FLAWLESS MEANING SPANISH HOW TO

With Spanish spoken in so many different countries, there are a whole range of different accents, sounds and local variations between them. Where then to start on your journey to improving your accent in Spanish? If you’re really committed to this goal, my personal view is that you should start by choosing one sort of Spanish, from a given region or country, as the version that you will largely focus on imitating – at least in the first instance. Your accent, on the other hand, is immediately noticeable to everyone. While you may be rightly proud to pull off a perfectly executed phrase in the pluscuamperfecto del subjuntivo, the chances are that your local friend won’t even realise the complicated grammatical gymnastics involved in such a feat. This isn’t solely down to improvements in my accent, but I’ve no doubt that this has played a very real part in helping me develop rapport with Spanish speakers more easily.Īnd in these situations I’ve found that native speakers are much more easily impressed by a foreigner with a reasonable accent, than by one with absolutely flawless Spanish grammar. Throughout the years, and as I’ve gradually improved, I’ve noticed that new people I meet are now far more willing to give me the time of day and spend at least a few minutes chatting, than they were when I first started out. Native speakers are more impressed by a reasonable accent than by flawless grammar. After many years living in Spanish-speaking countries, I’ve gradually been able to eradicate the rougher edges of my own British accent and speak the language which isn’t immediately identifiable as non-native. People naturally gravitate towards others that sound like them, he says, meaning a native speaker will be much more likely to talk to you, get on with you and form a friendship with you, if your way of speaking resembles their own.

FLAWLESS MEANING SPANISH HOW TO

Idahosa Ness, who coaches people on how to improve their Spanish pronunciation, believes that accent is one of the most important things to master if you want to connect with others when speaking Spanish. The benefits of a good accentĪvoiding misunderstandings and humiliations is not the only reason it’s important to develop a reasonable accent when speaking Spanish. There are a whole bunch of techniques we can use to improve the sound of our Spanish, and to begin to imitate that pleasant sing-songy tone of the real thing. We’re not condemned to forever destroy the accent, mind.

I distinctly remember, for instance, mispronouncing the word “ jaqueca” (“headache/migraine”) so spectacularly that my, usually very serious, Spanish teacher had to interrupt our group class for a good three minutes while she ended herself laughing. Sometimes we mess up the pronunciation so badly that native speakers can’t even understand what we’re saying on other occasions we just sound a little odd. We butcher the accent and destroy what was once a quite beautiful tongue.

When Spanish words are pronounced by a native speaker – be they from Argentina, Colombia, Spain, or elsewhere – the language has a certain musicality that gives it a real charm.īut, as foreigners, our efforts to replicate these sounds are often nothing short of a complete disaster.

Flawless meaning spanish