Since moving over to the US 5 months ago, I have had many reactions to my accent. For those who do not know, I am British and I have a Yorkshire accent.
I started work a month ago on a help desk (which is why I have not been around much recently). My job involves talking to people on the phone. I have had several people comment on my accent and ask me where I am from. I have also had some of my colleagues mention my accent, some of them have been teasing me that people will ring up even when they don’t have a problem just to hear me speak.
Anyway, one unexpected benefit is that people seem to be really nice to me every now and again. Not that people are rude the rest of the time.
Take tonight, for example. I stopped to get a half dozen donuts on the way home tonight. I pulled up to the window and gave my order. The woman commented on my accent and asked me where I am from then when she gave me the donuts she mentioned that she had put some more in there for me Score! That’s how I came home with 10 donuts.
There is a downside to having an accent though. Sometimes people can’t understand what I am saying. It is a pain in the arse sometimes and my wife will occasionally step in and speak if they are struggling. Some of the problem could be some of the phrases I use, people aren’t used to them. I guess they are not expecting the accent either.
Has anyone one else experienced positive or negative effects because of their accent when they are in another country? Anyone else got free stuff because of it?
Heh. I’ve gotten reactions like that without leaving the country. I’m from Louisiana originally, and I was once stopped on the street in Atwater, California (by friends of the relatives I was visiting) and asked to pronounce “New Orleans”. One of my cousins got rather testy with me, because for the entire duration of my visit, his girlfriend ignored him in favor of talking to me. No doubt much of that was the result of my natural charm and wit, but I’m willing to give my (really quite faint) accent some of the credit.
I love accents. Sometimes I wish my girlfriend had more of a Boston accent. Usually the most I can get out of her is a “sawr” instead of “saw”. Her sister doesn’t have one either, but her parents have it.
Yeah, I got shite occasionally when I was on a help desk here – I have a Canadian accent and the kind of jackoffs that hate American’s off the bat are also the kind that can’t tell a Canadian accent and are also the kind that will be happy to have a go at you over the phone.
I have a British accent too, apparently!
And I’m Austrailan.
And I always have been.
And I haven’t even VISITED the UK.
Yet I’ve been asked if I was British about three times now.
The goldfish is Canadian? Why didn’t someone tell me? Canadian accents make me melt. (you don’t happen to own a deaf dog, do you?)
I often get asked if I’m a New Zealander - I guess Victorian accents are more like NZ accents than New South Wales ones. (Don’t get me started on Western Australian syntax).
I love going to Denmark. Although the average Dane will swear he can’t hear the difference between Swedish and Norwegian, they can hear from my Norwegian that I’m not-quite-native. So they ask where I’m from. When they hear I’m an American, who is trying to speak Norwegian to Danes and understand Danish in return, I get seriously schmoozed
(Note to Danes: Can you please please do something about that counting system? But don’t change the bakeries one bit. Thanks.)
I hate having an accent personally, but that’s just because I hate the assumptions people make about me because of it. Unfortunately there’s nothing I can do about it because I couldn’t put on a Dublin accent to save my life…
Walking into a Fatburger in Riverside, CA the other week was fun. I was there with Spiny Norman, whose accent is a bit stronger than mine. So, the lady at the counter asks him where he’s from. So he responds: “I’m from the South Bay area” with a distinct Danish accent. When she turned to me (the guy whose accent she didn’t see as odd), I answered I live in the Netherlands.
Then she continued her part of the conversation in part American, part botched up German, and the rest North Yorkshire. It was quite surreal.
English is not my first language, and once I start talking people realize that and may arrive to the correct conclusion I am Hispanic. My basic problem, which I’ve had a few times, is that people repeat what they say, as if I didn’t understand it…or say I have a very thick accent. Hello? Have you people really listened to your accents? I live in a southern city (Gainesville, Florida), listening and trying to understand southernese. Please don’t tell me you don’t have an accent.
In Spanish, with my accent no one can place the country I come from, not even those from my own place! I’ve been asked if or told I am Costarrican, Cuban, Spanish, Argentinian, Colombian, etc. everything but the right place.
Another thing is that I take the accent of another person (or group) rather quickly, and mix it with my own accent. I’m still drearing the day I start talking with a mix of Southernese/Hispanic English accent.
I once worked with a Dubliner. An older lady came in one day and after talking to him a bit, inquired where he was from. When he said Ireland, she patted him on the arm and said, “Well, you speak English beautifully.” He replied, “Well, an’ I ought to, darlin’. Been spakin’ it all me loif!”
Most Americans, I find, have no ear for accents. The only reason I do is that I am fortunate in that my poppa’s whole family are Londoners and I can not only tell the difference between English, Scot, Australian, and, on a good day, South African accents, I can usually tell if the English accent is north or south. My mother, on ther other hand, has to have me along when we see British films so I can translate for her
Even in country, some folks can’t spot regional accents. My Tenneseean pal was accused of having a Hong Kong accent by a guy from Georgia - guess he never met a Korean Tennessean before
My mother’s Icelandic, and naturally my speech patterns have been influenced by her accent and the fact that I grew up in a household where there were two languages around. It makes it interesting for people who ask me where I’m from because of it, because most of the time they think I’m a foreigner as well. [Apparently I have a “distinctly foreign” appearance no matter where I am.]
KarlGrenze, I sympathise with you. Right now I’m living in Tallahassee and I keep noticing that some of my words are starting to have a distinctly southern flair, like “football game” in reference to what people do on weekends when FSU has a home game. It frightens me a little bit because it sounds even stranger when I say it in combination with words that have a distinctly Icelandic accent to them.
I do that too! I used to speak pretty much the Queens English when I worked for an English boss for 2.5 years. Now, I’ve had an American girlfriend for almost a year. My accent’s gone to hell, I can tell you.
I totally understand!When I went to go visit my husband’s grandparents this summer on vacation,most of the relatives automatically seemed to deduct about 100 IQ points based on my very Southern accent.
I don’t get it.Why do people from the Great White North seem to think that we Southerners are all backwoods,stupid,inbred yokels?We ain’t I tell ya!We ain’t!
Although,I must admit,some of hubby’s little cousins got a real kick out of asking me to sat “Foat Wuth” a couple hundred times.
Free stuff, ooh yes, although it’s hard to separate the effects of the accent from the girl-traveling-alone factor. My best score was a free meal, several beers, and a very nice keychain / bottle opener from a couple of British guys I met on a ferry once. (It happened to be the fourth of July, which probably helped a little.)
On this last trip, I got a cute little Canadian flag pin, several more beers, some apples, and a doughnut from various people … which surprised me a little, as I didn’t think I sounded un-Canadian, but it was certainly nice of them.
Nice to know there are plenty of people in the world who don’t hate Americans.
This is my dad. Oy. We were in Mexico a few years ago, and waiting in line for a ferry behind an English family. But my dad whispered, “Where do you think these people are from?” I whispered back “Dad, they’re English.” My dad’s response? “Nah, English people wouldn’t be having that much fun. They’re Australians!”
A few minutes later, they struck up a conversation with us, and my dad had the brilliant opportunity to make an ass out of himself. And he took it. Good going, Dad. Fortunately, they didn’t seem insulted.
Apparently, in my dad’s world, all English people sit around in tweed suits drinking tea with a stiff upper lip. Which is weird, because two of my mom’s best friends are English, and perfectly normal.
Score! That’s how I came home with 10 donuts.
