4 - Idahosa Ness: How to Speak In 6 Languages With A Perfect Accent

Want to sound like a native in 6 different languages? Our guest today, Idahosa Ness, is exactly that.

 

Idahosa is an American who grew up speaking only English. But later on in life, while he was learning Spanish studying abroad in Mexico - he realised he was studying it different to everyone else. He just sounded better, more natural. He didn’t have an American accent and sounded much more like a local.

 

That realisation only became stronger when he moved to China - everyone was trying to mimic Chinese tones but were struggling. He wasn’t. 

 

It was only when he was in Brazil, learning his third foreign language and teaching English that he had a Eureka moment while riding the bus after drumming practice.

 

Since then Idahosa learned to speak two more languages - French and German. He also broke down his own ability to mimic people’s accents, and started a business - the Mimic Method.

 

He now helps people learn to talk like a native in 6 languages by recording themselves singing foreign language songs online syllable by syllable... It’s an interesting business :)

 

I learned Portuguese with the Mimic Method and can attest to how useful that was.

 

Me and Idahosa are both huge language nerds so we had a great chat.

 

We have a great talk about:

• His life and language learnings stories including ones where people were actually convinced he was Brazilian, or even Chinese.
• what are the biggest issues are for people learning languages
• how you can train your ear to hear sounds you can’t distinguish and your mouth to make sounds you can’t produce
• what makes English so hard for some foreign speakers of it
• which are the most important sounds to nail in Spanish, Portuguese and French to have a nice accent in those language
• how to find incredible amounts of motivation to learn your target language 

And a lot more.