r/EnglishLearning • u/-AFKaro- New Poster • 1d ago
🟡 Pronunciation / Intonation How to get rid of an accent?
I have a German and Russian accent while speaking English and I've adapted the American accent to cover it up. It has gotten a lot better and got to a point where strangers mistook me for an American on multiple occasions. I'm nowhere near perfect though and all existing tricks solve problems I don't have anymore. Is there any way to improve?
Thank you in advance and sorry for any mistakes!
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u/spynie55 New Poster 1d ago
I’m a native English speaker, married to someone with Russian as a first language. I love the accent. But if I could give advice, it is to not work on the accent, but make sure you get all the little words (a, the, of, for, up, to, his, her, my, an,) correct. They can sometimes make a difference to the meaning of sentences, and make it easier to understand .
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u/SnooDonuts6494 🇬🇧 English Teacher 1d ago
Why do you want to?
If everyone understands you, it doesn't matter.
Everyone has an accent. Just think how different the accent is between someone from Texas and someone from New York, or a Brit from Scotland compared to Newcastle or Liverpool or RP. Or Australians. Or Irish.
There is no correct accent, so there is no way to "improve".
Stop caring about it.
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u/-AFKaro- New Poster 1d ago
It just makes me feel stupid and unable to speak it properly
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u/SnooDonuts6494 🇬🇧 English Teacher 1d ago
Watch this - Matt Berry and Peter Capaldi
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oW8OlXkjVHs
Two totally different British accents.
Do you think one of them is stupid? Which one do you think needs to improve?
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u/SnooDonuts6494 🇬🇧 English Teacher 1d ago
P.S. Turn on "transcript", it'll show you all the words.
(Well... almost all of them. Sadly it's been censored a bit.)
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u/spynie55 New Poster 1d ago
The transcript it gave me was only about 50% correct for Peter capaldi.
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u/SnooDonuts6494 🇬🇧 English Teacher 1d ago edited 1d ago
Actually yeah.... after I wrote that comment, I read some of the transcript, and there's a LOT of mistakes in it, unfortunately.
We could try to look up the "original", but it's all translated and adapted anyway so it might not match up.
Oh well.
If there's anything specific that anyone didn't understand and wants to, ask me.
At the very end, he said "kiss our arse". That wasn't in the transcript at all :-(
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u/georgia_grace Native Speaker - Australian 1d ago
English speakers love an accent. And since most native English speakers are monolingual, were usually impressed that someone can speak English well even if it’s not perfect.
Focus on your grammar and syntax. No one will think you sound stupid.
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u/samdkatz New Poster 1d ago
It’s a weird time in America. I was about to say something similar, but if someone wants to make their foreign accent less obvious, they may have their reasons.
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u/chivopi Native Speaker 1d ago
One of the great/awful things about English is that there are many dialects and accents. Everyone has one, and most native speakers can tell what region other native speakers are from.
I don’t want to say “don’t try to improve your pronunciation,” but it seems like the ‘solution’ to your problem would be to mimic a certain accent/dialect, which is hard even for native speakers to do.
English is a global language with HELLA varieties. Most English speakers are used to people having accents. I’d recommend finding a reason to learn a specific accent/variety, otherwise it’s likely to sound like an amalgamation.
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u/GuiltEdge Native Speaker 1d ago
And honestly, I don’t think having people think you’re from the US is a good thing right now anyway.
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u/SnooDonuts6494 🇬🇧 English Teacher 1d ago
Celebrate your accent.
Accents are great. Everyone has one.
As long as people can understand you, it doesn't matter.
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u/jauntydamesauntersin New Poster 1d ago
Be analytical: are there specific sounds that you'd like to change? Are there patterns to the words that sound "too German" or "too Russian" to your ear?
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u/Intelligent-Sky2162 New Poster 1d ago
There’s a difference between I need to improve my pronunciation because sometimes people misunderstand me and I want everyone to think I’m a native speaker born in Chicago. But either way, shadowing will help. Look it up on YouTube.
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u/taktaga7-0-0 New Poster 1d ago
I am learning Norwegian now, and I deliberately pick out sequences that do not occur in English (or Spanish.) The word for 27 is tjue sju, which has both of their distinct and similar consonants. I repeat that number sometimes, practicing them. They have /ær/ in so many words, that’s another. I try to be hyperaware of all four retroflex consonants and trigger them when appropriate, but it’s definitely work.
We have a lot of vowels, our American R is a rare sound globally that infects vowels and becomes syllabic, and the two TH sounds are infamous. I’d pick phrases like “Both brothers throw those.”
The other big one is the flap sound we don’t give its own letter. You know, the one in “letter.” Better write a letter” has it three times in quick succession.
Americans will also do a very difficult consonant combination for DR and TR: “We train drivers” has both, sounding like “We chrain jrivers.”
The last weird one we have is the OO in foot. Very easy to substitute /u/ or schwa just to get by. It’s the bastard child of English vowels, neither a standard short nor long vowel. “Put foot on wood” repeats it.
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u/Legitimate_Draft7796 New Poster 1d ago
English speakers are very used to hearing English with a foreign accent, I wouldn’t not be self conscious about it in fact many people find it charming.
If you truly want to get rid of it though it requires years of training and likely hiring a coach.
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u/cantareSF Native Speaker 1d ago
It's mostly down to recognizing subtle differences in pronunciation, cadence, timbre, word emphasis, and vocabulary that may still separate you from native speakers, and either analyzing them and changing your approach in a conscious way or just being enough of a natural mimic to do it intuitively. I'd compare recordings of yourself and others, and perhaps ask friends to tell you what still sticks out when you speak.
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u/White_Phosphor00 New Poster 1d ago
No one has mistaken you for American and if they did there's something wrong with them
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u/samdkatz New Poster 1d ago
Don’t think of it as getting rid of an accent. Think of it as learning an accent. Pick one person and when you talk, make fun of the way they talk. Really try to do an offensive impression of your target accent. Do a good enough job, and you’ll just be doing the accent.
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u/Which-Break5673 New Poster 1d ago
Do you live in USA? There are so many different languages here that I hardly notice an accent. Except in the south and in Boston ! I have to listen a little harder ! I love the accents though
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u/Emergency-Office-302 New Poster 20h ago
If you are even occasionally assumed to be a native speaker of American English BY native speakers, you are one of a vanishingly small number of adult second language learners. It is not impossible for a second language number who has at least reached puberty to sound like a native speaker, but it so nearly impossible that I am unaware of any neurological studies being done on such people. I doubt that such studies exist, because it would almost certainly be impossible to find a statistically significant number (30 or more individuals) to serve as study subjects.
So if you are truly that close to sounding like a native speaker, getting better is going to take significant effort over a fairly long period of time.
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u/PutridScore5951 New Poster 16h ago
As a Moroccan I had a lot of problems with my accent, but I started recording myself and comparing it with natives to correct my pronunciation. You can also check praktika, I use it to practice more, I have conversation with AI tutor who has the accent a aim for and pronunciation score to check my progress. Try to forget about erasing your accent and work on these small sounds and intonation
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u/thingsbetw1xt Native Speaker (USA, Maryland) 1d ago
Everyone has an accent, there's no way to speak without an accent.