Spain's Human Towers

[pjt33]

Originally Posted by JPablo

That's right. Did you watch the video Perikles posted at the beginning of this thread?
(I "love" the "English" /Catalonian accent of the people been interviewed... probably I laugh at them not listening to my own "Southern California twist, with Machego cheese Castilian..." (you know the Biblical saying, right? to the effect of "seeing the mote in one’s neighbor’s eye and not the beam in one’s own"...)

No vi el vídeo ayer, pero acabo de verlo.

Y en cuanto a los acentos... Varias personas en México me dijeron que "No tienes acento", así que ¡deben de tener una idea disparatada de cómo suenan los españoles!

[JPablo]

Bueno, yo no te he oído, pero si hablas como lo hacen en Valencia y no te comes las "erres" ni las "eres" a lo mejor no van desencaminados. (Por los posts que vas poniendo veo que tienes un dominio del español muy bueno, por lo que no me sorprende que los de México digan que no tienen acento... aunque claro, sin oírte, todo son conjeturas...)

[pjt33]

Pues a mis propios oídos sigo sonando demasiado inglés. Pero, bueno, perder todos los rasgos del acento extranjero "típico" de los hablantes de tu lengua materna ya sé que no se hace en tan sólo diez años...

[JPablo]

Claro, como yo, que llevo 20 años en California... y sigo teniendo mi acento español... ya lo decía mi abuela: "Genio y figura... hasta la sepultura..."

[AngelicaDeAlquezar]

@Pjt: Estoy de acuerdo con Pablo. Aunque puedas tener un cierto acento extranjero (que no siempre se pierde por completo), seguramente está muy por "encima" del estereotipo de las erres suaves y las vocales con diptongo.

[CrOtALiTo]

Really I'm stuck with this thread, because casually I have a uncle outside from Mexico and well he has around of twenty four years outside from Mexico and he's living in U.S.A in essence when I have spook with him, he can't speak well the Spanish, because I guess he has forgot the tone or the speak ways, really I don't know if one person or not loss the form speaks when is far way of his country for a long time.

For that reason I lift me stuck with this thread.

[JPablo]

Crotalito, I believe it depends on each person. I have been 21 years in Southern California... when I go back to Barcelona and speak Catalonian with people at the street or at a shop or store, nobody can recognize any "American accent at all". Same with Spanish. (There is a lady at the Spanish Consulate, LA, who despite living here for ages, she has such a thick Madrid accent, that it seems like she arrived yesterday on an Iberia flight...)

On the other hand, a friend was commenting to me how one politician went to the US to meet with the president and came back a week later talking Spanish with an American accent...

So... It is not good to generalize. But it is good to be aware.
Cheers.

[Perikles]

How come you understood what he said when I didn't?

[JPablo]

I know, it is spooky sometimes how I am able to understand Crotalito... but I attribute it to my Harry Potter's abilities to speak the language of the snakes (don't forget "crotalito" is "little rattlesnake").

It is called clairvoyance, or telekinesis... or telepathy... well, something very magical, you know.

On the other hand, jokingly now, I'd say that (with no offense intended to Crotalito at all) I believe that Jorge uses Spanish grammar to build his English sentences, and even if not orthodox by any standards, I believe I can get what he means, just by the nature of his construction and word choice (i.e., a bit of false-friend type of thing.)

But this, of course, is just joking, the actual reason, is the first one I gave you, the "para-normal" phenomena that I am actually still trying to master fully...

Other than that, in an old cassette I heard 10 or 15 years ago, on "American Training Accent" they said something like, "if you want to get the correct American accent, try to speak your own language imitating the way Americans speak it, and then go back to your English... and you American friends will be amazed on how understandable you are now...) Well, there are tricks of the trade that work here and there... besides the extra/supernatural powers... of course.

[vita32]

Originally Posted by CrOtALiTo

Really I'm stuck with this thread, because casually I have a uncle outside from Mexico and well he has around of twenty four years outside from Mexico and he's living in U.S.A in essence when I have spook with him, he can't speak well the Spanish, because I guess he has forgot the tone or the speak ways, really I don't know if one person or not loss the form speaks when is far way of his country for a long time.

For that reason I lift me stuck with this thread.

Originally Posted by JPablo

Crotalito, I believe it depends on each person. I have been 21 years in Southern California... when I go back to Barcelona and speak Catalonian with people at the street or at a shop or store, nobody can recognize any "American accent at all". Same with Spanish. (There is a lady at the Spanish Consulate, LA, who despite living here for ages, she has such a thick Madrid accent, that it seems like she arrived yesterday on an Iberia flight...)

On the other hand, a friend was commenting to me how one politician went to the US to meet with the president and came back a week later talking Spanish with an American accent...

So... It is not good to generalize. But it is good to be aware.
Cheers.

The saying, "If you don't use it, you lose it", is somewhat true also in language, at least for some people, including myself. Not having been able to use my native language on a daily basis, I tend to forget some of the words and it takes some time to recall these words when I'm actually speaking to my native country folks; and they told me "you sound funny", I said great! I sound funny in America too! So now I know that I have a funny accent in whatever language I speak

[CrOtALiTo]

Originally Posted by JPablo

Crotalito, I believe it depends on each person. I have been 21 years in Southern California... when I go back to Barcelona and speak Catalonian with people at the street or at a shop or store, nobody can recognize any "American accent at all". Same with Spanish. (There is a lady at the Spanish Consulate, LA, who despite living here for ages, she has such a thick Madrid accent, that it seems like she arrived yesterday on an Iberia flight...)

On the other hand, a friend was commenting to me how one politician went to the US to meet with the president and came back a week later talking Spanish with an American accent...

So... It is not good to generalize. But it is good to be aware.
Cheers.

Yes I guess you right, because no ones have the same capacity to speak in the same form, I mean, if you are telling me that you are living in South California for more than five years ago and you haven't any change in your accent or speaking way, then in essence it can be different for other person, it's curios, never I have been before in other country, at least I haven't the change to move me of this place until now, therefore I can't say anything about, only I commented about my uncle, how he speaks some strange his Spanish sometimes, because either I see him, but I have spoke for telephone with him, a couple times and I have noted his speaks way in three times, he tend to speaks very funny, because he casually forgets the words in Spanish and he end to telling me the word in English and when he tries to remind the word, he gets a different tones seems to an American native from United States.

I don't know if the time has much importance in this story, but at least I can be sure he has a different tone when we are speaking between themselves.

Sincerely yours.

[JPablo]

I understand what you say. More than "time" the key factor is "awareness" and "practice". Today I was talking to a Mexican friend, after listening to a short program in Catalonian, and he told me "Oye, me estás hablando con acento catalán"... I was not aware of it until he pointed it out... and I said, "Hah, I was just listening to a Catalonian program..."

The important thing is to be aware and then you can control it... (somehow!)