The many questions-not-worth-their-own-thread question thread XVII

[Ajidica]

Any tips for maintaing accents throughout a live presentation?
For Mock Trial I was assigned the role of a russian taxi cab driver and I'm a bit concerned over my ability to pull off an accent consistantly without starting to laugh or dropping it halfway through.

 

[Syno]

Any tips for maintaing accents throughout a live presentation?
For Mock Trial I was assigned the role of a russian taxi cab driver and I'm a bit concerned over my ability to pull off an accent consistantly without starting to laugh or dropping it halfway through.

Practice it a lot until the comedy value wears off. Be sure to often stop speaking so you can redo your accent, because extended amounts of time speaking with a forced accent will gradually reduce back to your normal accent without you really noticing.

That's pretty much all I can advise.

 

[madviking]

Any tips for maintaing accents throughout a live presentation?
For Mock Trial I was assigned the role of a russian taxi cab driver and I'm a bit concerned over my ability to pull off an accent consistantly without starting to laugh or dropping it halfway through.

Find a phrase that you can say in the accent automatically. If you ever lose your accent, use it to regain it.

 

[shadowplay]

I know that they are referred to as Commonwealth Realms but what are their 'official' names?

Like, the UK is the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and Mexico is the United Mexican States.

Was the name Dominion of XXX ever a legal name? If not, what is their legal name? Or are they like Japan, whose official name is just Japan.

I believe this answers your question:

The transition away from the use of Dominion was formally reflected in 1982 with the passage of the Canada Act, which refers only to Canada. Later in 1982, the national holiday was renamed from Dominion Day to Canada Day. Section 4 of the 1867 BNA Act also declares that:

"Unless it is otherwise expressed or implied, the Name Canada shall be taken to mean Canada as constituted under this Act."

and this has been interpreted to mean that the name of the country is simply Canada. No constitutional statute amends this name, and the subsequent Canada Act 1982 does not use the term dominion

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Name_of_Canada

In my own experience, I've only ever heard "Dominion of Canada" in historical contexts.

 

[Ajidica]

Find a phrase that you can say in the accent automatically. If you ever lose your accent, use it to regain it.

Thanks. Anything to keep in mind when doing a Russian accent? I'll probably end up cribbing it from SCTV's CCCP1 sketches though.

Link to video.

 

[madviking]

Thanks. Anything to keep in mind when doing a Russian accent? I'll probably end up cribbing it from SCTV's CCCP1 sketches though.

Roll r's.
Drop articles.
Reference random Soviet cities (e.g., Sevastopol).
Talk about your babushka. (pro: ba-BUSH-ka)

 

[aronnax]

Central Edinburgh's a nice place, if you can stand the yuppies. Not quite as cosmopolitan as it might think- most immigrants can't exactly afford the prices- but more so than most places in the UK, and the student body is at least quite diverse. It's where the Scots have decided to keep all their culture, on the basis that they seem to have a better idea of what to do with it than the rest of us, so you won't end up with a feeling of provincial abandonment as you might in, say, a certain town about fifty miles North. If you can afford it- it's a bit pricey by local standards, but, then, I don't really know what that would mean from a Singaporean perspective- I'd say that you wouldn't regret it.

Thanks! The feedback is good. In terms of price, UK in general is expensive to study. And my other choices are London universities so that is even worse.

But, aronnax? If you are going to study in the UK, won't you miss Singapore?

You cheeky little devil.

 

[aimeeandbeatles]

I found one of those things you plug into an outlet to give you extra outlets (it's not a power-strip). I had a lamp plugged directly into the outlet without any issue. I plugged the extender thing in and plugged the lamp in and a big white spark came out. So I deplugged it. Should I use it or get another one? (At the hardware store down the street they're not too much. I saw them when I was getting nails.)

 

[Cutlass]

It's probably no good.You shouldn't use those any more than you really have to.

 

[Flying Pig]

I found one of those things you plug into an outlet to give you extra outlets (it's not a power-strip). I had a lamp plugged directly into the outlet without any issue. I plugged the extender thing in and plugged the lamp in and a big white spark came out. So I deplugged it. Should I use it or get another one? (At the hardware store down the street they're not too much. I saw them when I was getting nails.)

In general, plugging too much into one socket is asking for trouble.

 

[aimeeandbeatles]

I got another one and there was no spark. The thing is I had an extension cord plugged in one and I needed to plug in a lamp and a clock to the other one and there was only 1 outlet left.

When you have a 2-litre bottle carbonated drink, why is it by the time you get to the bottom it always goes flat and yucky?

 

[Silurian]

I got another one and there was no spark. The thing is I had an extension cord plugged in one and I needed to plug in a lamp and a clock to the other one and there was only 1 outlet left.

When you have a 2-litre bottle carbonated drink, why is it by the time you get to the bottom it always goes flat and yucky?

Start drinking from the bottom

or

Drink it faster
Try to be gentle with the bottle so less of the CO2 comes out.
Close the cap asap

 

[_random_]

When you have a 2-litre bottle carbonated drink, why is it by the time you get to the bottom it always goes flat and yucky?

Because you're not chugging your pop fast enough.

 

[Leoreth]

Thanks. Anything to keep in mind when doing a Russian accent?

In addition to what madviking suggested, mess with vowel lengths. Altering a vowel's length doesn't change a word's meaning in Russian, so make long vowels shorter and (especially) short vowels longer.

 

[SS-18 ICBM]

Any tips for maintaing accents throughout a live presentation?
For Mock Trial I was assigned the role of a russian taxi cab driver and I'm a bit concerned over my ability to pull off an accent consistantly without starting to laugh or dropping it halfway through.

Is the accent only for show or is it supposed to test the lawyers' ability to judge truthfulness and their understanding of what was said despite such a difficulty?

 

[Cutlass]

When you have a 2-litre bottle carbonated drink, why is it by the time you get to the bottom it always goes flat and yucky?

Because if you don't finish it in a couple of days, the bubbles have time and room to expand into the air space.

 

[PlutonianEmpire]

A year ago or two, my local TV news station hosted a live chatroom on a subject. I had never gone to their chatrooms in my life, yet when I went there to make my very first comment in the chatroom, it told me that I was blocked or banned from there, even though I had never in my life participated in that station's forum or chatroom.

Why would that happen?

 

[Cutlass]

Flexible IP addresses. Someone with the IP you have now might have had it in the past and been banned.

 

[Verarde]

Flexible IP addresses. Someone with the IP you have now might have had it in the past and been banned.

Interesting. Perhaps that explains why lucasforums.com won't allow me in.

 

[Cutlass]

There could be other explanations. That one just comes to mind.