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Accents / what do you sound like?

Sadie

Sadie

Bluelight Crew
Joined
May 30, 2010
Messages
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Jess got me thinking, accents are odd and wonderful. Let's put accents to names. What do you sound like? Feel free to give an audio sample if you're in the mood.

I'm from Texas but live in Scotland. ive lived in Virginia, California, Germany and England. I'm a mutt it seems. I've been asked if I am Canadian, Irish, Australian and South African. ( that last one made me laugh)
 
Lol, I've got that Missouri twang goin on. Might provide a vocal sample if someone explains how lol.
 
I know theres a few ways. We did this in EADD. It's too late for me to look up now though.

I'd love to hear your accent.

We should come up with a paragrah or two for people to say if they felt so inclined.
 
It'd be kind of nice, accents have always interested me. There's alot of different ones around here.
 
I too am from Texas. Coupled with the four years I spent living in Arki'sas, I've got a bit of a southern drawl. Like the word Texas is drawn out when I say it, things like that. And I like the term 'y'all', as it's so damn useful. And I often use terms such as 'fixin' to' and 'mosey'. And when I'm drunk and driving in my convertible I like to shout 'yeeeehawwww!!!!' when I think no one can here me.
 
Lol gotta love those regional things, we say Missouri as (mizzer-uh) or the misssippi river lol.
 
I have an australian accent but frequently get mistaken for a brit because i enunciate.
 
Audio samples would be cool cause it's probably more accurate than self description, only problem (apart from privacy which would likely be of concern for some, but could be mitigated by only having the clip up for a few days) is how to easily do it. It can be done with YouTube but YouTube is more designed for video than audio by itself. Not sure what other easy services could be used for anyone interested.

Regardless, not sure exactly what my accent sounds like, it's definitely entirely or almost entirely American but within that rather broad category it's probably a bit of a hybrid.

spacejunk said:
I have an australian accent but frequently get mistaken for a brit because i enunciate.
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Mistaken by Australians or some other group? Perception of accents is relative to your own accent. Like how Australians can have a hard time telling apart Americans and Canadians and Americans and Canadians can have a hard time telling apart Australian and new Zealand accents.

Took me years before I could tell New Zealand and Australian accents apart.
 
I was born in North Carolina, lived in Texas, Washington, and now live in Oregon. So I guess I sound white. I have a bit of a Southern accent that comes and goes.
 
I grew up in the edge of the Chicago suburbs. I always felt like my accent was "neutral", ie, I didn't have one (but maybe everyone feels that way). At age 22 I moved to North Carolina, and I realized I did have an accent. I've lived here for 13 years now and I feel like I sound like all the other non-natives. I have grown to love the mid-southern accent, and I find myself using it in casual communications such as speaking to the cashier at the grocery store. I also like to say "y'all" but I'm guessing that to a native I still sound like a yankee. I guess at this point I have a bit of a hodgepodge. My family tells me my accent has changed when I visit them but I only notice it occasionally when I speak to people from here (and in my town most people are transplants from all over and sound "neutral" to me).

Certainly I sound very American. I was just wondering, how much do people from other countries differentiate various areas of American? To me they differ greatly. The most different from from anywhere else is the northeast ("New England") states. My drummer in my band is from Rhode Island and he sounds pretty neutral except for some words, and when he wants to accentuate his accent, which I find hilarious and which he basically only does for the sake of being funny. There are also some funny midwest words... for example, the word "wash" is pronounced like "warsh" in some places.
 
English speakers can generally tell apart the most notable different accents like Scottish VS British or some American accents, but a lot of the more subtle different accents will sound the same to someone who speaks in a different accent all together. Hence my above example of Americans being unable to tell apart Australian and new Zealand and their inability to tell apart many American accents and Canadian accents.

Everyone has an accent, strictly speaking there's no such thing as not having an accident. But since you often don't hear your own accents or other accents you're frequently exposed too since a young age, it's easy to feel like you can't hear any accent and feel like there isn't one. But it's just a perception trick, other people can hear it.

Fot example, you and I might hear a lot of American accents and have it sound to us like we aren't hearing an accent, it just sounds neutral. But it's not. To an Australian or British person even the most neutral American accent is probably pretty noticeable.

Likewise, I immediately register someone speaking with an Australian or British accent, but presumably Australians or British barely hear it amongst other Australians or British. It's all relative.

Likewise the further an accent is from one your brain is familiar with the more difficulty you'll have telling it apart from a similar accent. While someone who speaks it can hear the difference quite easily.

One of the most notable and easily noticed differences between most American accents and most British and Australian accents is rhoticity. The tendency to drop or pronounce the r sounds at the end of words. Like car or bar ending with an r sound or an ah sound. Most American accents include the r sound with a couple exceptions and most British accents again with a couple exceptions do not.
 
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A strong accent is like watching a new language being born. It's amazing.

I'll admit though I've been frustrated a few times seeing English get subtitled when the speaker seemed totally intelligible to me (which is definitely not the case here).
 
I always thought that South Africans didn't have an accent I will see if I can do a sound clip saying something and I'll post
 
South Africans have an accent and it's one I actually think is kinda neat. I had a teacher who was a white south African and that's how I learned to recognize the accent. And he was one of the only cool educators I've ever encountered.

Couldn't even begin to describe the accent and I probably couldn't mimick it, but I know it when I hear it. People who aren't familiar with either sometimes confuse South African English and Australian English, but they are quite different.
 
Yes we have also got people that speak Afrikaans which has a distinctive accent but English I didn't think we did lol.
Will definitely try post a sound bite
 
JessFR said:
Mistaken by Australians or some other group? Perception of accents is relative to your own accent. Like how Australians can have a hard time telling apart Americans and Canadians and Americans and Canadians can have a hard time telling apart Australian and new Zealand accents.

Took me years before I could tell New Zealand and Australian accents apart.
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Mistaken by australians and brits. I grew up in pretty international groups of people, i guess. Don't have a "broad" accent because of that, i guess - and i'm "educated".
 
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BehindtheShadow said:
Yes we have also got people that speak Afrikaans which has a distinctive accent but English I didn't think we did lol.
Will definitely try post a sound bite
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Haha, for Americans, you guys have probably the most extreme accent of English speakers. Or at least that's how it seems to me. :) Really, accent is just a word that describes whatever it is you sound like.
 
Australian accent.

It's not as strong as some here. I travel extensively and lived overseas so I put more effort into pronunciation because it helps foreigners understand and my father was born and raised in England. That said, I've been back in the country for 4-5 years so I probably sound more Australian now.

The weird part about been back is getting use to the word 'cunt' been used excessively, for everything and as a form of endearment, especially in blue-collar work. I've tried to explain this to international friends.. I swear we're the only Anglo country that uses that word in a completely different way.
 
In America, cunt is a pretty intense word, people don't use it that much in my experience. We use bitch a lot though. I think all English versions use fuck as one of the most versatile words. I think it's interesting how slang is such a big part of English, and how it changes rapidly and regionally and is very different if you go to another country, to the point that it can be hard to understand what people are talking about.
 
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