Not bad for someone who hasn’t been speaking with a native American or British English speaker on more than a few occasions in the entire lifetime, isn’t it?
The point of this article, however, isn’t to brag about my achievements in terms of native-like accent acquisition.
Today I’m going to talk about the simple fact that if you aspire to learn either American or British – or any other accent for that matter! – you simply have to SPEAK AN AWFUL LOT
A long time ago, in WHAT FELT LIKE another lifetime, I started my 50 American Phrase acquisition mission and I haven’t stopped doing it ever since!
Well, in reality I started the mission on April 30, if I’m not mistaken, and it’s only been 3 weeks into the mission. It does, however, feel like it’s already lasted for years – that’s how quickly something becomes your routine!
You do it for a day – it’s something new and exciting!
You do it for a few days – still fun but it becomes a bit of a drag.
You do it for a week – you wish you’d never started it in the first place!
You do it for a couple weeks – YOU JUST DO IT!
Yes, my friends, now I’m doing my daily American phrase videos out of habit. I just do it because I have to do it and that’s the only way to force yourself to achieve things that might seem a bit overwhelming at some stage.
Tonight I’m doing the 36th phrase in my 50 American Phrase Acquisition Mission, and the phrase in question is: TO GET PAST THE FACT THAT – followed by whatever the context demands.
Some foreign English speakers living abroad, for example, always find it hard to GET PAST THE FACT THAT their English isn’t as fluent as that of native English speakers, and it’s a massive impediment for their professional and social life.
All people aren’t the same, however, and many of our fellow foreigners don’t care too much about how they sound, and eventually they end up improving their fluency naturally – by a way of speaking all the time – and their lack of concern for how they sound is what helps them improve their fluency!
As you may know, I’m big into reading English fiction, and a while back I was truly fascinated by heroic fantasy which is a sub-genre of fantasy fiction focusing on questions surrounding people’s moral values in times of hardship and despair.
The main character would typically be a person of high moral values – just, determined and fearless, and on many occasions they would choose to GO OUT IN A BLAZE OF GLORY when faced with an option between backing down or fighting till the very end.
This phrase – to GO OUT IN A BLAZE OF GLORY – isn’t only relevant to English fiction lovers, though.
Hello my fellow foreign English speakers who aspire to speak with a native-like American accent!
In this video you can watch me TRY AND SPEAK with the General American Pronunciation, and while I’m not perfect at it yet, I’m quite hopeful that at some point down the line I’ll be capable of sounding just like an American hailing form Midwest.
Also, in this video you can witness me using a peculiar grammar construct which came to my attention while I was reading one of the GONE series books, namely – TRY followed by AND and then followed by another verb instead of TRY followed by the verb in infinitive.
Let’s say, for example, you want to convey the following message: “People working in a team should do their best to make sure responsibility is shared equally among all team members.”
Does it happen to you often that you DRAW A BLANK when you’re asked a question?
And does it also happen that you find it hard to remember something specific and in the end you just DRAW A BLANK instead of being able to recall the date, the name or the location you were trying to remember?
Well, if that’s the case, then I have two things to tell you.
First of all, you have a pretty bad memory!
Secondly, the American English idiom TO DRAW A BLANK is very relevant for your particular situation for the simple reason thatyou often find it hard to remember things, and that’s what this idiom means!
In order to sound a little bit more native-like when speaking in English with others, you may want to use such and similar idiomatic expressions, and you can use this one – TO DRAW A BLANK – in following situations:
When some family member of yours walks into the living room, do they often see you zoned out on the couch HOGGING THE REMOTE?
Are you reluctant to give up a space in your favorite spot at the dinner table to anyone else for the simple reason thatHOGGING THE MAIN SEAT at the long dinner table is almost your birthright?
Or maybe you’re always busting on your friends for trying to get the best spot in your company dining room because you believe that HOGGING THE TABLE at the window is only something you’re entitled to do?
If all the above mentioned characterizes you as a person, there’s quite a good chance that you have a habit of HOGGING many other things and the list isn’t limited just to items you can sit down on…
It’s another Saturday night, and most people are enjoying themselves in bars, restaurants, night-clubs or simply watching some TV program, but FOR ALL I KNOW, IT MIGHT WELL BE just a way of killing time if you haven’t got anything better to do!
I, on the other hand, have loads to do in terms of running my blogs and recording YouTube videos, and after all – I can’t relax for another 2 weeks before the 50 American Phrase Acquisition Mission is complete!
Tonight I’m on phrase #22 in this mission, but FOR ALL I KNOW, IT MIGHT WELL BE my thousandth phrase I’ve learned while recording my YouTube videos for the English Harmony Blog and this blog.
You see, I strongly believe – and it’s all backed up by my English fluency development! – that my regular spoken English practice sessions are largely responsible for new phraseology acquisition, and here’s how it happens:
