Thanks for all of your comments guys! A lot of you brought up some very good points about speaking with accents, and I just thought I'd explore it, if not try to open up the discussion a bit more. After all, this is a blog on education!
While it's true, as Alexander mentions, that they don't quite go away unless it's tackled early, I definitely think accents can be still played around with, albeit with more difficulty and more learning. It can be learnt, amplified, decreased, eliminated. The Vancouver School Board offers night classes for adults who wish to reduce their accent a bit. In fact, one of my professors was giving business interview tips to a classmate, and the specific advice was that he may want to consider taking one of these night classes. And I don't know how effective they are in the first place, but really I bet even a few classes would help immensely.
Ozh1565 brings up a great point about prioritizing... What good is having a flawless accent if you can't even use the language properly without butchering it to bits? That being said, I know some very able speaker/writers who sound like they just got off a boat... And no offense to anyone here, but I think some accents in particular, like say Chinese (the Chinese culture is strong in Vancouver) really takes away some of the credibility of your English speaking skills. This one girl I went to high school with knew every grammar rule in the book; crossed her t's and dotted her i's. Top of her class too... But when I first met her, I remember thinking she was horrible at English because of the accent. Yes it's a judgement... But that's what it is!
On that note, Ian Maguire mentions that indeed an individual's accent is not only a factor of his speech and personality, but it really colours his cultural background as well. On the Irish/Scottish English note, it's interesting to see how some accents can definitely sound better than others, even just by association. Some sound smart, some sound sexy, some sound just plain retarded... Pick your flavour!
AnthropoSeptic: I feel ya man... I had Japanese, Persian, Indian, and African accent-heavy profs all in one term. I stopped going to the lectures eventually and it made no visible difference...
And last but not least, just wanted to share with you guys a TV actor who is incredible with accents... Hugh Laurie, or as some might better know him as, House! I remember being completely blown away when I first found out he was British. Given that he is, he probably has THE most American-est sounding accent I've heard. I'm a big fan of the show, and I invite you guys to watch it with me!
Sorry if I missed you in the shoutouts, but there were just so many comments =D.
Keep 'em rollin' y'all!
MY sccent is scotttiiish
ReplyDeleteI don't have an accent coz I don't speak english
ReplyDeleteyap :3
Accents do make a big difference.
ReplyDeleteI have a southern US accent and it kind of makes me sound like a hillbilly.
Mine is german, hahah
ReplyDeleteBaxxmans
wtf? didn't know hes British...
ReplyDeletebtw check this out:
can we call it accent? :D
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F9chyDy2quk
interesting points from fellow bloggers. :)
ReplyDeleteinteresting comments from fellow bloggers. :)
ReplyDeletei hate my accent, everyone knows instantly from where i am...
ReplyDeletelol..up until I was 13 my teachers were from the US and UK. then I moved to another country and then most teachers were Asian. I believe accents develop mostly during lower school, but the influence afterwards matters a lot too. Most people I come across say I have a misplaced accent..a bit of everything :)
ReplyDeleteI think I have typical middle US East Coast accent. Maybe with a little bit of a southern touch. To me, I have a hard time even understanding some American accents, like Louisianan or thick New York. I had several Indian professors (physics/calculus/comp sci is full of them), it's one of those things. How do you expect me to fully comprehend what you want me to do when I can't comprehend you. The worst was when my physics teacher was my lab teacher, he always harshed on me for skipping lecture, but I couldn't understand him, so there was no point in going. I aced the lab portion, but failed the lecture (which has the higher grade). How does that figure? Showing that you can actually do physics is worth less then expressing your knowledge on poorly worded questions.
ReplyDeleteMy accent is british and it's not as strong of an accent as most films/tv series' refer to it as.
ReplyDeleteHugh Laurie is fantastic. I love how Americans don't know he's British ;]
ReplyDeleteDammit I hate it when I have nothing to add :)
ReplyDeletei always had the feeling that people with accents can get away with bad jokes more easily. like when they're trying to be funny, people laugh as if thinking "well considering he is so bad at [language X] this was a remarkable attempt at humor... "
ReplyDelete=) I can have an australian accent, a French, a Dutch, a ''texas'' flat american accent, and I can speak normal reasonable english...
ReplyDelete(other then this I also speak 4 languages FR NL GER and EN)
i tend to think i have no accent, but other ppl always prove me wrong ;_;
ReplyDeleteI wish I could get rid of my Finnish accent. I don't think it's easy or even possible though.
ReplyDeleteI love him!
ReplyDeleteI was blown away by Laurie's normal voice as well. Then I watched Black Adder and everything made sense.
ReplyDeleteI was born in quebec and I'm working/living in the UK, so my accent is rather weird at the moment.
ReplyDeletelol video is pretty funny
ReplyDeleteInteresting read. Here in the UK there are hundreds of accents, I grew up not 3 miles away from my wife yet she speaks with a thick Black Country (Yam Yam) accent and I speak with a Birmingham (Brummie) twang.
ReplyDeleteIt's strange how, say a londoner, will hear our accents as the same, whereas we can go as far as to locate where each of us are from to a five mile radius only going off how they sound.
I love accents! I know a couple Australians and I could listen to their accent all day.
ReplyDeleteAccents have always fascinated me a bit, because even though we consider ourselves to have no accent in America, if I grew up in some other country with a different accent, I'd feel the same exact way.
ReplyDeleteI remember Hugh Laurie from British comedy years ago, but the accent is so good on the show I can't get over House having an English accent now.
ReplyDeleteGood clip - I knew them all except for 'flossing'. (I thought it meant wearing a G-string.)
i dont have an accent, my english is pretty perfect
ReplyDeletemy accent is Scottish too ;P
ReplyDeletenice post
Heh, cool post. I consider myself good at doing accents.
ReplyDeleteI think I have a little french or german accent..
ReplyDeletehttp://all-around-toto.blogspot.com/
I love Hugh Laurie :D it's quite amazing how he manages to sound like a true American..
ReplyDeleteI really want to learn another language, but im afraid my accent will be so heavy.
ReplyDeleteI think an accent is a valuable part of someone's heritage... although that doesn't make it any easier to understand the professor when s/he has a really thick one.
ReplyDeletewowbanksta.blogspot.com
Some interesting takes on it. Thanks
ReplyDeleteI knew Hugh Laurie from Blackadder and when I heard his American accent on House it just sounded fake to me.
ReplyDeleteHugh Laurie is a great actor!
ReplyDeleteHugh Laurie is always relevant.
ReplyDeleteI personally find more posh English accents highly attractive (e.g. Keira Knightly), but it's more like an added bonus. Proper grammar is much more important.
I wish I still had the accent that I had back when I was younger, then I could impress my friends even more ;p
ReplyDeleteAs the above poster says, knowing Hugh Laurie from his other ventures does make it sound like he's putting it on a bit heavy with his American accent. Yet you guys across the sea go crazy for it :\
ReplyDeleteI grew up with a pretty thick Canadian maritime accent. I kind of miss it.
ReplyDelete"Jeeves and Wooster" is also a great series from early 90's. Hugh Laurie playing the main character Wooster.
ReplyDeletei can't watch house without seeing him as a stupid upperclass bumbling fool (see Jeeves and Wooster)..great actor though...
ReplyDeleteI sat through a presentation today by KPMG, from a woman who had the weirdest accent. It was a cross between broad English West Country and New Yorker...i had to literally bite my lip everytime she spoke.
Accents everyone a little more character!
ReplyDeleteAccents give everyone a bit more character!
ReplyDeleteHugh Laurie is awesome. i've lived in different places in the US and caught myself picking up different accents without even realizing it.
ReplyDeletei remember we once had an indian teacher speaking japanese, it was really hard to understand japanese back then but on an indian accent it was plainly imposible.
ReplyDeleteWhat sort of accent do you sport? Do you change daily? nice blog.
ReplyDeletesuch amazing infos,cant wait for more
ReplyDeletefollowed,MC'd
I sound like someone from the west coast, which I am. I don't know if that's affected someone's impression of me, yet.
ReplyDeleteWhat a great actor.
ReplyDeletewhen laurie auditioned for house they actually didnt know he was british. they yelled at the majority of the auditioners because they were british and they wanted someone who spoke english right like laurie. hahaa
ReplyDeletethat clip was pretty funny. had no idea he was british.
ReplyDeletehugh laurie does do an awesome american accent, personally my accent drifts kind of all over the place since i moved around a lot growing up.
ReplyDeleteGreat video, made me want to see the rest of that interview.
ReplyDeleteI think we might have an easier time understanding each other if we were exposed to lots of accents at an early age.
what university do you attend?
ReplyDeletenever heard of this guy, going to watch the vid
ReplyDeleteAfter living on the west cost for about three years I begin to realize that I do intact have an accent, a mideastern american accent.
ReplyDeleteI am so fascinated by accents! I find them interesting to listen to and try. Some days I'll just go around talking in a British accent. People ask me where I'm from. It's great.
ReplyDeleteAhaha i think british accents are nice d;
ReplyDeleteI'm so used to seeing him on house with his american accent, its so odd to hear him with his real voice D:
ReplyDelete