7.3 Recognising native speaker techniques

Amalia’s speech shows some common signs of natural speech. These are things we all do in our mother tongue to correct ourselves when speaking spontaneously without much time to think. An awareness of these techniques – repetition, correction, addition, reformulation and omission, alongside ‘fillers’ (such as ‘um’ and ‘ah’) – will help you ignore them and identify the essential information of a message. You’ll be able to follow the train of thought and deduce what Amalia might have intended to say.

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Listen to another extract and then, using the transcript, identify examples of these techniques.

Technique	Examples
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Transcript

Amalia

Lo más importante para mí en la vida es mi familia, es lo más… mi familia, la salud, que es sobre todo, y… el trabajo, luego ya viene lo… lo demás, claro. Pero eso es lo básico, lo más importante, y mi madre… con mi… conmigo siempre. Lo que más me hace feliz es cuando voy a mi… a ver a mi familia en Paraguay y reunirme otra vez con mis… con mis hermanos y a comer la comida de mi madre.

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Answer

You may have identified these examples in Amalia’s speech. You will see that they are no obstacle for understanding of the information she provides. With practice you will be able to recognise these techniques among the important content of someone’s message.

Technique	Examples
Repetition	Lo más importante… lo más importante
Correction	con mi… conmigo
Addition	y
Reformulation	lo básico, lo más importante cuando voy a mi… a ver a
Omission	es lo más… [importante]