Reading Spanish

[nuncapense]

still chugging along...

Getting lazy with reading. Been watching a lot of dubbed TV again. I had a period where I was listening to Spanish 5 or 6 hours a day, audiobooks and TV, and my Spanish was feeling fluent when I spoke. That didn't last long, and faded quickly when I listened less hours per day. I'm doing more classes and intercambios. I live in Mexico, and last moth traveled to a different part of the country, where I had a much harder time understanding people. I've gotten used to the local accent I guess, along with the dubbed accent.

I am going to try to listen to less dubbed stuff.

I'm looking for a good talk radio type show with many accents and regular natural speach patterns.

If I flip thru TV channels, the dubbed stuff I understand, but the regular stuff is still hard. Been living in Mexico 2 years now. Frustrating. I can follow long conversations better than short ones. I didn't know the correct way to ask what time it is until 2 weeks ago!

Question for people who have done this before: what types of material should I concentrate on? What should I be doing at this level?

[James29]

still chugging along...

Getting lazy with reading. Been watching a lot of dubbed TV again. I had a period where I was listening to Spanish 5 or 6 hours a day, audiobooks and TV, and my Spanish was feeling fluent when I spoke. That didn't last long, and faded quickly when I listened less hours per day. I'm doing more classes and intercambios. I live in Mexico, and last moth traveled to a different part of the country, where I had a much harder time understanding people. I've gotten used to the local accent I guess, along with the dubbed accent.

I am going to try to listen to less dubbed stuff.

I'm looking for a good talk radio type show with many accents and regular natural speach patterns.

If I flip thru TV channels, the dubbed stuff I understand, but the regular stuff is still hard. Been living in Mexico 2 years now. Frustrating. I can follow long conversations better than short ones. I didn't know the correct way to ask what time it is until 2 weeks ago!

Question for people who have done this before: what types of material should I concentrate on? What should I be doing at this level?

I'm not sure I'm one to give you advice at your level. That being said, I think you are doing the right things. A regular small dose of high level grammar coupled with quite a bit of input like you are doing should really help. My basic philosophy now is to try mix a small percentage of C1 level grammar in with as much reading books and listening to audio (news) as possible. I really wish I could watch more telenovelas, but I just don't.

Do you use subtitles when you are watching TV? If so, I'd get rid of them. That would help a ton.

[nuncapense]

I'm still studying Spanish and still living in Mexico. I haven't been readying anything in Spanish except for short news posts on facebook that related to my life here. Since my last post I've spent a lot of time watching TV series and a couple movies. I'm getting back into reading, though, with a Sherlock Holmes book. Since I last tried to read this same book about a year ago, it's now much easier in comparison.

In a week or so, I'll add this Sherlock Holmes book to my list of books read.

I'm also looking for ways to listen to recorded Mexican Spanish. I haven't found a ton of podcasts, and I haven't found any that interest me. I don't need scholarly type stuff, but more like regular people joking around with each other, which doesn't really interest me. The language interests me though. I'm starting to like the sound of Mexican Spanish a lot and the way it works -- reading a Sherlock Holmes book translated in Spain, for instance, almost feels like a different language than Mexican Spanish.

I also walk around with headphones on now listening to 100 Years of Solitude or something.

I did find a Mexican standup comedian on netflix. I could understand him fine, which surprised me, and I realize he wasn't that funny.

Anyway, still alive, still studying Spanish.

EDIT: In response to what James wrote, no, I don't normally use subtitles. I'm not sure I agree with you though that they're a hinderance. I've heard that very advanced polyglots sometimes even use subs in their native language. Sometimes I forget to turn the Spanish subs off on something. Closed captioning in Spanish would really be a huge asset for intermediate and beginning learners I think, but so often the translations in the subs are different enough that it could be confusing for people.