British vs. American accents

Post Reply New Topic

So, I was wondering: most Americans seem to love British accents - do British people feel the same way about American accents? (For the record, I am American, and I think American accents are nasal and not very charming.)

I'm Irish, I'm not a fan of some of the American accents. Histrionic and slightly too loud would be my main impression of it.

I also don't care for American accents. I find them a little too loud and abrasive to my ears.

Accents aren't loud though. People are.
There are some American accents that make me cringe though. (I am American.)
I've been told I have a west coast accent, but that is probably due to the fact that I learned to speak with an American accent from watching TV.

Edit: If that's confusing, my family came from Hungary, so my brothers and I actually learned to speak English with a Hungarian accent. We learned to speak with an American accent after being teased when we started school.

I find canadian accents more appealing. But you both share similair phonetics in how you say things. I like how your very subtle in emphasising sylabals in words yet the all encompassing dialects of the UK tend to really emphasise those sylabal gaps in words

i.e. Com-Pu-Te-Urrr in UK vs Americain/Canadian Comput-ter and the speed in which that is said seems to be quicker as well.

Some are nice.

I don't mind American accents,in fact I feel an affinity towards them as I grew up with tv programmes and films from "across the pond".
Also,the pronounciation is similar in some respects to my own Scottish accent,e.g. you pronounce the letter 'r' at the end of words,something that most English accents (i.e. from England itself) don't actually do.
Granted,there are some American accents such as broad Southern that I find more difficult to listen to,but at the same time there are
some local accents in Scotland that make me cringe as well !

http://www.wrongplanet.net/postt155733.html

I watch mostly American TV shows (okay, just American cartoons), but then IRL I was raised here in Southern England, and I love this accent the most of all

You can hear mine if you like - but it won't be what you're expecting!

I'm Lancashire through and through, me.

I prefer British accents, especially my local one or Cornish accents.
I don't like most American accents especially those from the south like Tennessee, the southern accents are a bit stupid sounding and the other American accents I hear on films just sound obnoxious to me. And don't get me started on New York!

God... try living here...
I mean, I don't live in Tennessee; I live in Georgia, around Atlanta, which has become more cultural and less "redneck" (not sure if British people are familiar with that term?) and most of the kids I know around here don't have southern accents... however, my mathematics teacher, my Band teacher, my advisement teacher, my AP Human Geography Teacher, and my Language Arts teacher... they all have different variations of a Southern accent. Meine Deutsch Lehrerin has a Bosnian/German accent, and my Biology teacher (like me) really doesn't have an accent (in America.)



Some British accents make my ears on the verge of hemorrhaging, though... Cockney accents are disgusting. Yes, I said that. Cockney. accents. are. disgusting.

The Northwestern U.S. English, however, is the most proper form of the English language there is. People argue, "Oh, no, people from southern England have the most proper accents..." At least in the Northwestern U.S. accent, everything is pronounced. We don't say "cah" for "car"... we pronounce everything. I say "we" because I am closest to this kind of accent; despite being born and raised in Atlanta, I have virtually no traces of a Southern U.S. accent.

Oddly enough, for all of the British accents I despise, I don't really mind scouse...

You've just insulted a quarter of my relatives but yes I agree their accent is horrible. Mockney is even worse!



My goodness that is one serious deviancy of perversion. I guess someone has to like them.

Eww cockney accents! (And scouse is rather horrible too, so rough sounding.)
But yeah, I do know a lot about rednecks since the internet and TV has educated me on all the US stereotypes, I've become an expert on American things. Speaking of school, how is your science department? Since I'm assuming you live well within the confines of the bible belt. The Northwestern accent is the one I mentioned that's on films a lot, it somewhat annoys me. Especially on teenage girls in the plastic/"preppy" clique, it's all "like uhhhh yeah sooo uhhh" and everything is suuppperrr slow, I'm like "jesus christ spit it out we haven't got all day!""

Yep, I do live in the Bible Belt for the most part. But as I said previously, the Atlanta area is highly cultural nowadays, so they're not as bad as they were, say, thirty or forty years ago. Maybe even sooner than that... nah, I'd say thirty or forty years ago. My parents aren't from the South, and my mother was a homemaker for most of my early childhood, so I never was left in the care of Southern ladies... thank God... I mean, they're really nice, but my speaking style most likely would have turned out much worse. -__-

But back on topic.

As far as Biology and such goes, I currently have a teacher with a PhD and she isn't Southern... I'm not sure what she is religiously, but I know she's incredibly liberal, and she teaches evolution quite well... so, I'm assuming she isn't really religious or spiritual at all. She's pretty smart; very professional and stuff. Science is pretty valued among the non-rednecks here; I mean, the Emory University (downtown) program for medicine and science is fantastic. I haven't had any Science teachers so far who rolled their eyes when evolution was brought up, so I've been pretty lucky. I wouldn't really consider where I live true "Bible belt" material, though fifty or so miles away would be.

Texas is really bad about their religion/evolution teaching, though. Last I heard... which was like, two years ago... some places in Texas had outlawed teaching evolution in biology classes, and they required the reading of the Bible in literature classes. Just glad I'm not in Texas. Maybe someone can enlighten me and bring me the good news that this was just a phase, but I really doubt that they would have... what, revoked?... that policy, considering the Texans they are.

There isn't a correct English accent, only English accents.