My Identity Crisis & Speaking Like A Native

hey what's up Stefanie the English coach here from EnglishFullTime.com

today in this video I want to talk to you guys about the idea of speaking like

a native speaker what this means and should you do it right now some people

think that they should lose their accent completely and other people feel like no

my accent is part of my identity I don't want to lose it so share your

thoughts in the comments I want to know what you guys think what my audience

thinks right I want to know if you guys are leaning more toward no I want to

retain my accent because it's part of my identity or I want to lose it completely

and I'm gonna talk to you guys about my viewpoint on this subject okay so first

of all I think that when people say speak like a native they're not

necessarily saying I want to sound exactly like a native speaker now with

this said there are some people who do mean that and then there are other

people who say like a native as in I want to speak fluently and clearly and I

want to be understood and I want to be able to connect my speech and I want to

feel as good in English as I feel in my native language okay so the definition

there is no consensus I guess as to what the definition of like a native is so

there's a lot of contention around this phrase right like people get really

upset about it some people don't care about it so yeah we're gonna keep

talking about this we're gonna dissect it a little bit today so the meaning of

like a native for some people it means sounding and speaking exactly like a

native speaker and for other people it just means no feeling comfortable in the

language like as comfortable as you feel in your native language now let's talk

about accent should you lose your accent and try to sound exactly like a native

speaker or should you retain your accent I'm gonna speak here from personal

experience I believe that the goal should be communicating clearly and

confidently and that's it the rest is like a cherry on top right if you sound

almost exactly like a native speaker congratulations that's awesome

but that doesn't mean that if someone doesn't sound like a native speaker that

their English is any less or anything like that okay so my opinion on this has

evolved over the last decade now let me tell you guys something that's pretty

personal okay and this could be something that you guys some of you are

going through and it caused a lot of turmoil in my life wow we are doing good

with the vocabulary today I just need to myself a little pat on the back for that

one okay no but seriously when I first started learning Spanish okay for those

of you who don't know my story in a nutshell is that my parents are from

Argentina and they immigrated to the US okay now it's a little more complicated

than that because my grandparents three of them were immigrants from Europe so

essentially I come from a long line of immigrants that's what I tell people and

I've had like not I've had I used to have an identity crisis over this

because my dad came from a German family but my parents were born in Argentina my

dad was raised in Argentina and in the USA I was born in the USA but I never

learned Spanish so I had this whole identity crisis over who I was right I

didn't know who I was I felt like I didn't belong to any group of people and

people are always seeking to belong right thankfully now I don't care about

any of that I Know Who I am I'm secure in my identity and all of that is my

past right but before I didn't I didn't know what my identity was and so I

wanted to learn Spanish and that was like my number-one desire I was fourteen

years old and I decided I want to get fluent in this language this is the

language of my family and I fantasized about this idea of getting super fluent

and speaking like a native speaker and I fantasized about people mistaking me for

a native English are a native Spanish speaker and the idea was just so

romantic and romanticized in my head and I imagine that I was just this I

don't know like mysterious person like people would look at me and be like wow

like she knows a foreign language

super embarrassing admitting that now but it's also funny and I bet some

people can relate so I'm glad I can talk about this confidently now cuz I think

it can help some people but essentially I created this whole thing in my head

this like a complex essentially I created my own complex because I wasn't

a native Spanish speaker I will never be a native Spanish speaker Spanish will

never be my mother tongue okay but I was in some kind of denial like I really

wanted that like I wanted people to think that I was a native Spanish

speaker and so what did that do that caused me to obsess over every mistake

it caused me to obsess over my pronunciation over grammar everything

and beyond obsess about all of this it caused me to not be able to speak

because I was so afraid I was living in fear I was afraid of making mistakes I

was afraid of people finding out my real identity which is I'm a native English

speaker and I was afraid of people discovering this because I wanted to

create this illusion that I was somebody that I wasn't this is so dangerous you

guys anytime you try to pretend that you're somebody that you're not it's

just not good okay it's not good for your stress levels it's not good for

your psyche it's not good for you it's not good for your happiness I didn't

know this and I was a teenager okay and I had nobody to help me through this

whole identity crisis thing it made learning the language very difficult for

me because when you're too afraid to speak you can't practice if you don't

practice you don't improve and if you don't make mistakes you don't improve we

need to make mistakes because that's how we learn it's like all of this is super

logical now but before I didn't get it I did

know what I was doing right and this is also now why I'm the English coach

because I've learned so many of these things through my experiences and

through the experiences of my students it's like I can look back and tell you

where I've been and etcetera etc okay that's off topic what coming back coming

full circle okay so I have this huge identity crisis but the good thing is

since I was so obsessed with sounding exactly like a native speaker I

developed a really good accent okay I really listened I imitated I really

learned how to imitate natives and how to sound native like okay and now when I

speak Spanish and I do have a video in Spanish I'll link it up here okay now

when I speak Spanish a lot of people say that I sound like a native speakers so I

basically I achieved my dream I achieved what I wanted right a lot of people say

that I sound like a native Spanish speaker and depending on how good my

Spanish is that day because if time goes by and I don't speak Spanish for a long

time I do get a little rusty and this is normal this and we can talk about this

in another video it happens to people even when you're fluent but yeah

depending on how good my Spanish is maybe I've gone a week and I've only

spoken Spanish so my Spanish is lit all right it's on fire it's amazing then

yeah people go oh my gosh like this is a native Spanish speaker that I'm talking

to or maybe they think I'm a native Spanish speaker but from a different

spanish-speaking country either way like I achieved my dream but at what cost

there was a huge cost and if I could go back in time and do things differently I

absolutely would I think this obsession with sounding

exactly like a native and not just sounding like a native but passing for a

native okay passing that's what I think is very unhealthy when you have this

obsession with the desire to pass as a native because that means that you are

not okay with your identity you are not a native English speaker okay

and that's okay you don't have to be and I wish somebody would have told me that

I wish when I was in high school and I was insecure I wish somebody would say

there's nothing wrong with not being a native speaker there's nothing wrong

with that you can learn languages embrace languages speak fluently engine

and enjoy who you are right and I didn't have that and it really makes me sad and

almost angry like at the amount of years that I wasted being afraid of speaking

because people would realize that I wasn't a native Spanish speaker okay so

I created this huge complex in my mind that still affects me occasionally to

this day I'm still trying to undo that but now let me tell you guys how I am

when it comes to speaking other languages because now I'm at a place

where I just I love languages I love listening to music in other languages I

love watching TV shows and other languages and I'm passively absorbing a

few different languages okay so I'm learning Portuguese I'm learning Italian

and I'm learning French all right so now here's how I am with these languages do

I care about passing as a native speaker no I don't care at all I don't want

people to think I'm a native Italian speaker or a native Spanish speaker or a

native French speaker okay I don't care that is not my goal however I love

accents I love imitating native speakers I love sounding like a native I love

working on my pronunciation I love learning new sounds I love training my

mouth so when I practice these languages I am going for authentic pronunciation

okay I want to sound like a native I don't want to just be lazy and use

English pronunciation in foreign languages because that's hard for other

people to understand and it's no fun at all I really really like learning new

sounds and saying words that sound completely foreign to me until they

sound natural to me I love that I love the whole transformation so that's how I

see it now and I think that that's a very healthy way to view languages and I

encourage you to view English in the same

way you don't have to pass as a native speaker but there's nothing wrong with

obsessing over pronunciation and intonation and you trying to sound as

native like as possible just because you love it there's nothing wrong with that

and this also extends beyond pronunciation sounding like a native can

also have to do with the way you put your sentences together I really really

like sounding like a native in other languages and putting sentences together

and phrases the the way a native speaker would but sometimes it's like I just I

get I get lazy and I don't remember how to say it the way a native speaker would

so I just you know translate directly even though I don't do this very often

once in a while it's kind of like a tool in the toolbox if you need it you grab

it and you use it if I don't know how to say something the way a native speaker

would say it I say it however I want to say it translating the idea from English

into that language and it usually works out and that makes me feel amazing

because it makes me feel like yeah I learned these languages and I can use

them however I want and nobody can tell me how to use it or how not to use it or

how I should sound and not that nobody can tell me but that I don't have to let

my own brain or my own ego there we go because it's not my brain it's my ego I

don't let I don't have to let my ego control me and tell me that my language

skills aren't good enough right I can use it how I want to use it and feel

confident doing it alright so who I hope that this was helpful you guys like

seriously again there's nothing wrong with wanting to sound like a native

working on your pronunciation sounding as authentic as possible working on your

accent but don't let your ego drive you crazy by making you believe that you

have to pass as a native speaker when you're not a native speaker embrace your

identity who you are where you're from the language that you speak the culture

that you're from there's so much history there there's so many beautiful things

there and no one is better than anybody else ok so let's just end on that note

and if you are interested working on your pronunciation with me

then I want to invite you to join my complete pronunciation course use the

link in the description and sign up below right now we are creating the

course and testing it with students we're going to launch a beta version

very soon so if you want to get more information about that just sign up for

it and we'll let you know when it's ready all right you guys that's it

please let me know your thoughts in the comments I hope you enjoyed the video I

hope it was helpful give it a thumbs up if it was helpful if you are not a

subscriber but you watch my videos and you enjoy them then go ahead and hit

that subscribe button okay that's it you guys and I'll see you in the next video

bye