Re: USAGE: pronunciation mimicry (was: rhotics)

On Fri, 5 Nov 2004 06:53:49 -0800, B. Garcia <madyaas@...> wrote:

>On Thu, 4 Nov 2004 22:16:16 -0500, Sally Caves <scaves@...> wrote:
>
>> Oh, but it's not totally acquired!  Of the gifts of foreign language
>> learning, I count a good mimicry of the sounds the easiest.  There is all
>> the rest, of course.
The mimicry of sounds is one thing, but another thing is the accent of your
native language. I think that most people once they're about ten or twelve
years old won't ever get rid of their native languge's accent for the rest
of their lives. They may learn other languges perfectly, but native speakers
will still notice that they're foreigners.

Only very few people have the remarkable gift of being able to speak a
foreign language so well that nobody notices they're foreigners. The person
I was talking about seemingly had that gift.

>Sort of like a very slight Mexican accent to those
>who learned English as a second language who emigrated from Mexico,
>but speak otherwise impeccable English.
That's what I'm talking about. I'm also thinking of Apu Nahasapeemapetilon
of the Kwik-E-Mart or of Rainier Wolfcastle (the first time I heard Arnold
Schwarzenegger I was surprised he talked exactly like him!).

gry@s:
j. 'mach' wust