Hi everyone,

Why is it when some learners (English speakers) who are learning a foreign language they don't bother to pick up the accent? I was doing French lessons on Thursday and I think I was the only one who had an accent (and the tutor obviously), as I have studied French for five years and most of the class had studied French for three or five years too, I'm not trying to drag anyone but I'm just wondering why is this? Is it because it's too hard or they just don't like the language.

Isn't it hard for some people to pick up the accent?

A bit of both. It's really really hard to sound like a native. You can try your best, but you'll still sound off. Once you get to fluency though, it's not really that big a deal. Unless you truly sound terrible.

Native English speakers are generally lazy when it comes to foreign languages, unless they were raised multilingual. Not all of course, but most are. Accents can be heard though.

Even after studying a language for five/ten years and not picking up the accent, that baffles me, I know that people will find it hard to pick up the accent but they will be able to pick up the accent after a certain period of time, shouldn't they?.

It's a talent kinda like singing. Some people are better at immitating the accent like some singers are better at hitting notes

You know, when learning a language it's actually extremely important to 'imitate' the accent of the native speakers. It's even better do exaggerate in the beginning.

I think people don't want to seem too try hard or silly. Especially with a language like French where the accent is really something different. (though I don't understand how someone can speak french without the accent )

Because it's hard. I've been studying English for 5 years now, and I still have that awful French accent that I can't lose.

It depends on how you are taught.

you should look into some studies done on second language acquisition
the general consensus is that learning a second language as an adult will probably never lead to a 100% native fluency. for most people that know two or more languages, speaking the second one is done via parts of the brain that differ from the parts they use to speak their native language, unless the second language was acquired in someone's first few years, basically

I know that it's hard to learn a foreign language as an adult, I couldn't even get my head around Mandarin Chinese but I'm shocked that I passed my HSK 1 exam

Why would you fake an accent lmao

There are a ton if interesting articles on language acquisition and you should look them up -- very interesting stuff.

As for accents, there was a study done that shows how many people just honestly don't notice they they are speaking without accents. There are also studies, however, which showed that foreigners sometimes understand the "Americanized" pronunciation of their language more than when an accent is attempted (whether it be due to a bad attempt at an accent, or just because it sounds just a little bit wrong, and confuses the **** out of people.)

There is also a significant link between accent skills and individuals who had a musical influenced childhood. People who learn to play instruments, sing (basically things with pitch) tend to acquire languages significantly faster, and with more fluency.

Some people are just less exposed to other accents and if it's the first time they learn a foreign language you can't expect them to master the accent immediately. It's not exclusive to Americans.

Also, in college and high school in the US, foreign language classes are mandatory which means people don't care about learning and just want to pass/get a good grade.

I agree. I'm french but I have an american accent when I speak english because I had the same teacher for 3 years and she had an american accent so now I speak like her. + I watch a lot of US TV shows, I guess it's because of that too.

To develop the accent you have to learn the language at a young age and have to be in that country speaking the language.

If you don't you have a very low chance of never picking up the accent naturally (though it's always possible).

So that speakers of other languages understand you?

Read Qbuilderz's post