Nena
How can I get rid of my Chinese accent, when I speak English or German? Have you any good idea?
Sep 8, 2010 4:42 AM
Answers · 13
3
Well, Chinese accents are sometimes sexy, so don't worry about it. How to get rid of it? Practice.
September 8, 2010
Unless you live in a country for a long time, you will always retain your own accent. I know Americans who have lived here for 20 years, but they still have their American accent.
September 8, 2010
Well try to listen/watch some recordings & videos and try to repeat the German words as good as possible. Or try to spell the single letters properly. That might help to accent to get bit less visible. Well still it's hard to make it dissappear completely. No need to get rid of the accent though, Chinese accent is kinda cute.
September 15, 2010
First, I found out that you have posed your question in the German way (Have you any good idea? :). The correct English way should be: "Do you have any good idea?". In my personal point of view, one can minimize his/her native accent through a long time of conversational practice with the people around who are native in that spoken language, but to completely eliminate it would be very difficult, unless you were born and raised in that particular environment. As for my case, I studied the bachelor and master degrees in Canada, and so, when I speak English in a normal pace, this is in Canadian accent. However, I well know myself that when I speak fast or when I need to switch between languages, people would probably hear my original accent (Cantonese). Regarding my German, when I worked in the South-East region (Sachsen) of Germany during a year of time, I had to speak in German in almost all occasions (Nobody could ever imagine that even a doctor there does not speak English at all!!). However, whenever I spoke to someone who is bilingual or multilingual with English, they usually asked me: "Why do you have a heavy (Canadian/American) English accent?" So, what can I say? It just happens to be. :) The same thing happens for my Mandarin, especially when we (my wife and I) visit my mother-in-law in Taiwan: wherever I go, people would ask me from where I am exactly, because they feel that my Mandarin does not sound like the local people (because there exists a certain level of Cantonese accent), even though I well know that I speak fluent Mandarin in general (except when I swear, then I usually say it in Cantonese :). In conclusion, as long as you are able to minimize the original Chinese accent into an acceptable level, then things would be fine. --- Good day. / 祝 是日安好。 / Schönen Tag.
September 14, 2010
You probably can't!
September 8, 2010
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