Can you Speak English like a Native and... SHOULD YOU?

Oh yeah! What's up everybody? I'm Ollie!  Your RealLife English fluency coach.

So, this lesson is about why you don’t need  to speak like a native to be a confident,  

fluent English speaker.

But, before we get into that,  

ask yourself this very important question:  “Is it even possible to speak LIKE a native?”

Well, in my humble opinion, yes you  can get to a level that’s pretty close  

to that of a native speaker, but it  requires a lot of hard work and dedication!

So, it’s largely dependent on whether or not  you can or want to put in that work. But,  

let’s not get ahead of ourselves.  We’ll cover that in a little bit.  

This lesson is pretty straight-forward  and it has two sections:

First I’ll answer the question (in  more detail than what I just did)  

“Is it possible to speak like a native?” And then I will tell you why it is okay  

if you DON’T sound like a native or if  you don’t WANT to sound like a native.

So, this lesson is for you if you…

But before we start, we help you understand  fast speech, be understood by anyone and  

connect to this beautiful world that  we live in. We help people like Nan,  

and Nan says that our channel does more than teach  English. It helps you develop the right mindset to  

continue to improve your English. So join Nan and  over 200 000 learners from all around the world by  

hitting that subscribe button and the bell down  below, so you don't miss any of our new lessons.

Is it possible to speak like a native? For me there are 3 factors that determine  

whether or not you can achieve a proficiency  level that’s just like a native English speaker. 

But, what is a native English speaker? You might be asking yourselves. Well, I'm a  

native english speaker, Ethan is a native English  speaker, Andrea is a native English speaker.

We all come from different countries  so there’s always the idea that: okay,  

you want to sound like a native speaker,  but a native speaker from where? Anyway,

these 3 factors are: Exposure, dedication, age.

Age? What do you mean? People say that you can  learn anything no matter what age you are?! 

That’s true, but let’s consider  that in relation to the other  

2 factors at play. We’re going to use this  diagram here to help illustrate these ideas.

Let’s invent a character. Let’s call him Lucas.  Let’s say Lucas is here at age 0, in other words  

he’s a new-born. And on exposure, let’s put him  at the right-hand end of the spectrum here: he  

lives in an English-speaking country. Here, the  other factor, dedication, is out of the picture.  

We could set him at “none” here and he would  still learn English. He’s going to be a native  

English speaker because he was born in an  English-speaking country. That’s me. I was  

born in Australia. I never made an effort to  learn English I just learned it naturally.

Now that we’ve established that case, let’s  focus on the other hypothetical cases in  

which Lucas is actually a learner  of English as a second language.

Let’s now increase Lucas’ age. He's  9. And he’s just gone from here,  

no exposure, all the way to here,  living in an English-speaking country.  

What this basically means is that Lucas  has moved to an English speaking country.  

He’s still quite young, so even if he doesn’t  make a big effort to learn the language,  

he will probably still be able to learn it  to the level of a native and be bilingual.

That means that he will still have,  practically speaking, native English level.  

And through life, even if he never  moves back to where he was born,  

he will still be a native speaker of his mother  tongue. By definition this is a bilingual speaker.  

Of course, this is still a generalization,  because who knows how many factors could  

be at play in someone’s life, but for  discussion’s sake, we’ll leave it at that.

By the way, the reason why I put 9  here at the middle of the spectrum  

is because this is the age (give  or take, it might be ... 11,  

maybe even 12)... Where it becomes more and  more difficult to acquire a native-like accent.  

It is not impossible though. We have  interviewed Hadar and Anna on our Talk  

Show Beyond Borders with Ethan, where they told  us how they achieved their incredible accents!

Anyway, Let's say now… another character, Zoey.  She started learning English somewhere between  

15 and 22. It doesn’t matter. She doesn’t move nor  has the opportunity to visit an English-speaking  

country. But she tries her best to make up  for that by watching a lot of TV in English,  

reading books, etc. Her dedication is extremely  high. What level can she achieve? She could land  

anywhere along the right-hand end of this line.  C2 is a very advanced English level. You might  

not be a native English speaker, but English  won’t be an impediment for almost anything.

Like Zoey, you can also get exposed to the  English language with our exclusive RealLife  

Native Immersion Course. Over 41 weeks, we will  take you on a journey of the English language.  

You will learn about culture, why and how natives  speak so fast, and lots more. And I want you to  

try it for free today with our three-part power  learning series. To sign up and get started,  

you can click up here and I will also leave  the link down in the description below.

What are you waiting for?

Now, imagine if someone is like Zoey, but instead  of starting to learn English in their early 20s,  

they start when they are 40. And, in my opinion,  

this person wouldn't be at a  disadvantage because they're older.  

You know, I'm talking about this idea that the  older you get the less ability you have to learn  

something. Right? I hate this all the time  and, quite frankly, I don't believe in that.

However, someone at this age, as a full-grown  adult, is going to have a very different life than  

most people in their early 20s. They might have a  job that obviously demands a lot out of them, they  

might have kids to raise, and all sorts of other  responsibilities. So age can have an impact on  

your ability to dedicate yourself to your learning  and to how much exposure you can actually get.

Now, assuming that you're older than 9, which  would be totally safe to assume, right?! Let's  

change the question can you speak like a native  to just "how proficient or fluent can you get  

in English?" The answer is it will depend on  how much exposure and dedication you can have.

Let's move on to the second part of this lesson.

Why you don’t Need to Sound like a Native! So, there’s a reason why I said “sound like  

a native” and not “speak like a native”. The  idea behind “sounding like a native” implies  

modifying your accent so it’s closer to that of a  native from a specific place, while “speaking like  

a native” implies the broader idea of fluency,  and it might not so much be so focused on accent.

We’ll talk more about accent in a second, but  for me what’s most important is the question of  

whether someone's proficiency in a second language  allows them to have the same type of opportunities  

that they would in their native language.  That is, despite it being a second language,  

you've learned it so well that you can excel  in an environment where that English is spoken  

or be in a relatively level playing field among  those who speak it as a first/native language.

Now, when it comes to accent it might  come as no surprise that there are many  

English learners who do want to be  exposed to a "native speaker" accent  

and will make an effort to sound as closely  as possible to a native English speaker.

Some people say that that is a good goal because  if you set a very ambitious goal for yourself  

and you make a big effort to  attain it, even if you don’t,  

you’re going to have a very high level.  The famous quote by Oscar Wilde goes  

“Shoot for the moon. Even if you  miss, you’ll land among the stars”

We recently had the pleasure of speaking to  Hadar Shemesh from Accent's Way English with  

Hadar in our brand-new Talk Show Beyond Borders  with Ethan. She was kind enough to share with us  

her process of achieving an  INCREDIBLE American accent  

and she also talked about how she  had to deal with perfectionism.

I do have the privilege of sounding  

like a native speaker, for the most part. And as a result, you know, 

I do have access to things that people with an accent don't have.  

I do have access to people who don't sound like an American, who don't have a 

standard accent don't have. So I  recognize that. And I think that 

the result like what we see now  is the result of you know, the 

first few years of me dealing with English being perfectionate 

and being a perfectionist. And  recognising that it has changed 

my, the way I speak, but it also  created a lot of insecurities 

because at some point I, you  know, my English level, I 

sounded like a native, but  my English was not an native 

English. So I constantly felt insecure 

again, like an impostor people  are gonna hear those mistakes, 

and they're gonna be like, what?  Uh, we thought that you're a 

native. So I think that that  created a lot of insecurities 

for me. And I have gone through this emotional and mindset 

transformation around my English  and around how I present my 

English, so I'm now left with a  result of the first few years of 

my journey. But I know the  impact that it had and I how I 

could easily fall into that rabbit hole of, you know, 

constantly feeling like I need  to keep on improving my English. 

But I still think that the  internal process is what counts.

You can watch the full interview by clicking  up here or down in the description below.

Other people, however, will say that  “instead of trying to sound like a native,  

why don’t you try to sound like yourself?"

This might connect with a deeper, more  psychological question. We recently had  

Rachel from Rachel’s English as a guest in  our podcast, and this is what she had to say:

You know, I don't, I don't ever want to criticize someone's goal,  

but let's, let's do talk about that as a goal. In my experience,  

students who have that as a goal tend to be less happy with where they are. 

And I think that that perspective,  well, definitely slows down progress.

Again, if you want to listen to this  podcast episode, I'll link it down in  

the description so you can also find it  on the RealLife app. You can download  

the app from the Apple App or Google Play  Stores. Just search for RealLife English.

Going back to what I said earlier. There are many  learners who do want to strive to sound like or  

almost like a native. However, very frequently  lots of other want to retain their own accent  

when they speak a foreign language because  they feel that it is part of their identity.  

I personally feel the same when I  speak Portuguese. I find it quite  

a compliment when a taxi driver asks where  I am from. Because I am a proud Australian.

English as a second language speakers who  have strong accents have at some point  

made the conscious or unconscious decision that  they would not try to pursue a foreign accent,  

whether it be American, British or otherwise.  In other cases, some speakers are very vague  

about it. So, while someone might have a  specific model of English as their goal,  

others just don’t think too much about it.

We believe that most learners still  desire to improve their accent,  

but in a context where some might have  their reasons for keeping their own accent,  

intelligibility has gotne to be considered  the prime goal of pronunciation.

Now, back to our conversation with Hadar,  

she had a message that we would like  to emphasize at RealLife English.

And I think that the more people  with accents, I mean, everyone has an 

accent, but let's say with  an international or, or a non 

American s..standard accent,  uh, dare to show up, the more we 

normalize different sounds and different voices. And then when 

there is more representation, then people dare more, because 

right now a child that grows up  and watches Hollywood movies and 

Netflix, then the majority is  like the sound of them, the... 

most of the people who speak is very,  

very distinct, and it doesn't sound like them.  

And I think that then they would be afraid to speak up in public or 

make videos because it doesn't sound right like English is supposed  

to sound. And I think that the more we normalize foreign accents,  

umm non-native accents, I think we would have more representation,  

more people would dare, more people would show up.

That leads to some lessons we have done on  Learn English with TV with Sofia Vergara  

and Deepika Padukone. You can think of other  actors as well, like Arnold Schwarzenegger and  

Penelope Cruz. They all have stupendous  English but they speak with an accent.  

If you ask me about it, this is what  makes them unique, interesting and exotic!

So in the end, it is up to you whether or not  you want to pursue a native accent in English.  

What I advise my students to do, is to put their  focus on clear pronunciation, so even though they  

might have an accent, which makes them interesting  and exotic, is that they are easy to understand.

I hope today's lesson was insightful for you.  

Don't forget we have new lessons  every Monday and Friday. Ah yeah!