How can I improve my pronunciation?
Hi, I wanna ask some question written above. I'm Japanese, not a native speaker of English, and I know my Japanese accent is too hard to get rid of. Do you know someone who comes from a non-English-speaking country but can speak English as well as native? Why do you think we cannot get rid of our strong accents? It's more than 10 years since I started to learn English but I still speak terrible and I'm even afraid of talking in front of someone else. Why does everyone of native speakers of English require us to speak without any accents? Why can't you understand even I pronounce 99% correctly but have 1% mistake? Is it a problem of our physical difference that every Japanese has, or what? Why are we so weak when talking in English?

Any solution for one of those problems? I'm so frustrated because everything I do for leaning English turns out to be nothing after all…

Question

How can I improve my pronunciation?
Hi, I wanna ask some question written above. I'm Japanese, not a native speaker of English, and I know my Japanese accent is too hard to get rid of. Do you know someone who comes from a non-English-speaking country but can speak English as well as native? Why do you think we cannot get rid of our strong accents? It's more than 10 years since I started to learn English but I still speak terrible and I'm even afraid of talking in front of someone else. Why does everyone of native speakers of English require us to speak without any accents? Why can't you understand even I pronounce 99% correctly but have 1% mistake? Is it a problem of our physical difference that every Japanese has, or what? Why are we so weak when talking in English?

Any solution for one of those problems? I'm so frustrated because everything I do for leaning English turns out to be nothing after all…

Answer

Hi Hinaggik!

I think that accents are a little difficult to get rid of, but the only way that I know to help is to practice speaking with a native speaker constantly. The more you speak and practice speaking, having someone correct your pronunciation, it will get better.

As for us native English speakers, we do not "require" anyone to speak English fluently, we understand and are patient with English learners. We will definitely try our best to help when we can. Also, if you get 99% correct and only have 1% mistake, then that is great! That is definitely not bad.

Just to restate my point, to help with your accent, practice speaking with a native speaker and getting corrections on pronunciation are definitely the best way!

Answer

You can certainly talk natively with some effort and, as Saul has already said, we will try to understand you even if the pronunciation is not shiny-perfect. :)

The main thing here is, I really don't know what you sound like.  If you think it's a good idea to record yourself speaking for about half a minute or less and post a link here for feedback, you could use Soundcloud, Vocaroo or Youtube.

Even native speakers can fall into poor speaking habits (like, y'know...), so taking a cold hard look at what you really sound like is necessary if you want to improve. I do see students talk and talk, repeat the same mistakes and bad habits, and wonder why there's no improvement... walking in circles, really.

Seeing "wanna" in your writing makes me wonder if that's another red flag...

Answers · 4

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