I find it interesting that in Newcastle upon Tyne and North East England in general people pronounce about as “aboot” and right as “reet” and round their o’s in words like “so” because I think of these linguistic features as Canadianisms. The Canadian accent is pretty Americanized among a lot of people but people with broad accents especially in the Prairies and Northern Ontario can sound very much like Geordies or Lowland Scots with a touch of French influence.
Was Canada in general heavily settled by people from North East England? I know there was a huge number of Scots that moved there and you generally encounter names like Robertson and Pattinson quite often, which are native to England’s far north and the Scottish Lowlands.
People often conflate Canadian and upper Midwestern accents. Canada doesn’t have that much Scandinavian heritage compared to Minnesota nor do I think there was that much migration between there and Canada, but Geordie is very similar sounding to Norwegian and Danish due to the Danish and Norse-Irish influence in the kingdom of Northumbria. So that could explain the similarity.
Yes. People in Canada have accents due to the people who settled here. There’s no such thing as a “Canadian accent.” People in Newfoundland do not sound like people from British Columbia, etc.
Also note that the US Upper Midwest (especially the Dakotas) also has a heavy German influence, which is also found elsewhere in the country as well (Pennsylvania being of note). This comes out sometimes in terms of English speakers using German word order and/or using calques from German. E.g. “Do you want to come with?” from Kommst du mit? and “Stupid-head” or “dumbhead” from Dummkopf.
I thought it was Scottish influence. I’ve noticed greater links between Canada and Scotland than the US and Scotland, but this could be confirmation bias. There is, obviously Nova Scotia in Canada, whereas Americans have New England (as well as New York, New Hamshire, etc.).
I guess when I say a “Canadian accent” I mean the dialect spoken south of the 60th parallel and anywhere between Ottawa and Tofino. I’d be excluding the North and Maritimes, and Newfoundland and Quebec of course.
Just like when people say an “American accent” they tend to mean the accent spoken in western states and in certain parts of the Midwest and urban Sunbelt.
That’s what it sounds like to me, a lot of the time. It’s more like “aboat” and “rate” though, if I was going to phonologize them. It’s proven fact Canadians are blind to hearing their own accents. My Canadian friend says I have a “drawl” yet in my mind I sound the same as people on television. People can’t really hear their own accents unless they have a reference to compare it to in real life … the mind processes recorded voices differently.
