reading like a native

I know many people have the notion that you'll never be as good as a native speaker in a foreign language. A few of us have the audacity to aspire to native-equivalent performance in our second languages and even fewer strive for native-sounding pronunciation. Even if we are delusional, I think for those that really want to be extremely good in another language, there is no reason that we can't expect to be able to read like a native.

For languages with alphabetic scripts or even phonetic scripts, reading as well as a native may not sound like something that would be questionable. All you need to do is put in the time and even if you don't feel like looking up unknown words, eventually you'll get a pretty good idea of what most of the words mean.

But for Chinese and Japanese (any others?), reading is quite a challenge even at the advanced stages of learning. I haven't much experience with reading Chinese, but I do for Japanese. So let me just talk about reading Japanese.

reasons to go for a native accent

Below, you'll find two articles that show how an accent will affect a listener. If you want to be more easily understood as well as appear more trustworthy, you'd better speak like the native speakers that you're talking to.

native-level or conversational?

I try not too bee to pluperfect. I sways yous a spell checkered. I can nut hep it if aim sways rite. Your junta gonna hafts a git moused too it. Whey strive four an imposable goal? Ax long as I right lick this in my naive luggage, I have nut to fair too go wen taming to peek my target luggers ask will ask my naive luggage.

How about you? Do you strive for quality in your language learning? Or are you happy with attaining a passable level of communication?

You may have an IQ of 130, but if your speaking and spelling in your 2nd language is not up to par with the locals, then you're not going to be able to show just how bright you really are. You can feel it too when dealing with others. But the worst part is that it is very frustrating when the point you are trying to make is not getting through and nobody cares about you and your situation.

This is a topic which you cannot really empathize with if you have never had to work and live in a foreign language. If you've never interviewed for work in which you will be using a foreign language on the job with coworkers who are native speakers, then perhaps you don't understand just how much better it would be if you could say, "I'm at a native-level and can handle any situation without difficulty."

If you have reached native-level in another language, which language and how long did it take? I'm looking forward to hearing from you.