I know our brains are trained in a certain way from childhood, but could someone elaborate? It seems physically impossible yet it is very much possible
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So there are studies that have confirmed that a human child, if they have not heard certain sounds by the age of 5, will effectively be unable to hear/process/make those sounds.
A good example is a sound in yiddish (Hebrew) which they’ve found most english speakers (especially Americans) literally don’t even HEAR when it’s used because their brains, used to american english, literally filter’s it out as an extraneous sound that doesnt need to be heard.
ESL teacher of 10 years here! Finally, my time to shine.
On the surface: it is because you are not use to saying **those specific sounds in that specific order**. You are also not used to needing to actively think about the word you are saying. It takes practice to build the neural connections in your brain and make the reactions faster when saying a word. You have had a lifetime of experience speaking your native language, a lot of that experience at ages where you naturally soak it up.
There is a deeper explanation, however, and that is because sounds between languages can very dramatically. For example: Did you know that English itself has two L sounds? Or multiple T sounds? You almost certainly don’t unless you’ve had linguistic training, and the reason you can’t hear the difference between them is because you don’t have to. To use two different languages: “N” in Mandarin words like “ni” is not pronounced in the same way as the word “knee” in English, even though they sound essentially the same to our ear at first. These small differences are compounded by unusual inflections and intonations we may not be used to in a different language. Different languages are just spoken at different “rhythms” and it takes time to get to know that.
When you add the two paragraphs together, it means your brain is already working overtime to produce sounds it *doesn’t know how to produce with the tongue yet*. Through actively practicing sounds in isolation and then diligently practicing speaking out in the real world, you can reduce the gap between what you think the sound is and what it actually is. Further, listening to the language more will help you begin to distinguish the difference between its sound and your own language.
Phonemes. Those are the different sounds in each language. English has 44 but there are hundreds. If your primary language doesn’t use the same phonemes as the language you’re trying to learn its very hard for your brain to tell your mouth to pronounce them.
You know how you cross your arms, or fold your hands together with fingers interlaced? Ok do that now, but the opposite direction than you normally do.
Weird, right? Or how about signing your name with your opposite-than-normal hand? Or getting on/off your bike from the other side?
We don’t think of pronouncing words as a physical skill, but it is. Every much as the stuff I just described. Each sound you make is a careful coordination of breathing, voice, mouth shape and tongue positioning. Unfamiliar sounds = unfamiliar motions. Habits from pronouncing one language, showing up in another = accent.
Some people are better at un-learning or learning new moves (in speech and elsewhere) than others are.
To all those who think you *can’t* learn new to pronounce new phonemes after some certain age: of course you can. It’s just harder. Think of actors learning to do accents, or of accent reduction training. Same process
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