For non-native English speakers, the ultimate goal of learning English may be to be able to communicate fluently in English, including the ability to communicate verbally and in writing in English in order to be able to communicate effectively with native English speakers during travel, work, study, or everyday life.
I thought that the importance of learning English well was communication. So how should we think about the importance of accents when studying?
For some people, the accent is very important, especially for those who wish to work or live in an English-speaking country. For others, the accent is not so important, they are more concerned with being able to understand and be understood, as long as the communication is smooth.
For some people, accents are part of their cultural identity. They will feel that having a specific accent can make them feel more like part of a specific group of people or communities.
In some cases, differences in accents may affect the effectiveness of our communication. If one person has a strong accent, it may be difficult for others to understand them. In this case, having an accent that is closer to standard English may improve the efficiency of communication, and a near-standard English accent refers to learning to pronounce words correctly with phonetic transcription, including English and American pronunciation, of course. Speaking of accents, I recommend learning to approach the correct English accent by imitating the pronunciation of native speakers.
Being able to speak English fluently and with standard pronunciation is undoubtedly widely popular or more respected. It is true that each of us has our own preferences, and some people may prefer one accent over another. For some, they may prefer English with a specific accent, while for others, they may prefer standard English.
I have traveled to many countries around the world and have come into contact with English speakers with different accents, both native speakers of English-speaking countries and non-native speakers of other countries. The biggest difference between native speakers is regionality, for example, people in different parts of the United Kingdom and Australia, their accents are still quite different, if you stay longer, you can even hear that they are from **, there are several accents in the north of England, such as Yorkshire accent, Lancashire accent, etc. In the Newcastle accent, "heard" is pronounced as "hord", while "along" will be pronounced as "alang"...In the north, "bus" is pronounced "bus".
In the south of England, the accent of Oxford and Cambridge is what we often call the Oxford accent, and the Queen of England is this accent, which is actually very close to the standard British English accent, that is, received pronunciation, which refers to the non-dialect English of educated people, and the BBC pronunciation is also like this.
For us, this should be the easiest pronunciation to understand. Listening to the BBC is a great way to learn standard British English pronunciation, with the exception of American pronunciation. Yingyin gives people a feeling of "uprightness", and some people say that Meiyin is much more comfortable and natural. Authentic American tones, you can feel it from the slow American notes in VOA.
The impact of the Australian accent on me is not weak, in Australia, I heard their pronunciation a little slurred, the words are very slurred, more like a mixture of British regional accents and Irish accents.
When I first arrived in the UK, my first encounter with Scottish pronunciation was a challenge for me, as they often pronounced the parts that should not be pronounced as ascending, and I often couldn't tell whether they were questioning or affirming. A normal tone of voice suddenly rises in places you don't expect at all. The sound is heavy, such as bloody [.]'bldi]，tuesday ['tju:z de:]，way [we:]。
The Welsh pronunciation is undulating and too subdued. The pronunciation of people in these two places, the first contact at the beginning, for us who are used to listening to the standard pronunciation, is really not used to it for a while.
However, these accent variations are not a thing, after all, they are all revolving around RP, which is considered several dialects. When I went to other countries, such as Africa, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, etc., the Africans, Indians, Pakistanis, and Middle Eastern Arabs spoke English with their own distinctive.
Africans speak English with a strong local flavor and very vague pronunciation. The Indian and Pakistani accents are heavier, and the t is always pronounced as d, and in Sri Lanka, I have experienced this, and I can understand the English pronunciation of the Indians and Pakistanis, and the other accents are not a problem. What impressed me the most when I worked with them was that their educated people generally had an amazing vocabulary and of course had problems with grammar. It was also because of the needs of my work that I gradually got used to their pronunciation rules.
The importance of accent in English learning depends on the needs and preferences of each of us. If you think that accent is important to you, then you can make an effort to practice pronunciation to get an accent that is closer to standard English. If you don't think your accent matters, you can focus more on other aspects of language learning, such as grammar, vocabulary, and listening comprehension. After all, communication is king, what do you say?