Having minored in French and majored in German, the two languages correspond with the mindsets of the two different peoples. When you speak German, you feel somehow stricter, more military, and undaunted. In French I always felt looser and could see the funny side of everything. As Nikola Tesla said, it is all sound and frequency.
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To an American who has learned German but still has a heavy accent: German IS very difficult, even for Germans (!); I referred to this in my post about Christopher Walken.
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People used to always say I resemble Christopher Walken. His father, Paul Wälken, was from Gelsenkirchen, Germany and ran a bakery in Astoria, Queens, NYC, a then German neighborhood. He says he got his strange voice from his father. Germans pause while speaking because sentences have to be mentally organized in advance, with the verb often coming at the very end, like a “Hail Mary” football pass to the end zone. I think this requirement to plan out sentences carries over into all walks of life. Germans plan their work and then work the plan. 
This is part of why in WWII it took the whole world six years to beat ONE country….
This is part of why in WWII it took the whole world six years to beat ONE country…..
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I suppose I could teach you the German and Austrian accents. I did it professionally. Germans actually think I’m German, or Dutch (and, of course, I look the part; my French second wife once called me fondly “mon Waffen-SS” 
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And I learned to speak flawless Tyrolean, a dialect from Kufstein (photo) and Innsbruck that is almost a different language from High German. And I mean by this a mastery of both the accent and the grammar..
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There are books and courses for acquiring a foreign accent, and Broadway and Hollywood actors have been mastering accents for generations. Aussies can and do master a British accent (Russell Crowe in “Master and Commander” or, going back, Errol Flynn in “Robin Hood”).
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Brits can even take on an American cowboy accent (Daniel Craig AKA James Bond in “Cowboys and Aliens”), etc.
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And Martin Sheen, whose father was a Spaniard named Estevez, did pretty well with a Virginia accent as Robert E. Lee.
. 2:56:01-59:42 General Lee upbraids Colonel JEB Stuart for not following important orders
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It’s really not rocket science, but pretty much no one teaches it except to actors, or, as the sole major exception, the CIA and or KGB teach perfect foreign accents to spies to infiltrate the other country. I remember back in 1968 accidentally tuning into an evening broadcast on AM radio of Radio Moscow! The announcer spoke in PERFECTLY accented American English, ending with “Thank you for listening. I’m Vladimir Volkov.” I was astounded!
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In fact, I read once that at parties in England, if things get slow, someone, just for laughs, will start imitating various American accents which they know from all the Hollywood movies or tv shows: Mafia New Jersey Italian; raspy cowboy; Deep Southern drawl, etc.
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This is how actor James Gandolfini really sounded when not in character as mob boss “‘Tony Soprano”:
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Gandolfini in character (on SNL):
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First, understand what the American accent actually is so you can get rid of it. Btw, the American accent does sound, well, kinda doofus in German, like a man talking while chewing gum, because we (and the Brits) double the stressed vowels. 
Our spelling actually reflects this. Take the word “wait.” It is “a” plus “i.” This is accurately two sounds, not one, and not at all some insane English quirky spelling that no one bothered to change ove the centuries. We DO “dipthongize” (double) the syllable. A German would pronounce it in HIS accent as ONE sound, one vowel: “eh” (as in “dehnen” (to stretch). But we as Amis don’t say “WATE”; we say “WAY-eet.” It’s called vowel diphthongization. Or take the word “home.” A German would pronounce it “hohm.” But we say “HO-umm.” It is TWO vowels and two syllables! See? It is just a crime that while teaching foreign languages we do not simultaneously teach the correct accent!
Our spelling actually reflects this. Take the word “wait.” It is “a” plus “i.” This is accurately two sounds, not one, and not at all some insane English quirky spelling that no one bothered to change ove the centuries. We DO “dipthongize” (double) the syllable. A German would pronounce it in HIS accent as ONE sound, one vowel: “eh” (as in “dehnen” (to stretch). But we as Amis don’t say “WATE”; we say “WAY-eet.” It’s called vowel diphthongization. Or take the word “home.” A German would pronounce it “hohm.” But we say “HO-umm.” It is TWO vowels and two syllables! See? It is just a crime that while teaching foreign languages we do not simultaneously teach the correct accent!.
The “Ami” [German nickname for all Amerikaners] accent is kinda cringeworthy to German or French ears, in the same way that a working-class Deep South drawl is kinda cringe to a Yankee (although I do adore a light Southern accent, especially on a lady). “Why do Southerners drag their vowels out like that?”, an educated New Englander might ask.
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Well, we ALL, both Yanks and Rebs, and Londoners and Crocodile Dundee in Australia, come across as drawling to Continentals, making simple, pure, ONE-syllable vowels into double syllables, a quirky thing that, behind our backs, ze Churmans und Ohstrians call “der Kaugummi-Akzent” (the chewing-gum accent)
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Oh, and the Austrians speak nasally, and have only a light stress accent even on stressed syllables. One trick I do is have clients talk in the target accent. I had Japanese MD/PhDs talking like cowboys, which after all the films they have watched was no problem for them. And sink of all ze Hollyvood filmss wiss evil N@zis!
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I used the excellent semi-comedic sports movie “Jerry Maguire” with Tom Cruise and Renée Zellweger, and I had the Japanese, who lack about 1/4 of the sounds we have in American English, suddenly sounding like Emerson Winchester the Third, M.D. on “MASH”.
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Btw, this was me on August 17, 2003 on National Public Radio talking about reducing the Rhode Island accent:
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https://johndenugent.com/wp-content/uploads/jdn-rhode-island-accent-npr-17-aug-2003.mp3
I’ve never wanted to learn German, but i would like to learn Italian or Spanish. I’ve heard hebrew is really difficult and yiddish but who would want to learn the kikes language.
If i learned an Asian language it would be Thai.
German is a thrilling, strange language, not that hard, and way closer to English than I expected. Once you know it you can read 80% of Yiddish, considerable Dutch etc. In my experience all language learning is constructive.
Who knows, bilingualism might save your life someday.
Studies have shown that it was a huge mistake for many generations for immigrants to not speak their native tongue with their own kids, imagining that it would harm their mastering of the English language. I have lived twice in Europe — in Austria and in France — and tens of millions of Europeans (who are not geniuses, just regular folks) speak fluent English as well as their native tongue.
It truly expands brainpower to be multilingual.
And it is a real source of resentment amongst Continental Europeans that anglophones refuse to learn THEIR languages, or they speak French, German, Italian or Polish with an atrociously heavy accent. It makes Europeans wince, and they often switch, exasperated, to English just to stop hearing the slaughter of their language.
It is truly an astounding ego trip how many Anglos are monolingual yet view America as somehow the rightful world superpower.
It is a kind of proud ignorance. “I don’t need to learn YOUR language; we are the superpower and so you have to learn OUR language.”
I had a great professor of German at Georgetown University, Alfred Obernberger, and I can testify how right he was when he once said:
And this is how it was for me. I saw, first, how Germans and Austrians do things, and, later on, how the French operate. I became a huge admirer of both cultures, while realizing the specific ways that America was better.
Just a few minor examples:
— fantastic bread in Germany and Austria,
— windows that open in multiple ways for cleaning and letting a breeze in, but not rain, and
— door levers, not door knobs. Knobs make it hard for people with arthritis in their hands, and require lots of turning. And if there is a serious house fire and you are crawling right along the floor toward the door, staying low since toxic smoke rises, you might be so weakened you cannot turn the door knob but all you have to do with a lever is pull it down a bit, not twist as with a doorknob.
Because of West Germany and the millions of GIs who were stationed there during the four decades of the Cold War, door knobs have disappeared from all new home construction in America, and, for all I know, are now prescribed and are part of the building code.
But we STILL don’t use German-stye windows.
As for France, a keltic-mediterranean country with some Germanic influences (the name France itself coming from the Germanic Franks), their whole mindset is to seek to enjoy life and find something funny to laugh in every conversation. The French truly are happier than other nations, they have more frequent sex, they truly savor delicious food, not bolting it down like dogs do or Amurrikins at McDonalds while yakking or checking their phone, and French women, while not all beautiful, are sexy and charming. The French know how to live.
Here is an old cliché with some truth to it: Germans live to work, and the French work to live.
I learned a huge amount by living in both cultures. Every European country has its own flavor. 🙂
And all must be preserved.
Just as a parting note: the French chocolate and regular croissants are to die for, light, puffy, flaky and full of flavor. The French buy them fresh every morning. They SAVOR in the mouth the taste! Never rush the good things. Or as we say here, “stop and smell the roses.” The French have this down.
I have no doubt that the juze seek a ghastly anti-white alliance with the Chinese, and their current backing of US hegemony is temporary. The juze hate Aryans and Anglo-Saxons — in fact, all Nordic nations.
They want to cut a deal with China as the next hyperpower.
Their problem is the Chinese see right through them and, never having been a Judeo-Christian culture, they laugh at the juze’s pretension of being “God’s Chosen People,” and in fact the notion of a personal God is foreign to them. Buddhism, Confucianism and Taoism never discuss God, saying at most “the will of heaven.”
And when the juze begin moaning about their fake Holocaust, the Chinese see that it is pure manipulation to get money from gullible Westerners. China has suffered six million dead many, many times due to invasions (such as the horrible Japanese attack), earthquakes, floods, famines, droughts, plagues, etc.
Their culture is not about compassion and pity parties.
The ONLY thing about which they and the juze can agree is they both sure do like to make money. 😉
We can get along fine with the Chinese — once the ju-run US Deep State is dismantled. We agree not to dominate them — and vice versa! China is again and will remain a superpower, and rightfully so in view of their hard work, belief in education, and strong families.
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Interesting page. I’ve been a language/ accent/ dialect/ alphabet freak all my boomer life. Especially as a Southerner it grinds my gears that people take courses in losing their regional accents — everybody will end up talking like Oprah. Realize in many cases this is because businesses require it, but that doesn’t help in my nagging opinion.
The trend is toward an alarming sameness — new fast-food eateries are all the same shoebox, etc. Extremely cool that a great racialist gets interviewed in National Politburo Radio though. Skol!