Accent and dialect

In this episode I’m looking at accent and dialect. Many learners have a distinct foreign accent. Is that inevitable, or are their ways to work on your accent (and if so, is it necessary)? I’m talking about various techniques, such as shadowing and working on individual sounds, as well as how sounds that initially seem familiar may be the ‘problem areas’ where an accent persists, just because the learner does not realise that the pronunciation is slightly different, while totally different sounds may, eventually, be easier to produce. As my pronunciation was getting better, I had to choose whether to copy my teachers’ northern accents, or include other dialectal features in my speech.