Hello
I'm italian, boy and going on 18
Unfortunately in my art accademy english is not a matter so I had to self-taught english to myself using a dictionary, movies and novels
I still think my written english is terrible but my spoken english is even worse
I have to admit I haven't paid enough attention to spoken language and pronunciation so as I read english words I listen the wrong pronunciation in my mind related to the way characters and or groups of characters are pronounced in my language. For example I've mentally pronounced "OWN" as "avuan" for a long time as I encountered this on sentences.
I have debated many times the conventional belief that age is correlated to success on those disciplines that require something to become your second nature: for example age and ballet, age and piano, age and composition all those matters where a young age is thought to be necessary to make the information you learn subconscious. And I have seen this belief debunked many times.
I believe that there's a correlation but the correlation is not between age and learning but between learning and those conditions that are socially favourable to learning and which are more likely to exist in young age (more free time, less stress about passing time, less competition, more open-mindedness, less cultural brainwashing, more spontaneity, less fear to do wrong or be ridiculed and so on) and even an older person knowing this can seek those favourable conditions
A further aspect though I believe plays a role in learning a language and it is "muscular habits".
This is my theory:
It's often observed that children can learn a second language perfectly and if they learn it soon enough no one will recognize they're not native speakers when they speak on the other hand adults that learn a second language will always pronounce the words not as perfectly as if they were native speakers
All languages have their own sounds and often text-books explain how each language has unique sounds and how hard is to learn a new sound if you haven't never "produced" it with your body. And how do we produce different sounds? Why with the muscles of the tongue, the muscle of the mouth/face and the muscles of the throat.
It is also known that muscles have a memory and that the more they are used in a way the more we will consciously use them in exact that way and they will naturally move in that way. So a child who has been alive for 6 years and began speaking at 2 years old had just used his/her "language muscles" for 4 years and those muscles are still not conditioned enough so they can easily learn how to move them in a different ways.
On the other hand a 40 years old has been using his "language muscles" in a certain way for a long time and they get used to that movements and it won't be easy to change the way they move/work *unless* a conscious effort is made to "de-condition and re-condition" those muscles!
I have observed people who try to pronounce foreign words
If they're children they observe the way the tongue/mouth/throat is used to pronunce that sound and it takes very few attempts to decondition their muscles/tongue/throat and use them in the way they're used to pronounce that words by native speakers
If they're adults though they keep trying to pronounce those words by "maintaning the muscular foundation" which is necessary to produce the sounds of their language but which doesn't allow them to produce different sounds
It's like switching from guitar to bass, if the guitarist is young enough he/she will recondition his/her muscular foundation quickly enough, but if the guitarist is older and have been playing the guitar for a long time he/she will attempt to play the bass using the same "muscular foundation necessary to play the guitar" unless he/she focus on deconditioning those muscles and re-adapt them for bass playing
I don't know if you can understand my explanation and I'm afraid my english is not good enough to explain this concept thoroughly but this is my theory: learning to speak another language and hence produce sounds that are stranger to your native language sounds requires muscular/tongue deconditioning and althought children can decondition their muscles quite easily because they have been using them not long enough to create radicated habits, teens and adults have get used to the way their muscles/tongue move and work and they need to make a strong conscious effort in order to decondition their muscles/tongue
That would explain for example why written english can easily become "second nature" for many non native and they even learn how to think in english rather than in their native language but perfect spoken english remains an hard goal to attain anyway!
If it was mental, then even written language would never become a second nature ... but the hard part is spoken language, is sounds production and hence "sound production apparatus" deconditioning
What do you think?
Do you agree with me or believe my theory may have a point?
Now I accept the challenge at 18 years old to learn english so perfectly that no one must be able to recognize I'm not a native speaker.
I want to use all the resources available to me including my theory to meet this goal and your help is welcome
Thanks
Daniel
I'm italian, boy and going on 18
Unfortunately in my art accademy english is not a matter so I had to self-taught english to myself using a dictionary, movies and novels
I still think my written english is terrible but my spoken english is even worse
I have to admit I haven't paid enough attention to spoken language and pronunciation so as I read english words I listen the wrong pronunciation in my mind related to the way characters and or groups of characters are pronounced in my language. For example I've mentally pronounced "OWN" as "avuan" for a long time as I encountered this on sentences.
I have debated many times the conventional belief that age is correlated to success on those disciplines that require something to become your second nature: for example age and ballet, age and piano, age and composition all those matters where a young age is thought to be necessary to make the information you learn subconscious. And I have seen this belief debunked many times.
I believe that there's a correlation but the correlation is not between age and learning but between learning and those conditions that are socially favourable to learning and which are more likely to exist in young age (more free time, less stress about passing time, less competition, more open-mindedness, less cultural brainwashing, more spontaneity, less fear to do wrong or be ridiculed and so on) and even an older person knowing this can seek those favourable conditions
A further aspect though I believe plays a role in learning a language and it is "muscular habits".
This is my theory:
It's often observed that children can learn a second language perfectly and if they learn it soon enough no one will recognize they're not native speakers when they speak on the other hand adults that learn a second language will always pronounce the words not as perfectly as if they were native speakers
All languages have their own sounds and often text-books explain how each language has unique sounds and how hard is to learn a new sound if you haven't never "produced" it with your body. And how do we produce different sounds? Why with the muscles of the tongue, the muscle of the mouth/face and the muscles of the throat.
It is also known that muscles have a memory and that the more they are used in a way the more we will consciously use them in exact that way and they will naturally move in that way. So a child who has been alive for 6 years and began speaking at 2 years old had just used his/her "language muscles" for 4 years and those muscles are still not conditioned enough so they can easily learn how to move them in a different ways.
On the other hand a 40 years old has been using his "language muscles" in a certain way for a long time and they get used to that movements and it won't be easy to change the way they move/work *unless* a conscious effort is made to "de-condition and re-condition" those muscles!
I have observed people who try to pronounce foreign words
If they're children they observe the way the tongue/mouth/throat is used to pronunce that sound and it takes very few attempts to decondition their muscles/tongue/throat and use them in the way they're used to pronounce that words by native speakers
If they're adults though they keep trying to pronounce those words by "maintaning the muscular foundation" which is necessary to produce the sounds of their language but which doesn't allow them to produce different sounds
It's like switching from guitar to bass, if the guitarist is young enough he/she will recondition his/her muscular foundation quickly enough, but if the guitarist is older and have been playing the guitar for a long time he/she will attempt to play the bass using the same "muscular foundation necessary to play the guitar" unless he/she focus on deconditioning those muscles and re-adapt them for bass playing
I don't know if you can understand my explanation and I'm afraid my english is not good enough to explain this concept thoroughly but this is my theory: learning to speak another language and hence produce sounds that are stranger to your native language sounds requires muscular/tongue deconditioning and althought children can decondition their muscles quite easily because they have been using them not long enough to create radicated habits, teens and adults have get used to the way their muscles/tongue move and work and they need to make a strong conscious effort in order to decondition their muscles/tongue
That would explain for example why written english can easily become "second nature" for many non native and they even learn how to think in english rather than in their native language but perfect spoken english remains an hard goal to attain anyway!
If it was mental, then even written language would never become a second nature ... but the hard part is spoken language, is sounds production and hence "sound production apparatus" deconditioning
What do you think?
Do you agree with me or believe my theory may have a point?
Now I accept the challenge at 18 years old to learn english so perfectly that no one must be able to recognize I'm not a native speaker.
I want to use all the resources available to me including my theory to meet this goal and your help is welcome
Thanks
Daniel