A few days ago, I was in a bar and overheard a nearby patron talking in what sounded like an Australian accent. I was curious, so I asked him where he was from. Melbourne? Sydney? “No,” he told me, “I’m from Birmingham [England.]” Well, that sure made me feel like an ignorant American.
So - what differences are their between different Australian and English accents? Is it hard at all for native ears to tell the difference between North Atlantic english and South Pacific english?
I’ve not made a real study of it, but I can tell them apart (I’m from Indiana, so you-uns all talk funny all over the USA). OZzies seem to have more of an “edge” on their vowels. That’s really all I can say.
A Birmingham accent is very distinctive - it has severe rising inflection at the end of each sentence.
An Aussie accent is just very normal. 
Too many to list. For a start, the vowel are all shifted around. To an English person, when an Australian says fish and chips, we sound like we are saying “feesh and cheeps” and a Kiwi sounds like they are saying “fush and chups”. Australians sound very nasal to an English person, and they say we tend to drawl (which we do, though the degree of drawl depends on your socio/educational/regional background).
There are many other differences but I’m no linguist.
Hell. No.
In fact, (I’m not trying to be insulting here) I find a surprising number of Americans to be stunningly obtuse when it comes to accents (understanding them, recognising them).
Sorry neuroman but you have done nothing to alter my prejudices: again, I don’t mean to be insulting but to not be able to tell the difference between Strine and Brummie is, to a native, just unbelievable.
It is startlingly common for someone from the UK to be confused with an Aussie in the US, but quite why just baffles people from Australia and the UK.
Some popular culture references this, for example IIRC the episodes of “Only Fools and Horses” where Del-boy et al went to the US had a running joek where everyone thought they were Aussies.
Anyway, you think that is bad? The guy cleaning my room in Atlanta thought I was French. Yeah, my Warwickshire accent is soooooooo French-sounding.
This is not the first time I’ve heard an Amercian say this, but for me (a Brit) it seems unbelievable.
It should be mentioned that there are a really wide diversity of regional accents within spoken English just within the British Isles.
It probably comes down to familiarity; I’ve had trouoble telling a Canadian Accent from an American one before now (although I’m sure this sounds laughable to anyone from one of those countries).
It doesn’t because the difference between Canadian and American accents is minimal at best. The whole “aboot” thing is just hyperbole and is limited to certain segments of the Maritime (East Coast) population. Canadians with the strongest accent are from the Maritimes as well.
As a Canadian I have no trouble discerning the difference between a British and Australia accent, I can also break down regional British accents. But this probably has alot to do with both my parents being British and having visited England alot. In my travels I’ve met alot of Kiwis and Aussies and do have some trouble distinguishing the accent.
The biggest difference between Canadians and Americans is patterns of speech, not accent. Its small nuaces that stick out. For instance, Americans refer to levels in school as 1st Grade, 7th Grade, 12th Grade etc. Canadians reverse it, you’re in Grade 6, Grade 9, etc.
Trouble is that it is hard to objectively measure the difference or distance between accents. Personally (and entirely subjectively) I’d say there’s a greater difference between English as spoken by a (stereo)typical Glaswegian and a typical resident of Surrey, than there is between a typical resident of Portsmouth and a typical Australian.
Then again, other regional accents can be hard to tell apart - Somerset and Norfolk accents are quite similar (to my ear) even though they are on opposite sides of the isle.
:eek:
Forgive our astonishment, but this question is perhaps akin to someone asking, “Is it hard to tell the difference between North American and South American english?”
I’m no linguist, but to my ear the Australian accent is characterised by distinctly flat vowel sounds and a slightly nasal tone. English accents are too numerous to describe individually, but this page has a go at it.
Strewth mate! y’can’t tell when a blowke’s stalking 'strine?
There’s been alot of work done documeting the Austrailian accent and it is quite distinct from the numerous British accents.
Mangetout … East Anglians never roll their rrrrrrrrs, and West Country folk can’t seem to help it! 
I have always thought that the Aussie accent bears a striking resemblance to my native Suffolk, and I once read on the Net (sorry no cite, tho’ I’ve Googled for it) that this is because of the large proportion of Suffolk immigrants to Australia way back when.
Julie
Bear in mind too that the very nasal Australian accent is mostly found away from the cities, and even then tends to be amongst the older people (although there are exceptions to both of these). Australian vowels are now getting shorter and less pronounced; we are drifting towards a New Zealand accent. There have also been changes due to the large influx of migrants from the Mediterranean, SE Asia, and elsewhere. The “young urban” accent in Sydney and Melbourne reflects this. If you listen to a twenty year old Australian-born child of Asian parents, you will often find he has the same accent as his friend born of Greek parents. The speech is fast, clipped, and the vowels are swallowed. “Wheels” won’t be the “wheeeeeeeeaaalz” you’d expect from the traditional Aussie accent, but rather something like “Wooz”.
Bear in mind too that the very nasal Australian accent is mostly found away from the cities, and even then tends to be amongst the older people (although there are exceptions to both of these). Australian vowels are now getting shorter and less pronounced; we are drifting towards a New Zealand accent. There have also been changes due to the large influx of migrants from the Mediterranean, SE Asia, and elsewhere. The “young urban” accent in Sydney and Melbourne reflects this. If you listen to a twenty year old Australian-born child of Asian parents, you will often find he has the same accent as his friend born of Greek parents. The speech is fast, clipped, and the vowels are swallowed. “Wheels” won’t be the “wheeeeeeeeaaalz” you’d expect from the traditional Aussie accent, but rather something like “Wooz”.
In my experience, anyway.
I think the obtuseness is probably related to what you’re used to hearing. I recently met an english couple and we got to talking about accents, they were completely unable to tell the difference between a New England accent, a Texas accent, a Southern Accent, and a California accent. They were excellent at distinguishing between English and Australian accents though, go figure.
For all the Australians and English chiming in here: it seems obvious it would be easier to tell your accent from someone else’s, than it would to tell apart two distinct accents that are not your own. Americans have no troube distinguishing an American accent from virtually any other (except maybe Canadian).
I’d say this is probably less common though simply because of the number of American entertainment products the rest of the world is exposed to; for example I can usually tell the difference between a Texas (Tommy Lee Jones, James Garner) accent and an East coast (Woody Allen, Bruce Willis) one (despite what I said about American/Canadian accents above)
Whereas English characters are quite often protrayed by non-English actors (Dick Van Dyke, Kevin Costner),- who make such a terrible job of mimicking the accent, and indeed in these cases it is hard to tell if they are meant to be English or Australian or something else altogether.
(please note that I’m not implying that any nationality is worse than any other at mimicking another’s accent, my point is about the ubiquity of American entertainment).
I think we even once had some rather naive Californian person post here on the board asking “why does everyone else speak with an accent, when I don’t?”
Ah, but you managed to be insulting anyway, thanks!
I can certainly tell an Aussie from a Brit—In fact, I can frequently tell what part of England someone’s from. But South African accents throw me: I have mortally insulted South Africans by asking what part of England or Australia they’re from.
Can any of you furriners tell someone from Baltimore from someone from Virginia? Or a Texan from a Louisianan?
But the OP asked “Is it hard at all for native ears to tell the difference between North Atlantic english and South Pacific english?” so perhaps your remark ought to have been made in that direction?
Personally, I have no difficulty telling apart a person from Australia and New Zealand let alone a person from either of those countries and an American, a Canadian or a South African. It’s not simply a matter of comparing them with people from my own country.
Of course it certainly is a matter of familiarity and “getting your ear in” for the differences. That’s why people can confuse accents even from places close to home. I’m not certain I could tell a Baltimore accent from a Virginia accent (you’d have to give me some celebrity examples, Eve), but I think I’d be OK comparing a Texan and a Louisianan. It might depend what part of Texas they were from.
FTR, Mangetout, James Garner is from Oklahoma not Texas, but I’m not at all sure I could tell the difference between his accent and someone from elsewhere in the midwest.
If it’s any consolation to the OP I’d say that of all the British accents that might be confused with an Australian one the Birmingham accent would be the most likely. Of course, those of us from either country may be familiar with the differences, but describing them in writing is not easy.
For instance, antechinus (rightly) said that a Birmingham accent has severe rising inflection at the end of each sentence, but that’s also a notable characteristic of an Australian accent (i.e. the Australian Questioning Intonation). Princhester also said that to an English person, when an Australian says fish and chips, it sounds like he is saying “feesh and cheeps”, but many English people would give that as an example of a Birmingham pronunciation.
Americans just seem to have a tough time with Australian accents. Aussies and Brits always sound very different to me, but I’ve seem them confused often. Of course, the typical Aussie has a much more “colorful” vocabulary as well, which is often a dead give away.
I find the South African accent to be more similar to the Aussie accent, than the British one is. Still distinct, but closer.
But here in CA, I often hear people refer to an “East Coast accent” and it’s common to confuse a Bostonian with a New Yorker or Philadelphian. Having grown up mostly in New England, that is just laughable to me. On the other hand, I have difficulty telling if someone is from South Carolina or Texas. It’s just what you’re used to hearing, that’s all.