Post History

Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/7526
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/7526
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

If you want to write like a native _speaker_, you should also be _listening._ So listen to radio broadcasts, podcasts, and TV shows. (Movies can vary; because they are shorter, they can be narratively compressed, so dialogue is often more focused on moving the plot forward. TV shows have the luxury of time, so they can afford to have people just banter.)

In particular, try to find series: soap operas, long-running (four or more years) TV shows and podcasts, radio hosts who have been on for a long time. When you have character (or real-person) relationships which are ongoing, it becomes less important to tell a story and you can spend time just enjoying one another's company. So your speech is more relaxed, more "native." The idea is that this is how people actually talk to one another.

Also, try improvised or ad-libbed shows. Search on YouTube for "Whose Line Is It Anyway?" (the U.S. cast). People who are ad-libbing aren't thinking about how they're constructing sentences, so that's about as pure of "native" speech as you can get.

Record these and transcribe what you hear, if you can. That will give you something to compare your work to.

Original score: 8