Lone Frank: Bilingual (Danish/English)?

Open Forum in English
1

Any Danish speakers here?
Below are two clips of Lone Frank, a neurobiologist, author of the book Mitt smukke genom/My Beautiful Genome, talking about her book in English:

and in Danish:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cHA-cgPTwLY

I can’t judge her Danish, obviously (aside from the stød that I can detect), but her English is absolutely perfect. I could perhaps detect a slight devoicing of the /z/ sound in “physical,” “predispositions,” “puzzle,” and a couple of other words. She has a tendency toward dropping the /r/ in the words “information” and “misunderstanding” (which is not unusual for native English speakers of certain dialects of AmE). Finally, her /ɑ/ in “not,” “prophecies,” and “what” is closer to /ɔ/ (again, not uncommon in AmE).

Other than that—save a few minor oddities here and there—her English sounds native to me. Her intonations are spot on, her grammar is perfect (for spontaneous speech), gesticulation does not seem overly compensatory, and her hesitation is within that of a native speaker.

I couldn’t find any biographical information about her, except that she lived and studied in the US for a few years.

Everywhere on the Internet she’s referred to as a “Danish journalist,” “Danish scientist,” “Danish author,” etc.

Her book was written in Danish and translated into English by Russell Dees.

2

I wonder whether it’s possible to learn English or any other language in this almost perfect way at age 30 years or more. In my view, this “native” level can be learned just when you start at childhood. I wish I were wrong. :slight_smile:

3

I know a Russian lady who came to America when she was seventeen, and she speaks English with practically no noticeable foreign accent. Apparently, it used to be much stronger, but she’s just always had a desire to speak English just like an American. That’s something that’s always interested me, people who learn other languages at later ages in life to near perfect native level.

4

I think it depends on your definition of near perfect. I know many people who speak English better than many native speakers but have an accent. To me that is near perfect. I think it is possible to reach this level of “perfection” after the age of 30.

Accent is more individual, some people do better and some not so well. I think it has to do with our ability to hear and notice, and then the willingness to let go and imitate. Many people find it more comfortable to stay with their accent because they don’t trust themselves really imitating the native accent.

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