Accent does not matter, Good communication does!

c/o asianbite.com

A Korean TV actress in one of her appearances in a Korean show, outraged ‘some’ Filipinos when she mimic the latter’s way of speaking English. A lot of Koreans flock to the Philippines to learn English and logic would say that Filipinos are good English speakers and teachers otherwise these Koreans would not spend money for tutorial no matter how inexpensive the tuition may be.

The issue is not on Filipinos’ English proficiency but on the way Filipinos speak English. She made fun of the accent we produce when speaking English. Admittedly we have thick accent and it is so because our tongue is accustomed to our mother language, like Tagalog, when spoken the weight of the word goes with its meaning. But with good training and practice one can be very good with his or her English pronunciation and accent, as would be obvious among many Filipinos living and working in English speaking countries.

I was not offended by this actress’ mimicking for two obvious reasons: most Filipinos undeniably have thick accent, although her version was a little bit exaggerated (or maybe that’s the way she speaks English), and every English speaker has his or her own accent. Accent only matters to people who set standards and look down on other people. But for communication’s sake, one should not copy cat another group’s accent just to feel belong or pretend being like them, because what a good communication needs is to deliver the message, get it right and makes it understandable.

A lot of people who put too much emphasis on accent end up either frustrated (for not achieving one’s purpose) or sounding stupid (for speaking more than a native speaker does). I always tell my Taiwanese students (yes, I teach English) to prioritize pronouncing the words correctly, then accent is just an option. With their tongue not accustomed to Western language, pronouncing a word with a western accent can be dreadful to the ears, just like this Korean actress does.

One piece of advice to my countrymen: speak and learn English the way we used to. But please do not ‘make a mountain out of a molehill’.