# Origin of the American accent **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 3, 2012, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-the-american-accent/608284 "2012-01-03T19:49:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![sweeteviljesus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/898d66/32.png) [@sweeteviljesus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sweeteviljesus)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2012, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-the-american-accent/608284/1 "2012-01-03T19:49:17Z")
I was at a party over the holidays and a woman from the U.K. told me that she was under the impression that at the time of the Revolution, British accents closely resembled American accents and then evolved into what they are today. Is this accurate? Thanks, Rob ---
**Author:** ![murrmac](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/50afbb/32.png) [@murrmac](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/murrmac)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2012, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-the-american-accent/608284/2 "2012-01-03T19:56:03Z")
There are literally thousands of different British accents. None that I have heard resemble any American accent. ---
**Author:** ![Candyman74](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ad7895/32.png) [@Candyman74](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Candyman74)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2012, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-the-american-accent/608284/3 "2012-01-03T19:56:50Z")
I imagine that neither sounds much like it did 300 years ago. ---
**Author:** ![Leaffan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leaffan/32/299_2.png) [@Leaffan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaffan)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2012, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-the-american-accent/608284/4 "2012-01-03T19:58:48Z")
> [@sweeteviljesus](#): > > …at the time of the Revolution, British accents closely resembled American accents… Isn’t that a given since the majority of people in the American colonies at the time were in fact from Britain, or at least descendents thereof? ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2012, 8:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-the-american-accent/608284/5 "2012-01-03T20:00:04Z")
Not to mention the fact that there is no one American accent, either. A New Yorker will sound very different from someone from Dallas, who will sound very different from someone from Wisconsin, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Candyman74](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ad7895/32.png) [@Candyman74](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Candyman74)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2012, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-the-american-accent/608284/6 "2012-01-03T20:20:28Z")
Eeek. It’s already turned into Standard Accent Thread (Monthly) #1-B. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2012, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-the-american-accent/608284/7 "2012-01-03T20:30:17Z")
> [@Candyman74](#): > > Eeek. It’s already turned into Standard Accent Thread (Monthly) #1-B. 😃 Nooooo! Not that again! 😉 ---
**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2012, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-the-american-accent/608284/8 "2012-01-03T20:30:43Z")
> [@murrmac](#): > > There are literally thousands of different British accents. > > None that I have heard resemble any American accent. I (American) think a Norfolk (UK) accent sounds vaguely American, certainly more so than an RP accent. ---
**Author:** ![murrmac](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/50afbb/32.png) [@murrmac](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/murrmac)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2012, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-the-american-accent/608284/9 "2012-01-03T20:49:33Z")
> [@robert\_columbia](#): > > I (American) think a Norfolk (UK) accent sounds vaguely American, certainly more so than an RP accent. I see what you mean, but if anything, I would have said it sounds more Canadian than American. ---
**Author:** ![TruCelt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/trucelt/32/523_2.png) [@TruCelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TruCelt)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2012, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-the-american-accent/608284/10 "2012-01-03T21:04:28Z")
There has been a persistent myth - usually told about the islands of the Outer Banks or various pockets of rural Appalachia - that Elizabethan English is still spoken among certain isolated American populations. [http://www.cas.sc.edu/engl/dictionary/articles/speaklikeshakespeare.pdf](http://www.cas.sc.edu/engl/dictionary/articles/speaklikeshakespeare.pdf) It sounds as if she had heard a version of this wive’s tale. ---
**Author:** ![TruCelt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/trucelt/32/523_2.png) [@TruCelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TruCelt)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2012, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-the-american-accent/608284/11 "2012-01-03T21:09:58Z")
Missed the window to add: While it’s certainly true that fairly close-to-original version of some old songs have been discovered there, that happened in the 1940’s. ---
**Author:** ![Duckster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/duckster/32/1244_2.png) [@Duckster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duckster)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2012, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-the-american-accent/608284/12 "2012-01-03T21:11:21Z")
> [@TruCelt](#): > > There has been a persistent myth - usually told about the islands of the Outer Banks or various pockets of rural Appalachia - that Elizabethan English is still spoken among certain isolated American populations. > > [Department of English Language and Literature - Department of English Language and Literature | University of South Carolina](http://www.cas.sc.edu/engl/dictionary/articles/speaklikeshakespeare.pdf) > > It sounds as if she had heard a version of this wive’s tale. There was a TV show recently on the CMT(?) cable channel about the American South. One topic concerned the various Southern accents. The expert was a New England university professor/linguist who said much of the “Southern accent” actually derives from English aristocracy, with different off-shoots depending upon the immigration patterns at the time. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2012, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-the-american-accent/608284/13 "2012-01-03T22:02:45Z")
I remember watching a show on History where a supposed language expert said that several ‘southern’ accents in the US were corrupted versions of aristocratic British accents (presumably London upper class accents, since the UK has a huge variety of accents) from the time of the revolution…especially (and ironically) the heavy accents of the lower classes in the South. Gods know how accurate this is (I got shot down on this board for bringing it up before), but when this guy was imitating the various accents, especially key words, it sounded to ME like he was onto something. That said, there is a huge variety of accents in the US, and they have been influenced by a truly bewildering variety of immigrant accents from all over the world. -XT ---
**Author:** ![Lizzyerd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Lizzyerd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lizzyerd)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2012, 10:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-the-american-accent/608284/14 "2012-01-03T22:28:08Z")
I think (yeah I know, ‘think’ doesn’t work here, sorry but I want to add this!) anyways, I feel like a lot of the accents really sound a like to each other. Think of it this way, Irish, Scottish, English(England), American, Austrian, and even German all have the same _sound_. True many of them are harder or softer than each other, but they have many of the same things to each other. There’s been so many times someone will be at the register and have an accent and I ask: 'are you from England?" and get ‘No, I’m from Scotland’. Or a ‘proper’ speaker may sound like a high class Englishwoman. Or a southerner here sounds like a southerner in England (been mentioned). ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2012, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-the-american-accent/608284/15 "2012-01-03T23:24:40Z")
> [@sweeteviljesus](#): > > I was at a party over the holidays and a woman from the U.K. told me that she was under the impression that at the time of the Revolution, British accents closely resembled American accents and then evolved into what they are today. Is this accurate? That’s probably close to being true, although there were many other influences, post-Revolution, on American accents that did not come from Britain. All accents change over time, and the farther back you go back in American history, the closer our accents will resemble certain British accents at the time. Until, that is, you get to a time before 1609… ---
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2012, 11:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-the-american-accent/608284/16 "2012-01-04T11:07:50Z")
Speaking as a southern Englishman, the accent that sounds to me to be closest to the generally American one is that of South West England. i.e. Devon and Cornwall. To a non American there seems to be a lot less variation in the various American accents then there are between different British, or even English accents. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2012, 1:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-the-american-accent/608284/17 "2012-01-04T13:36:57Z")
> [@Lust4Life](#): > > To a non American there seems to be a lot less variation in the various American accents then there are between different British, or even English accents. I’ve opined this before, but I’m pretty much convinced this is largely perceptual. To me, there’s almost no similarity between, say, Dorset and Merseyside accents, but to Johnny Foreigner, they’re just ‘British’. ---
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2012, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-the-american-accent/608284/18 "2012-01-04T13:51:39Z")
Whilst Johnny F. may well understand R.P. , or South Eastern English easily, good luck to them if they encounter a Geordie or a Glasweigan ! Also I think that Brum and Scouse are sufficiently different different from some other forms of British English to be recognised even by non Brits. The Americans showed this when Liverpudlian was all the rage, by including Scouse speakers, as opposed to the normal bland slightly southern/R.P. accent that all Brits are supposed to speak, on their t.v programmes of the time. (Sitcoms etc.) ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2012, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-the-american-accent/608284/19 "2012-01-04T14:03:54Z")
Yet when you look in other accent-related threads (and there have been many), it’s not at all unusual to find people who have a great deal of trouble perceiving the breadth of variation in British accents that a Brit perceives (and this isn’t because of lack of exposure to the different accents) - sometimes to the extent of reluctance to stop referring to ‘the British accent’ as if it’s just one thing. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2012, 2:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-the-american-accent/608284/20 "2012-01-04T14:05:52Z")
And I expect the same is true in reverse - that American people perceive a broad spectrum of different American accents, seemingly broader than exists in other English-speaking nations. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-the-american-accent/608284.md?page=2)