When I was taking a German class in England, the teacher asked me why I was speaking with a French accent. Before I could say anything, my ex-wife (who grew up in France), who was also taking the class, fired back, “That’s not a French accent.” And she should have known, after being told off the same year by her Modern Icelandic teacher for speaking that language with a French accent.
One of my french teachers (my first, actually) was from Niece, France (spelling? I think I got it right). My entire class spoke like a southern french person.
My spanish is obviously baja california, but my voice changes completely. It goes all smooth sounding, like a cross between a late night dj and phone sex chick. It’s embarrassing, especially in parent conferences, and I wish I could make it stop.
I can also speak spanish with a Castilian accent, thanks to a foreign exchange student friend, but vocab differences give me away.
My Japanese also has a few Kansai expressions - this is western Japan. But, I don’t use them around people I don’t know well, because lots of Japanese are already inclined to laugh at foreigners who use their language. (This is encouraged all the time by the media; Japanese-speaking foreigners are on tv purely for comedy value all the time.)
Anyway, back to my point: this is doubly true when the foreigner uses a dialect, so I don’t do it around people I don’t know well. It’s not a good country to commit murder, and I’m already this close… about six times daily.
Is this true in your experience as a speaker of Kansai-ben, jovan?