talkmagic.co.uk

??? wrote:And as an aside, if you think the person might be Irish or much less importantly Scottish, do not under any circumstances ask where in England they are from.

Never.
You may get hurt.
Badly.

You may get hurt badly in a minute. You forgot Wales!

A series about England and where English traditions come from traced the olde English accent and dialect back to either Germany of it might have been somewhere else. May have been Flemish based? I'm waffling now lol

Reverend Tristan wrote:A series about England and where English traditions come from traced the olde English accent and dialect back to either Germany of it might have been somewhere else. May have been Flemish based? I'm waffling now lol

Should have been Germany, as that's where both the Angles and the Saxons came from (and the Jutes too). The Saxons did have some connection to the low countries, so you might be right to mention Flemish.

However, I did an English Language Studies A level, and the influence of the Vikings was confined largely to the North East.

Hence why I don't think you can say it's the true English accent.

It's as 'true' as Anglo-Saxon with Norman French influences that you got further south.

Come to think of it, the Midlands probably got a Welsh influence, at least on the West side of England.

But the Vikings gave us the word kiosk! WTF! Thought I might start a nice debate with this lol

Oh, I also have been meaning to point this out...

In the States, we use the letter Z in many places you do not. Some of you may already know this. It is used in words such as realize, magazine, and other words.

I just wanted to let you all know so that you don't think my spelling and grammer to be terrible.



That's All.

as long as you dont really spell grammar, grammer...

I would best describe the American accent as more nasally than English. A crueler man than me would say a nasal whine.
My X girlfriend was American and an actress. Her voice coach when she did accents told her that the main cause of the way Americans and the English speak is down to the use of the tongue. I forget which but either Americans or the English speak with the tongue pressed closer to the roof of the mouth.

IAIN wrote:as long as you dont really spell grammar, grammer...

oops!

Magnus wrote:During the few times I've been to the US (California) I got the feeling that there's a very distincitve difference between "grown-ups" and "teen" talk.
Many young people used the phrases "like" or "kind of like" way too often within one senctence.

Example: "And I was like: Jason, I kind'a like your eyes, and he was like: wow, that like about the nicest thing I heared so far - like ever!"

Imagine this sentence spoken with a voice which gradually raises towards the end of the sentence (as if asking a question). I friend for the US told me this type of accent is called "valley girl talk". If you don't know what it sounds like, just watch ANY episode of MTV "Dismissed". Interestingly, this type of language stops at a certain age group, I've never heared anyone over 40 talking that way.

Does anyone know what I mean? Thanks for listening anyway.

I know what you mean... It's not just limited to California though unfortunately. I hate that way of talking, it's very like...annoying.

ed crawford wrote:I would best describe the American accent as more nasally than English. A crueler man than me would say a nasal whine.
My X girlfriend was American and an actress. Her voice coach when she did accents told her that the main cause of the way Americans and the English speak is down to the use of the tongue. I forget which but either Americans or the English speak with the tongue pressed closer to the roof of the mouth.

I can do a good English accent, it comes naturally to me, and I was just about to post that I noticed my tongue was closer to the roof of my mouth in an English accent. That's when I saw this post, which clarifies it.

-Jake

hahahaha................i love it when the english try to make themselves interesting by picking over grammmmmeer lol

The blog Separated By A Common Language is THE place to go if you want to ponder Britspeak/Amerispeak (and a bit of Oz, Kiwi, Canadian, and others thrown in). Random discussions on accent, spelling, vocabulary, and subtle distinctions of usage. The blogger is an American transplanted to Sussex, where she's a lecturer in linguistics and English, so she knows what she's talking about.

A major difference between UK and US speech is the intonation (the "melody" of speech). Generally speaking, British English has more complex rise-and-fall patterns, steeper changes of intonation, and a wider range of intonation than American. British is spoken faster as well, on average. This makes British English sound more "lively" to some hearers.

The other main difference between US and UK speech is the pronunciation of vowels, but that's too complex to go into here.

This website has a good collection of accents from English speakers all over the world.

JakeThePerformer wrote:In the States, we use the letter Z in many places you do not. Some of you may already know this. It is used in words such as realize, magazine, and other words.

And there was me thinking it was spelt magazine in britain too.

Damn.