We all know that English is very easy to learn at basic level, but how difficult is it to learn English to near-native level compared with other languages?
Difficulty of learning English to near-native level
"Guests",
Why don't you pick an actual nickname?
It would be easier to understand who said what, and the discussion would therefore be easier to follow.
With my best ESL wishes,
Achab
Why don't you pick an actual nickname?
It would be easier to understand who said what, and the discussion would therefore be easier to follow.
With my best ESL wishes,
Achab
Unless you move to an anglophone country permanently, or are a memory genius, it's impossible.
One can get the basics down of any language or speak it very very well, but the multitude, thousands probably, of everyday expressions, nuances, analogies, metaphors and colloquialisms are too much for the brain to juggle unless you are surrounded by natives all the time and for years.
You simply cannot learn it all by reading or listening to the radio. Unless you are speaking English, are surrounded by it, you will never be as good as a native. There are exceptions of course--memory geniuses, which most of us are not.
One can get the basics down of any language or speak it very very well, but the multitude, thousands probably, of everyday expressions, nuances, analogies, metaphors and colloquialisms are too much for the brain to juggle unless you are surrounded by natives all the time and for years.
You simply cannot learn it all by reading or listening to the radio. Unless you are speaking English, are surrounded by it, you will never be as good as a native. There are exceptions of course--memory geniuses, which most of us are not.
There is no need for you to gain near-native English! Even if you managed, so what?
Why not put the energy to study computer science or medicine or any other subject? If you are an expert in a given field, who cares your accent?
Why not put the energy to study computer science or medicine or any other subject? If you are an expert in a given field, who cares your accent?
If you are a small child - somewhere between 5 and 8 years old and if you live in foreign country for few years you will get such accent that nobody will recognize that you are not native speaker. The reason is that small kids learn English as their mother's language. But if you are after 11 -12 or a little bit older you will always have a little accent with which people will recognize that you are not native. May be if you live permanently in english speaking country you will lose slowly you accent, but remember something very important as much english you get to know as much you will forget your own language. Finally it will be like a disaster you will speak some slang which only you will get to know. If you return back to your own country you will be such a mess that only God can help you.
It's called neither here, nor there. You will be neither with Englishmen engl nor with your own like your owns.
<<It's called neither here, nor there. You will be neither with Englishmen engl nor with your own like your owns.>>
The worst is foreign students who segregate themselves. They develop a sort of new colloquial dialect of their native language that speeds up their loss of intelligibility with the standard dialect, and they never learn English well either. Not even God could help these people's messed up speech, lol.
The worst is foreign students who segregate themselves. They develop a sort of new colloquial dialect of their native language that speeds up their loss of intelligibility with the standard dialect, and they never learn English well either. Not even God could help these people's messed up speech, lol.