have been THE OTHER GUY in the video, and I was like "No it's the guy on the right." and said "I thought he WAS French..."

I've heard someone say the same thing about Italian. But if you can sound native in German as a Russian then if you speak a Slavic language you can sound native in other Germanic languages as well.

True, I only know a very, very few words of French but I really try to "French it up" when I use them. I temporarily fool the native speaker and they are so happy and impressed with my effort that they then rattle off a whole paragraph in French and I go, "You what, mate?" 😂😂😂

Salut ce mai faci

Steve Kaufmann - lingosteve ,hello sir,I'm doing fine ,thank you,,,tocmai am urmarit emisiunea dumneavoastra despre accent,,,

D'accord

I agree with you. I am huge fan of Steve and what he has accomplished. The language he speaks and how fluent he speaks it. But to say you will never reach native level is unrealistic. Just because someone is not able to do something does mean it is impossible. There are a lot of videoes of youtube of people who have been able to reach native American fluency in English despite starting after the age of fifteen, to the degree that even American's are not able to tell there are not natives. Check out this video kzfaq.info/get/bejne/oamldcqCzNfJqXU.html On a second the human brain is amazing. If you believe you cannot do something then your brain is going to believe it. Steve is able to speak and learn all those languages because he believes he can. If he did not I think he would not be to speak all those languages he can. So, I wonder why Steve has decided to believe he cannot reach native level and by doing so it has limited him and therefore will never be able to. To speak like a native requires time and a lot practising, repeating, shadowing, pronunciation practicing, drilling, etc. A lot of people do not practice up to that level and so will never reach level.

C2 is completely fluent. It doesn't mean that you sound just like a native.

His mother was French. His father is Russian. He was born in France. He started learning Russisan, as he was 15. I think, he sounds French like native. Because of his French mother. I think, a person, living in US since 3 months of age, must speak English without any accent. Look into Wiki. Родители официально не состояли в браке до пятилетнего возраста Владимира Познера. Мать увезла трёхмесячного Владимира в США[7]. К тому времени в США жили её мать и сестра, а также близкие друзья. Вскоре Жеральдин устроилась работать монтажёром во французском отделении кинокомпании Paramount Pictures[7]. Через 5 лет, в 1939 году, Владимир Александрович Познер, который в это время работал в европейском филиале кинокомпании «Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer», забрал Жеральдин с сыном из США, и семья вернулась во Францию. Pozner lives in Russia since he was 18. В 1952 году семья переехала в СССР. 66 years of living is Moscow is quite a period of time to speak Russian without any accent.

Барсик М Barsik, that depends on which language you want to learn. I assume Russian is your native language. I am currently learning your native language once again. I have given up many times. There are sounds that are extremely hard to pronounce. There are sounds that my ears 👂 can’t even tell them apart. There are languages with few sounds like Spanish, Japanese, Italian. The Russian language has a bunch of consonants. Words like нет, молоко или хлеб,да мой друг are easy to pronounce and remember.

@@Theyoutuberpolyglot It's true my native lang is Russian. What sounds are you having hard time to distinguish and pronounce? I'm curious because Russian phonetics are way more easier than English. For any foreign language you should reserve at least 20 years to spend for to achieve true level of "nativeness" if you are not a talented person. I don't think there are easy languages in terms of deep knowledge.

Барсик М my native language is Portuguese from Portugal 🇵🇹. They are sounds that are easy to pronounce, but it’s a mess when I see three consonants together. The perfective and imperfective verbs are a nightmare, but interesting 🤔 at the same time. Считать почитать. The good thing is ,Russian people are willing to help foreigners to learn their native language.

For example, for me, it's extremely hard to pronounce this word занимаются

@@Theyoutuberpolyglot Hi there. Just like in English if there is a three(or more) consonant cluster in Russian some letters are pronounced very short others can stretch others can be pronounced with a small added vowel sound others can be silent. It's all maid to ease the pronunciation. For example Здравствуйте sounds similar to Здрраастуйте. The joking word Вбзднуть sounds like ВВыбызднуть. I never had a problem with a perfective or imperfective verbs. It's like Perfect Tense in English but more precise and better. For example In English phrase "I lost the key" it's kinda uncertain whether I Have lost the key or I lost the key several times in last year. In Russian in first case you use the perfective verb in second the imperfective one. If you are interested in (or more important) process itself you use imperfective form if you are interested more in result than you use perfective one. All this is no biggie. You should gobble up this simple base quickly and go over to the real essential stuff where the real beauty(and of course complexity)of Russian language begins. It's when you are starting putting two words together. Many many many word cannot be put together just like in English. You should pick up a specific verb to a certain noun and put it all in a proper case simultaneously watching very carefully for the general sense of the sentence because the meaning of the words are very precise. Half of our native population can't speak(put aside write) properly on a good level of language which is called "literature language". Foreigners make dreadful mistakes. I saw foreigners which had been studying Russian for 5 years and more and made a major mistake in each sentence they spoke. Remember one person,In 5 minute of his speech he did not say a one sentence properly. And I don't know it's awful or amazing :)

Great comment! Much better than sounding like a native is telling something interesting (regardless how you sound). Time is not limitless for us, so it's sensible to use it properly.

But this is irrelevant if your goal is pure language proficiency.

@@DominikLuger My point is that it's a foolish goal. And for 99% of adult learners an impossible one.

@@JBfan88 How is learning a skill to a high level a foolish goal? Is practicing sports to be in the Olympics or learning an instrument to become a virtuoso also foolish? And proficiency is definitely not an impossible goal for 99% of adult learners.

@@DominikLuger 'proficiency' and 'native-level' are not remotely the same. Not even close. Ghandi was proficient in English. Thich Nhat Hanh is proficient in English. Neither sounded like a native. If you start playing a sport as an adult without experience and make it your goal to play professionally there's a 99.9% chance you will fail. No matter how hard you practice, you'll never play in the Premier League, NFL, WTP etc.

Not true at all

I don't see it as such a big problem. People see my name and ask me if I am German (which I'm not). If I see an Asian looking person at home, especially if they have a slight accent, I ask if they speak any Asian languages. I just like to speak one of my Asian languages. I agree, though, that our appearance, or family name, or DNA has nothing to do with our cultural identification.

Maybe. Some people's accent is too thick and they should try to reduce it. On the other hand, there are people that are fooling themselves into thinking they are going to sound 100% native when they never will. No one can sound like a native who didn't hear the language as a child. I wish someone could prove me wrong, but it seems, I am right. I'm a short woman. It would be foolish of me to think I'll be an NBA star. Thats's impossible, so a very foolish goal. It would be better if I tried to play as well as I could at my level, and I was satisfied with that.

jvu2ilj26 key word is “almost”, as a Canadian native i can hear his accent, still great though.

I am quite on the other side of what Steve is saying here, in other words, I'm on YOUR side... but PewdiePie doesn't sound like a native or near it. He has that classic vageuly European lilt... it isn't "classic Swedish" (there aren't actually many who have that classic Swedish accent) but he just doesn't sound American, and even if he did... his grammar gives him away. He makes a very common Swedish error of not conjugating properly when there is a relatively pronoun or any complicating factor to the sentence, e.g. "The people who is saying this stuff..." or "The people playing this game tends to be..." and then a bunch of little preposition things too.

The question is: why should it even be a goal?

@@JBfan88 Integration.

Could you please explain