What's your accent (in your native language)?

[Elta]

My mom is from Mexico and My dad is from the New Jersey's Tri state area, but he was also rasied in rural Illinois and Southern California. My White Grandmother is from the south and had a very thick accent. All of that did rub off on me a little bit, but it is hardly noticeable unless I say particular words.

Essentially I have a west coast chicano accent (People from Texas sound different even with a chicano accent).

I also have a very strong lisp.

Here is a video where I am talking (slight profanity, I was a little bit high at the time and had just got done working a long shift.

My accent is much less sharp when I am at work etc

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bd9lDIRDpiY video below of how I sound with friends/family.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=md_8WJzhsow - Another person with the same accent I have



In Spanish I clearly sound American (Drop hard Ds at the end of words etc) in my opinion, but in Mexico I get mistaken for Argentinan a lot, I think it's because my step grandpa is from there and I use a lot of Argentine phrases.

There is a legitimate "Canadian English" now?

How do you differentiate it from the (sort of) Standard American English?

There are similarities to rural northern midwestern Americans, but it is easy to spot a Canadian. Sure fire way - ask them to say Sorry. They all pronounce that word in a most strange way.

 

[Joecoolyo]

There are similarities to rural northern midwestern Americans, but it is easy to spot a Canadian. Sure fire way - ask them to say Sorry. They all pronounce that word in a most strange way.

YES

My Brain Studies teacher is Canadian, and that's literally the only word he still has an accent on.

It sounds so weird.

 

[ParkCungHee]

Whoa, not bad at all. I couldn't get a single damn word when he did the British ones, though

With Russian he wasn't very succesfull. For some strange reason, it is assumed that when doing Russian accent, the consonants should sound especially strong. Which is very far from true. In fact, the biggest feature of Russian language are palalalized (i.e. softened) consonants.

Hollywood Russian accent isn't accurate at all. Here's a dude faking an American perception of Russian language:


Link to video.

I've always wondered how unified the Russian language is.

Can you tell where someone is from by their accent? In there an "Eastern" accent in Russian? Do people from Moscow and Petrograd talk differently? Since Winner brought it up, do you have class based accents?

Okay, I'm done flooding you with questions.

 

[emzie]

YES

My Brain Studies teacher is Canadian, and that's literally the only word he still has an accent on.

It sounds so weird.

Like sore-ey? I don't hear it that often, or maybe I stopped noticing.

 

[Joecoolyo]

Like sore-ey? I don't hear it that often, or maybe I stopped noticing.

Yes, something like that, with a big emphasis on the sore part.

 

[Veles]

I've always wondered how unified the Russian language is.

Can you tell where someone is from by their accent? In there an "Eastern" accent in Russian? Do people from Moscow and Petrograd talk differently? Since Winner brought it up, do you have class based accents?

Okay, I'm done flooding you with questions.

That's perfectly ok, bro.

I sorta answered most of your questions already earlier in this thread.

In more details:

You can only tell where one is from by the accent if it's really pronounced, which is rarely the case and almost always indicate rural origin of the speaker. If he pronounces /g/ as /h/, he's from the Don regions or Ukraine. If he actually pronounces /o/ where there should be /a/, he's from the European North: Vologda, Archangelsk, etc. (To clarify this a bit: the standart way of pronouncing, say, Moskva is Maskva. Just how in English you would pronounce 'come on' as 'cahm on', not 'cohm on', that would sound weird.) If he kinda slightly reduces first vowels after consonants (like says kneshno instead of koneshno, or kroche instead of koroche), he's from the Pacific coastal provinces or, less likely, from the Ural territories.

Overall, I'd say Russian language is remarkably unified throughout the country, which is rather amazing actually, given the size of the land. There are no mutually unintelligible dialects, that for sure. Compare it to Ireland, where they don't even have a common set of rules for languge.

"In there an "Eastern" accent in Russian?" Only if you mean non-Slavic (non-white) minorities, which all combined are about 15% of the population. The quirk of Siberian and Pacific white dudes is slightly reducing vowels, like I mentioned. And they generally talk faster, at least it's my impression.

"Do people from Moscow and Petrograd talk differently?" Nope. Not pronounciation-wise at least. But some times we have differents words for the same thing and it's an big source of jokes and friendly pun. Generally, St. Pete's folks are regarded as more cultured, but also more out of touch with reality, romatics of sorts.

"Do you have class based accents?" Nope. Although some things, like pronouncing /g/ like /h/ is associated with farmers and rural peasant folk. That's just a stereotype, but you wouldn't be hired as talkshow host on the radio with it, that's fo sho.

 

[Pangur Bán]

Palatalization is also a feature of many Irish accents (and some Scottish accents).

 

[Elta]

Overall, I'd say Russian language is remarkably unified throughout the country, which is rather amazing actually

According to Robin Dunbar (Big time Anthropologist) - Language variety has almost nothing at all to do with distance and everything to do with population size. The theory is that languages changed in order to weed out who is a member of an in group or out group. Not sure if I trust that theory. But the idea that variety in language has to do with population and not distance holds water time and time again.

 

[Pangur Bán]

This is brilliant! He has to be British or at least not American though, judging by the # of US accents he did vs # of UK accents.

I think his name is George Agdgdgwngo.

EDIT: His Twitter says he's from Edinburgh.

He appears to have some Scottish connection anyway, I don't find it plausible that he could do four different Scottish accents so well without some connection. However, when he starts the video he's using a US accent ... maybe faking it or maybe a student in Edinburgh perhaps.

 

[Veles]

Palatalization is also a feature of many Irish accents (and some Scottish accents).

Yeah, I've noticed that. By the way, if you could be bothered, it would be interesting to know, how ok is that little Scottish folk-song, performed by Russian band, sounds to you, pronounciation-wise?

...the idea that variety in language has to do with population and not distance holds water time and time again.

What about 4 mil Eire, with it's own language in every village?

 

[sophie]

You guys should check this guy out:


Link to video.

He's American I gather, but for some strange reason the four Scottish accents he does are very accurate, creepily accurate almost. Not often you hear an American doing a decent Scottish accent either, far from ones that good!

His Californian accent is not so good. His South African one is great though!

 

[Mise]

He appears to have some Scottish connection anyway, I don't find it plausible that he could do four different Scottish accents so well without some connection. However, when he starts the video he's using a US accent ... maybe faking it or maybe a student in Edinburgh perhaps.

He says "this isn't my real accent" at the start when he describes the American accent he's speaking in.

 

[Pangur Bán]

@Mise, missed that. Guess that explains it.

Yeah, I've noticed that. By the way, if you could be bothered, it would be interesting to know, how ok is that little Scottish folk-song, performed by Russian band, sounds to you, pronounciation-wise?

Nice puirt a beul. They've done their pronunciation research for sure.

 

[Leoreth]

There are similarities to rural northern midwestern Americans, but it is easy to spot a Canadian. Sure fire way - ask them to say Sorry. They all pronounce that word in a most strange way.

"Come on Jessica, come on Tory,
let's go to the mall, you won't be so-ry"

 

[otago]

I sound like this bloke when speaking English, in the USA and Canada most thought I was English from the accent.
In the USA an Aussie picked me as being a Kiwi from the jar of Marmite on the table at breakfast along with being Polynesian.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WkoR8qBSUtY

 

[Dachs]

According to Robin Dunbar (Big time Anthropologist) - Language variety has almost nothing at all to do with distance and everything to do with population size. The theory is that languages changed in order to weed out who is a member of an in group or out group. Not sure if I trust that theory. But the idea that variety in language has to do with population and not distance holds water time and time again.

I'm reasonably certain that there is a larger population of natively English-speaking Americans than there is of natively English-speaking Britishers, you know, on the order of 'hundreds of millions more', yet is it not generally agreed that there are many more varieties of British English than there are of American English?

 

[Tabarnak]

Standard(most common) French Canadian here. There is 3 other varieties(bigger accent) of this language in some distant regions of the province of Québec.

Common : Montreal(Monteregian, Laurentian), Québec and Outaouais regions(and some more)
Others : Acadian, Gaspesian, Saguenayan

Acadian is certainly the funniest to hear. I even have some difficulties to understand what they say for some people with a really big accent.

 

[thomas.berubeg]

My English is some weird hybrid of New Jersey, Georgia, and Toronto.

My French is Quebecois, with small hints of Anglophone.

 

[kochman]

Standard(most common) French Canadian here. There is 3 other varieties(bigger accent) of this language in some distant regions of the province of Québec.

Common : Montreal(Monteregian, Laurentian), Québec and Outaouais regions(and some more)
Others : Acadian, Gaspesian, Saguenayan

Acadian is certainly the funniest to hear. I even have some difficulties to understand what they say for some people with a really big accent.

Can you expand on the Acadian?
I know a lot about their history, as my girlfriend is mainly Acadian French (from main)... She told me she really has a hard time with traditional French, because they are so different.
Can you pinpoint the differences? She really couldn't as a barely even part time speaker.
I find it fascinating.

 

[aronnax]

My first language is English, though what kind, I cannot tell you.
Most people will immediately notice that my accent sounds foreign and assumed that I lived overseas in either UK, USA or Australia.
However, I asked a couple of Americans, Europeans and Brazilians and they think my accent is neither British, American or Australian, but a massive mix of General American tone, British inflections and stress with a couple of oddball Chinese (Or what they perceive to be Chinese) influences smashed together.

My Chinese language accent is far more localised, though more formal than the Singaporean Chinese accented speaking is.