On 20/12/08 18:43, in article 494D2ECB.57E99546@yahoo.co.uk, "Bill Bonde {
No matter what happens, it's caused by global warming )"
wrote:
> I know you can tell the difference between a British and a General
> American accent when someone is speaking English. The question is
> when they are speaking some other language.
`
Often yes. It depends on their language training and age of learning
the language. Our daughter who started French in French schools at
5 spoke like the rest of the French kids. She kept her Parisians
accent up until now even though she lives in the US. Her first
job after her MBA was as an auditor for French companies bought
out an American concern. With each audit the employees were suspicious
of this American woman coming in to audit THEM, but on hearing her
accent they got fooled that she was actually of "US". That illusion
was always destroyed when she turned in her audit.
I always listen to Americans interviewed professionally on French
TV news. A great many of them obviously had learned their
French by living in France in their early lives. These
speakers are nearly free of any discernable accent due
specifically to have English (whatever English) as a mother
tongue.
I have read that learning a language before the age of 10 is
done through neuron elimination and retention of those which are involved
with the language, individuals in this class will learn
the language accent free. As an adult, one is creating neuron
networks from existing neurons, and that will not be accent
free. I have never met an adult who learned English after the
age of 20 who did not have an accent from their mother tongue.
Around 18 is the border line.
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