This was one of the first things that came to my mind. New York can be pretty provincial for the reasons stated above. Have you experienced this phenomenon in other parts of the country?
Oh, that Jeter! Such a kidder… :dubious:
You sound like you are from Mississippi, although your accent is not as strong as some. I think the reason it might sound British is because you use more open vowels.
Oh, and you are definitely not non-rhotic, but you are a bit more conservative with your Rs.
You know, open vowels, light Rs… my choir teacher would’ve really liked you. Do you sing?
I’m from NY, and I can’t imagine why anyone would think you sound British.
To my ears, you don’t have a strong accent, and I wouldn’t have been able to place it as Mississippi specifically, but it’s definitely “Southern.” It’s the way you bend some of your vowels a little. (I don’t know the proper term for that.)
But you can read me stories anytime!
Perhaps because you speak softly (at least in that audio clip) and people cannot hear certain “southern” aspects of your dialect. I think many are used to a southern accent as being somewhat louder and shriller, or more mumbled in certain instances.
Although I wouldn’t have pegged you as British, I have to admit, I would have had to listen a bit longer to figure out your accent.
Plus, accent tweaks can be assimilated from anywhere. Case in point; I had a big, burly guy who was born and raised in Berlin and he started my English class. When he spoke German, you could tell exactly where he came from - practically down to the street and district of Berlin. But when he spoke English, he had a FRENCH accent!
It took me by surprise - and then I found out he had a French girlfriend who didn’t speak German, so she had been speaking English to him and that is how he learned to pronounce English vocabulary. Trust me when I say that if you had ever heard him, you would have thought he was from France (and he spoke not a word of French).
I think the “O” sound is unusual - as in “over the ocean”. It’s not British. It sounds like “oever the oecean” to me - Scandawegian of some stripe, like an ø.
Anyway, you sound cute, whatever the accent is. 
People are useless at identifying accents. My experience is that Americans often guess I’m British (I’m Australian), while Australians would frequently ask my American ex if he was Irish or Canadian. A fellow Australian - who I met on several occasions and had several conversations with - thought I was Canadian, even though I don’t have an accent at all*. I’m guilty of it too - I thought my new doctor had a Mexican accent… turned out he was Russian! :smack: In my defence… I was sick 
But that’s my guess. In general, people are just very, very bad at identifying accents.
- To him. I shouldn’t have an accent to him because we’re from the same place. Yet he thought I did and that I was from Canada and was so convinced of this that he asked me if I was going over there to spend Christmas with my family or if they would come over here to spend Christmas with me.
I have a Mississippi/Memphis accent, and have been told several times by Mexican nationals that I sound British. I’ve actually gotten “so when did you move here from England ?”. I don’t sound British at all, ya’ll!
You do have a lovely soothing voice, but I can’t imagine why anyone would think you were British. I’m British, and though I couldn’t have placed you in a state, I would have thought Southern US.
I haven’t been there, but I suppose in a way they’re right. The city does boast the ultimate in just about every area of culture and night life. If you live there and never travel, it’s true you won’t get to be someplace warm in the winter, but at least you’ll never be bored.
Isn’t it true, though, that a great many New Yorkers moved there from someplace else? I’d think that would make it hard for natives not to have some significant experience with different accents.
Define a “great many.” According to Wiki 20% of New Yorkers were born outside the US. However, to makes no mention about what precentage of those folks live en mass in places like China Town vs throughout the entire state.
Because you totally should!
Assuming we’re talking about people from New York City, which is what I assumed, 36.7% (that’s over 3 million) are foreign born (as per the U.S. Census 2006-2008 American Community Survey). As for where they live, the booklet The Newest New Yorkers [PDF!] has all sorts of information on where people from different parts of the world settle in New York City.
As for why New Yorkers think the OP sounds British, I can’t say. Mainly because I don’t have Real Player. I think the posters above who have noted how bad most people are with placing accents are probably right. If you don’t have a super stereotypical southern accent, most people from the northern U.S. will probably not know you’re southern. Perhaps they like your accent, and since a lot of Americans think British accents are the best, they make some kind of leap. I seriously doubt it has anything to do with how you actually sound.
You don’t sound British to this Chicagoan. As a matter of fact, you could be from Chicago, except your “primeval” and “pines” are altered in the direction of “prahmeval” and “pahns”.
I suspect this may be the closest to the truth we’ll get. I think that, for whatever reason, these NYers parse my accent as:
Doesn’t sound like Foghorn Leghorn = foreign? + native English speaker = British?
Why it’s typically New Yorkers, and why so often, I don’t pretend to know. I also don’t understand why my friend Steve would think a genuine English person sounds anything like me. Other than we speak dialects of the same language, we can’t possibly sound alike. My last British ancestor arrived in 1800, for goodness’ sake.
And no, I don’t recall getting many “You sound like you’re from England!” comments from people in other parts of the country, and I’ve known Americans from every corner of the USA. As I mentioned in my OP, people sometimes ask me if I’m of Russian descent (not true, unless my mother has been lying to me all these years :eek: ) but they don’t think I *am *Russian.
And yes, BigT, I do sing. I am a boring mezzo-soprano.