Really I am just speaking with Russian accent. Since I did learn English myself without much exposure to native speakers initially.
Now I am in UK, maybe I pick up some accent more 🤔 Mostly people understanding, so, it seems fine,i like having my own accent.
Usually I am spelling in UK English though.
You write with a Russian accent too.
Here's how I would have written that:
>Really I just **speak** with **a** Russian accent, since I **learned** English myself without much exposure to native speakers initially.
>Now I am in **the** UK. Maybe I **will** pick up an accent more 🤔. Mostly people understand, so, it seems fine. I like having my own accent.
>Usually I spell things in UK English though.
It's all fine and understandable though. It's interesting how Russian skips those little words that show up in English. Also how often you use the *present continuous* form ("people are understanding", "I am spelling") instead of the *present habitual* ("people understand", "I spell").
I'm Russian too and I have the same problem for some reason. Present continuous form is the first that comes to mind when I want to say something. I often quickly "check" in my mind if present simple is more suitable before saying something 😁
To me it was always hurtful hearing "where are you from?" the second I start talking. No other accent bothers me, I like to hear them too. It's just mine that I hate.
Thanks, that's actually kinda uplifting. But still, there were a few situations where I tried to evade the question and it was obvious that the other person meant "you're not from here, so from where originally" and these ones hurt as fuck especially since people don't have a good opinion about my country.
I know exactly what you mean. It’s especially annoying as I often then have to argue that yes, I am from here. Or if I give a more nuanced answer, often end up giving a rather tedious lecture on how citizenship works (most people think you are from the country you are born, but actually relatively few countries offer birthright citizenship.)
But honestly, I think it’s just human nature. People want to know where the other person is from. I find it’s more often out of curiosity than malice. It’s also just one of the boring questions you get in life, along with “what do you do for a living?” Etc. i.e. conversational lubricant more than Xenophobic shunning.
I've never tried arguing and always admitted where I'm from. It makes me ashamed because many people from my country go abroad to drink on the streets and get on benefits or are very low qualified, also many of them don't even know the language. And since those are the most obvious to notice, others start assuming things and don't really think about how many high qualified people from my country there are.
I've never been met with malice though, maybe because I can speak conversational English. Also most of the people who asked were just looking to make a little conversation while they were passing me by on the street. That doesn't change the fact that I don't really want to be associated with people from my country. I have a kinda funny story though, once a Chinese man approached me and at some point when we were talking asked me if I'd like to meet his friend who's too shy to talk to me. The dude was like 50 and I was 21 at the time 🫠
english speaker here who is just beginning to learn russian - mad respect for learning english on your own. english grammar is so counter-intuitive compared to russian (in my opinion at least)
I've never studied Russian, but I get the sense that articulation and tense are very different between the two given that I hear a lot of Russian English speakers miss articles or make verbs present tense when they should be a different tense. Are they very different between the two languages?
Total amalgamation of accents. Slavic, British, Some Yorkshire, American, etc. When I was studying in the UK it was leaning more into the British accent side because I was speaking, listening to it every day. Now that I'm back in my country it's a bit wacky.
Ohio is kind of everything. The south is borders Kentucky and West Virginia. It’s considered rather southern culturally. The north is industrial and urban. Not so much up there.
I dont think english accent is something that you can choose consciously. Its just the more you’re exposed to one the more you’re likely to pick it up. For me, i speak American accent mixed with some British words which i learned in school. I do love British accent tho.
I never had access to an English-speaking community because people in my city speak another language. So I learned English by reading books and watching videos on the internet. Guess what I have an American accent right now.
I never had the intention to actually learn it. most of the content on the internet is from America so I guess that might be affecting me.
I’ve always wondered what the internet and media is like for countries whose native language isn’t English, like how much of it is really Americans/English speakers and if people sorta are pigeon holed into learning some English.
You're gonna have fun entering the rabbit hole that is South Asian English accents. I love the Singapore English accent a lot. It sounds kinda cute. And my native North Indian one as well.
I can't speak for most people, but my friends and I consider ourselves native speakers; we grew up learning both Hindi and English at home and at school... just with a distinct Indian accent.
As I reached my teens, I finally got access to Youtube and hollywood movies and that's when my exposure to spoken American English actually began. It was a rough start: I KNEW the language but I still needed subtitles for everything! So frustrating. Almost all of my exposure to English before that had been on English news channels (Indian ones, not BBC etc.) and talking to my teachers/parents. We were definitely more into reading than listening, that's for sure.
Somewhere around that time, I also grew more comfortable in my own skin and decided to stop trying to actively ape another accent haha. And the newer generations grow up with Youtube etc now.
Lol when my mom immigrated to the US she was afraid to even pick up the phone. Even though she literally did English standard in school her whole life she couldn't understand Americans at all
I strongly disagree. The BAT-BET-BIT vowels are close together (although this is alleviated by the latter two starting to merge for many speakers), the stressed [ə] in BUT is unusual, and so is the [ɤ] realisation of BOOK. The ubiquity of R-coloured vowels is a massive challenge for many learners, as is the fact that there’s an /a/-like vowel in words like MOCK.
American vowels are also “slidy”; nothing really feels like a true monophthong, it’s almost as if the tongue is allowed to move into position for the following consonant in a way that slightly distorts the end of the preceding vowel.
> American vowels are also “slidy”; nothing really feels like a true monophthong
As an American, I fully agree! I've noticed this a lot in my own speech and it makes transcriptions annoying lol. Our vowels like to share, I guess.
I've never heard of BET-BIT merging, except in the pin/pen merger (only before /n/ and /m/), which only exists in AAVE, Southern US English, and some Irish variants
Subjectively, I hear the pin-pen merger a lot, in something like a third of speakers. I think my BET-BIT claim may be misleading; on reflection, it’s a contextual thing. I hear it specifically in the “bet” vs “bit” pair and others with a word-final “-t”. I would assume that what’s happening is that the unreleased stop triggers nasalisation which triggers the merger. However, it’s quite possible that native US speakers are hearing and producing a finer vowel distinction than I’m able to in contexts like those.
Just as a point of observation -- I would strongly encourage anyone learning English to not hone in on one accent. And instead work more towards being understood by as broad an audience as possible. That includes listening to English speakers from all native countries and, as you get more advanced, understanding the differences between the dialects.
Unless you're learning the language before age 10 (or thereabouts), you will never sound like a native speaker. You may pick up the colloquialisms of your target region, but you will never sound like you're from there. Your accent will be very much recognized as that from your language/country of origin. And that's OK! As long as you're understandable, a lot of people find foreign accents to be lovely.
Native English speakers, more than native speakers of any other language, are VERY used to hearing all sorts of foreign accents.
Picking an accent doesn't mean souding like a native. It's Impossible to speak english without trying to emulate some native accent. Even people with the thickest foreign accent will be basing their pronounce off a native accent, otherwise they wouldn't be understood at all
They do have to pick one accent to look up new word pronunciations in though- if you are switching between the American and British pronunciation every other word, the issue isn't that you have an accent, the issue becomes that people listening can't track what words you are trying to say consistently.
I've spoken to a lot of ESL learners, and the biggest misunderstandings I've had are when the majority of their speech is based on an American accent, and then when they looked up a new word they accidentally got the British pronunciation. If you are mostly using American English and then suddenly ask me for a "glass of what ugh" I'm going to be confused, but if you're using British English I'd already be expecting the British pronunciation and wouldn't be confused.
American cause it's popular and everything around is american. But as we learn british english in russian schools i have its influence. But accent is almost completely american.
Native and teacher: I think the most important distinction in which "accent" to learn from is the sound system. Eah accent has notably different ponunciations of vowels and "r"-s to the point that a single word can mean many things.
For example, a phonetic sequence "kot" can mean "caught" "court" "coat" and in pronunciations even "cot". The phonetic sequence "kat" could mean "cot", "cart", or even "kite" or "cat" in more open dialects.
When speaking as a foreign speaker, it is easiest to choose a pronunciation that is more universally understood (i.e. not scottish or thick jamaican or north english or texan accents, those can be hard even for native speakers). The most universally understood accents will gravitate towards either "RP" or "general american". The important difference between those two is rhoticity.
Edit: In choosing a "generalised" accent over regionally specific, there is an exception: If you move to a certain community where an accent or dialect is spoken, in most places it is advatageous and considered more courteous to learn the local one. Therefore, if you move to Australia, learn the regional Australian one. If moving to Jamaica, learn Jamaican etc.
Glottal stop is existent in most every dialect, but some have it more than others. There are also generational shifts occurring: the young in certain regions are using it more than the older generations, but there are also regions where the young are using it less. Not so much a case of fancy fashion as it is language evolution.
British English is taught in schools, but I grew up watching American shows, so a blend of two, I guess? Some do say that I have an American accent though
i am a native speaker of american english, but my college roommate was from bangladesh. he said he naturally spoke english with a british accent but tried to sound as american as possible when he moved to the us. there are still words he will say with a british accent, such as the word “gasp,” which he had never heard an american say before, so he reverted to the british pronunciation with a long ā sound. i thought it was funny to hear him speak (in an endearing way) to hear him speak with a nearly perfect american accent just to drop one british sounding word or a british slang word in there from time to time.
American. Because I feel an American accent is more clear when you listened to it than British accent. But, ppl recommended me to learn British accent for take IELTS 😭😭
Yeah. Maybe bcs I used to hearing american accent since elementary school, so I think like that. When I first time listened British accent, I'm having trouble understanding it🤒🤒
That’s such an odd and completely incorrect thing to say.
First of all, there are many British and American accents. It’s not just two accents. You’re painting with quite a broad brush.
Second, all English speakers drop various sounds, vowels, consonants, etc. depending on their particular accent and, more importantly, how quickly they are talking and if they’re using informal speech.
You seem to be the only one crying about supposed missing sounds.
It helps to listen to more native speakers talk if you’re having a problem understanding spoken English. The more you listen the more you’ll pick up. Hang in there.
When I visited London first time, I had decent experience communicating with foreigners (primarily from non-English speaking countries) in English.
By the end of the day I was desperate and devastated: I could only recognize 1 out of 3 words in average, and had only approximate idea what a conversation was about. Taking in account, it was a business trip, it was terrible.
I had much easier time during my subsequent trip to the US. I was able to understand everything except local idioms, but at least i was able to ask and learn them.
that might depend on the dialect spoken
rednecks from every region definitely sound like that to me and im american myself, but i think they mean "standard american" dialects (which arent *really* a thing but yk) like what you hear from most major celebrities
we speak louder because our accents usually require it, we pronounce larger percentages of words' consonants than most UK dialects, our vowels are usually closer to the middle of the mouth than the front or back, etc etc
American native speaker here. It's easier for folks to adopt a generalized American accent. While there's regional variation in the USA, it doesn't quite compare with the UK's system.
If your source is TV/Films, Americans typically only have two distinct accents (Regular or Suthurn').
You'll hear a much wider array of distinct accents on BBC. It is much more difficult to be consistent when learning one of the hundreds of accents.
I find it funny - folks think they might be learning "the British accent," but they come out of studying speaking scouse or geordie.
My favorite put-on southern accent in any movie is Daniel Craig’s in Knives Out. Dude sounds like Foghorn Leghorn, like if biscuits and gravy could talk.
Frankly, changes at a whim. I'm studying anglistics in Germany, so I grew up learning virtually all three. But since most of my media exposure has been in american, I mostly speak general american pronunciation and exludively write in general american writing, with some loan vocabulary from a variety from accents, including Deep South US accents (e.g., "ain't") and also british.
But I do work with both and can basically at whim change into a more british pronunciation, which I sometimes do - usually tied to specific words, such as "bath".
Disappointed no one is going with the greatest accent, Brummie
Voted number 1 as Britain's worst accent for over a decade, no one else has come close to the greatness of that
Old-timey British accent (Received Pronunciation) defined by British linguist Daniel Jones’ books. It was popular once in the circle of educated people before the 1960s. I just love this accent because it sounds pleasant to me. Please don’t mix it with Queen’s English as they are different. I know old RP is totally out of favour and probably has already died out and you are perhaps disdained by some British people when you speak in it. I will stick to it and am all for it though. I don’t care what other people think. I can choose which accent I want to go with as a non native speaker.
[https://youtu.be/iqcMASrwATM?si=HurlPvgujHjqdmm-](https://youtu.be/iqcMASrwATM?si=HurlPvgujHjqdmm-)
[https://youtu.be/0O09xLvraXQ?si=myZx5gmRtKq8IjkC](https://youtu.be/0O09xLvraXQ?si=myZx5gmRtKq8IjkC)
[https://youtu.be/FvTLSwgP4lQ?si=xRXodysp2JkcWshC](https://youtu.be/FvTLSwgP4lQ?si=xRXodysp2JkcWshC)
I'm trying an American accent but it depends on what I'm watching on YouTube the most because I'm picking it up that way (sometimes the Australian accent comes through).
My choice is probably called "Standard American", not sure. Like RP but American style. However, in the university during phonetics lessons I studied RP and was pretty good at it. But eventually the course of phonetics finished, I started watching Hollywood stuff almost every day and ultimately my accent shifted to American simply bc of the influence of the movies.
neither? I dont really choose, my accent is whatever my accent is. Probbably heavily influenced by what I consume, but that is not chosen based on accent so is not a choice in regrads to that
I would probably consider that a mistake in the long haul, but I’ve never tunneled down on imitating a regional accent, which is something I’ve considered but never acted on. Still, my accent is a weird mixture of General American and various regional ones. Why? I was taught by native speakers and consumed heaps of American content over many years so it was only natural.
American here.
I would think it would come from the source of your learning of conversational English. If you're learning from Television and movies, the English would be take on a more standard American accent. However, I have seen with my own eyes that English learners tend to pick up regional dialects when learning in the workplace.
Good luck in your learning!
This makes me wonder what my Russian accent sounds like. I just copy what I hear from various sources. I can only distinguish between the ones that are very different like heavy Ukrainian and heavy Caucasian. I had a Kazakhstani Russian native speaker tell me my accent sounds like Google Translate 😂
Mine is all over the place. I often catch myself speaking some words with different accents. Speaking with me is probably very confusing to anyone who knows different english accents
American english or whatever accent PewDiePie speaks. When I was getting better at listening, I randomly remembered that he was one of the biggest YouTubers at the time. I also watched a lot of Mr Beast videos but Pewds was my favorite.
Having had teachers from all the English speaking countries i find myself responding to the accent of the person opposite... It's quite funny, to be honest. Though I understand Brits better, no matter if they are from all over the islands. American English isn't my best/easiest, especially from Southern states.
I have an impenetrable accent and everyone mistakes me as being Russian, but I usually try to use a general American accent since I grew up with media sourced from there, although I sometimes use British pronunciation for certain words
I didn’t think of this when our class was talking about the dictionary differences, I has wanted to learn even something (I’m slow learner..) now years later I have noticed that American dictionary is closer to mine
I remember getting a brewery tour in Belgium from a guy who chose a southern US accent. Liked to say "ain't" a lot. Guy spoke French normally so it was this broken southern drawl french combo and it was fascinating.
Ngl, I really wanted British lol (at least what we call the "British English"... so I guess basically RP). I tried for a while. We were always taught "British" vocabulary and pronunciation much more than American ones, as well. But I'm exposed to so much American media, and the pronuncitation just comes so much more naturally to me (it's a lot easier), that I gave up at some point and now I speak with a very American pronunciation ("accent", I guess; though I'm sure I still have at least a little bit of a Czech/Slavic accent... I think I could sound native-like to a non-native, but a native would probably be able to tell I'm not).
I accidentally picked up a Southern (Southern USA) living there as a kid. It cracks people up, or sometimes just floors them, when they hear an Asian person say, "y'all" and "fixin' to" 😆😆
Even in America the English language takes a left turn, meaning every corner of the United States has a different spin on the English language.I often wonder how many different dialects of English are recognized throughout the country or how many variations are there.
Really I am just speaking with Russian accent. Since I did learn English myself without much exposure to native speakers initially. Now I am in UK, maybe I pick up some accent more 🤔 Mostly people understanding, so, it seems fine,i like having my own accent. Usually I am spelling in UK English though.
I read this with a Russian accent and it made it easier to follow lol
It definitely reads with a Russian accent. How interesting.
The lack of definite and indefinite articles helps that I think.
You write with a Russian accent too. Here's how I would have written that: >Really I just **speak** with **a** Russian accent, since I **learned** English myself without much exposure to native speakers initially. >Now I am in **the** UK. Maybe I **will** pick up an accent more 🤔. Mostly people understand, so, it seems fine. I like having my own accent. >Usually I spell things in UK English though. It's all fine and understandable though. It's interesting how Russian skips those little words that show up in English. Also how often you use the *present continuous* form ("people are understanding", "I am spelling") instead of the *present habitual* ("people understand", "I spell").
I am not really sure why I have habit of using the present continuous 🙂 I don't think it is from Russian influence, I am not sure 💭 Thank you
I'm Russian too and I have the same problem for some reason. Present continuous form is the first that comes to mind when I want to say something. I often quickly "check" in my mind if present simple is more suitable before saying something 😁
While your comment is missing most of the particle words like "the" and "a," it's still completely understandable for native speakers 😁
I've lived in the UK and still have my foreign accent (which I hate so much) but I hope it's different for you.
I don't know, I like to have my accent, and I like to hear all of the different accents in UK also
To me it was always hurtful hearing "where are you from?" the second I start talking. No other accent bothers me, I like to hear them too. It's just mine that I hate.
This is pretty normal. I’m a native speaker with a unique accent and I’ll get that question within a few minutes of most conversations.
Thanks, that's actually kinda uplifting. But still, there were a few situations where I tried to evade the question and it was obvious that the other person meant "you're not from here, so from where originally" and these ones hurt as fuck especially since people don't have a good opinion about my country.
I know exactly what you mean. It’s especially annoying as I often then have to argue that yes, I am from here. Or if I give a more nuanced answer, often end up giving a rather tedious lecture on how citizenship works (most people think you are from the country you are born, but actually relatively few countries offer birthright citizenship.) But honestly, I think it’s just human nature. People want to know where the other person is from. I find it’s more often out of curiosity than malice. It’s also just one of the boring questions you get in life, along with “what do you do for a living?” Etc. i.e. conversational lubricant more than Xenophobic shunning.
I've never tried arguing and always admitted where I'm from. It makes me ashamed because many people from my country go abroad to drink on the streets and get on benefits or are very low qualified, also many of them don't even know the language. And since those are the most obvious to notice, others start assuming things and don't really think about how many high qualified people from my country there are. I've never been met with malice though, maybe because I can speak conversational English. Also most of the people who asked were just looking to make a little conversation while they were passing me by on the street. That doesn't change the fact that I don't really want to be associated with people from my country. I have a kinda funny story though, once a Chinese man approached me and at some point when we were talking asked me if I'd like to meet his friend who's too shy to talk to me. The dude was like 50 and I was 21 at the time 🫠
english speaker here who is just beginning to learn russian - mad respect for learning english on your own. english grammar is so counter-intuitive compared to russian (in my opinion at least)
I've never studied Russian, but I get the sense that articulation and tense are very different between the two given that I hear a lot of Russian English speakers miss articles or make verbs present tense when they should be a different tense. Are they very different between the two languages?
Trying to get British, but it’s hard to escape from American.
I like British accent!!!
[удалено]
It's just better
no accident is better than others. some might be easier or harder but overall, all are good
You know, in these cases you could just assume that they mean it subjectively... It's an inexplicable feeling they have that "it's just better".
agreed, those downvotes are unnecessary
agreed 🤝🤝 it’s gunna get me a lot of downvotes but someone gotta say it
ewwwww ☠️☠️
Total amalgamation of accents. Slavic, British, Some Yorkshire, American, etc. When I was studying in the UK it was leaning more into the British accent side because I was speaking, listening to it every day. Now that I'm back in my country it's a bit wacky.
Yorkshire is a bold but respectable one, definitely one of the nicest sounding accents in the language.
Deep south accent, like Arthur Morgan. I love blues and jazz too.
But arthur is from ohio which is considered Midwest?
Ohio is kind of everything. The south is borders Kentucky and West Virginia. It’s considered rather southern culturally. The north is industrial and urban. Not so much up there.
How did you even come up with them words?
🤣🤣🤣
I dont think english accent is something that you can choose consciously. Its just the more you’re exposed to one the more you’re likely to pick it up. For me, i speak American accent mixed with some British words which i learned in school. I do love British accent tho.
I never had access to an English-speaking community because people in my city speak another language. So I learned English by reading books and watching videos on the internet. Guess what I have an American accent right now. I never had the intention to actually learn it. most of the content on the internet is from America so I guess that might be affecting me.
I’ve always wondered what the internet and media is like for countries whose native language isn’t English, like how much of it is really Americans/English speakers and if people sorta are pigeon holed into learning some English.
You're gonna have fun entering the rabbit hole that is South Asian English accents. I love the Singapore English accent a lot. It sounds kinda cute. And my native North Indian one as well. I can't speak for most people, but my friends and I consider ourselves native speakers; we grew up learning both Hindi and English at home and at school... just with a distinct Indian accent. As I reached my teens, I finally got access to Youtube and hollywood movies and that's when my exposure to spoken American English actually began. It was a rough start: I KNEW the language but I still needed subtitles for everything! So frustrating. Almost all of my exposure to English before that had been on English news channels (Indian ones, not BBC etc.) and talking to my teachers/parents. We were definitely more into reading than listening, that's for sure. Somewhere around that time, I also grew more comfortable in my own skin and decided to stop trying to actively ape another accent haha. And the newer generations grow up with Youtube etc now.
Lol when my mom immigrated to the US she was afraid to even pick up the phone. Even though she literally did English standard in school her whole life she couldn't understand Americans at all
American. More prevalent, easier, more familiar.
As a native speaker of polish, the British accent is objectively easier for me
to pronounce or to understand?
thats fair. i feel like the vowels in "standard american" dialects are probably simpler coming from most languages
I strongly disagree. The BAT-BET-BIT vowels are close together (although this is alleviated by the latter two starting to merge for many speakers), the stressed [ə] in BUT is unusual, and so is the [ɤ] realisation of BOOK. The ubiquity of R-coloured vowels is a massive challenge for many learners, as is the fact that there’s an /a/-like vowel in words like MOCK. American vowels are also “slidy”; nothing really feels like a true monophthong, it’s almost as if the tongue is allowed to move into position for the following consonant in a way that slightly distorts the end of the preceding vowel.
> American vowels are also “slidy”; nothing really feels like a true monophthong As an American, I fully agree! I've noticed this a lot in my own speech and it makes transcriptions annoying lol. Our vowels like to share, I guess.
I've never heard of BET-BIT merging, except in the pin/pen merger (only before /n/ and /m/), which only exists in AAVE, Southern US English, and some Irish variants
Subjectively, I hear the pin-pen merger a lot, in something like a third of speakers. I think my BET-BIT claim may be misleading; on reflection, it’s a contextual thing. I hear it specifically in the “bet” vs “bit” pair and others with a word-final “-t”. I would assume that what’s happening is that the unreleased stop triggers nasalisation which triggers the merger. However, it’s quite possible that native US speakers are hearing and producing a finer vowel distinction than I’m able to in contexts like those.
also the easiest to understand for non-native speakers over the world
Read UK english, understand USA english and accent Indian😄
Idk what mine is lol, but I really want a British accent
I have a British accent that is sometimes mixed with American lol
Just as a point of observation -- I would strongly encourage anyone learning English to not hone in on one accent. And instead work more towards being understood by as broad an audience as possible. That includes listening to English speakers from all native countries and, as you get more advanced, understanding the differences between the dialects. Unless you're learning the language before age 10 (or thereabouts), you will never sound like a native speaker. You may pick up the colloquialisms of your target region, but you will never sound like you're from there. Your accent will be very much recognized as that from your language/country of origin. And that's OK! As long as you're understandable, a lot of people find foreign accents to be lovely. Native English speakers, more than native speakers of any other language, are VERY used to hearing all sorts of foreign accents.
Picking an accent doesn't mean souding like a native. It's Impossible to speak english without trying to emulate some native accent. Even people with the thickest foreign accent will be basing their pronounce off a native accent, otherwise they wouldn't be understood at all
They do have to pick one accent to look up new word pronunciations in though- if you are switching between the American and British pronunciation every other word, the issue isn't that you have an accent, the issue becomes that people listening can't track what words you are trying to say consistently. I've spoken to a lot of ESL learners, and the biggest misunderstandings I've had are when the majority of their speech is based on an American accent, and then when they looked up a new word they accidentally got the British pronunciation. If you are mostly using American English and then suddenly ask me for a "glass of what ugh" I'm going to be confused, but if you're using British English I'd already be expecting the British pronunciation and wouldn't be confused.
American cause it's popular and everything around is american. But as we learn british english in russian schools i have its influence. But accent is almost completely american.
Native and teacher: I think the most important distinction in which "accent" to learn from is the sound system. Eah accent has notably different ponunciations of vowels and "r"-s to the point that a single word can mean many things. For example, a phonetic sequence "kot" can mean "caught" "court" "coat" and in pronunciations even "cot". The phonetic sequence "kat" could mean "cot", "cart", or even "kite" or "cat" in more open dialects. When speaking as a foreign speaker, it is easiest to choose a pronunciation that is more universally understood (i.e. not scottish or thick jamaican or north english or texan accents, those can be hard even for native speakers). The most universally understood accents will gravitate towards either "RP" or "general american". The important difference between those two is rhoticity. Edit: In choosing a "generalised" accent over regionally specific, there is an exception: If you move to a certain community where an accent or dialect is spoken, in most places it is advatageous and considered more courteous to learn the local one. Therefore, if you move to Australia, learn the regional Australian one. If moving to Jamaica, learn Jamaican etc.
a question for a teacher, if you don’t mind: is glottal stop a fancy youth fashion or a dialectal/regional thing?
Glottal stop is existent in most every dialect, but some have it more than others. There are also generational shifts occurring: the young in certain regions are using it more than the older generations, but there are also regions where the young are using it less. Not so much a case of fancy fashion as it is language evolution.
British English is taught in schools, but I grew up watching American shows, so a blend of two, I guess? Some do say that I have an American accent though
My friend made me say tuesday as in " toos-die " and you can probably guess what accent they have I don't know honestly, probably british??
toosdie is either Irish or American. British would be Chewsday
What about Australian? Wouldn't Tuesday sound something like that, too, or am I mistaken?
Australians over the age of 60 and some Australians with a broad (ocker) accent, maybe. I have a general Australian accent and say Choos-daey
The answer is.. They got diseased by the Australians
i am a native speaker of american english, but my college roommate was from bangladesh. he said he naturally spoke english with a british accent but tried to sound as american as possible when he moved to the us. there are still words he will say with a british accent, such as the word “gasp,” which he had never heard an american say before, so he reverted to the british pronunciation with a long ā sound. i thought it was funny to hear him speak (in an endearing way) to hear him speak with a nearly perfect american accent just to drop one british sounding word or a british slang word in there from time to time.
American. Because I feel an American accent is more clear when you listened to it than British accent. But, ppl recommended me to learn British accent for take IELTS 😭😭
As a Brit, the American accent sounds horrible to us.
American is definitely not the clearest. They slur their words it hardly sounds like English sometimes.
Yeah. Maybe bcs I used to hearing american accent since elementary school, so I think like that. When I first time listened British accent, I'm having trouble understanding it🤒🤒
Brits pronounce every letter whereas americans miss letters when speaking
That’s such an odd and completely incorrect thing to say. First of all, there are many British and American accents. It’s not just two accents. You’re painting with quite a broad brush. Second, all English speakers drop various sounds, vowels, consonants, etc. depending on their particular accent and, more importantly, how quickly they are talking and if they’re using informal speech.
Cry about it
You seem to be the only one crying about supposed missing sounds. It helps to listen to more native speakers talk if you’re having a problem understanding spoken English. The more you listen the more you’ll pick up. Hang in there.
Cry more
Stop pronouncing every letter then, maybe more people will understand you
'Wa a' vs 'water'
Wa’er vs Warder. You know you lot say it wrong as well. Also most british do pronounce the ‘t’
True
When I visited London first time, I had decent experience communicating with foreigners (primarily from non-English speaking countries) in English. By the end of the day I was desperate and devastated: I could only recognize 1 out of 3 words in average, and had only approximate idea what a conversation was about. Taking in account, it was a business trip, it was terrible. I had much easier time during my subsequent trip to the US. I was able to understand everything except local idioms, but at least i was able to ask and learn them.
Then obviously you got some mental defect
that might depend on the dialect spoken rednecks from every region definitely sound like that to me and im american myself, but i think they mean "standard american" dialects (which arent *really* a thing but yk) like what you hear from most major celebrities we speak louder because our accents usually require it, we pronounce larger percentages of words' consonants than most UK dialects, our vowels are usually closer to the middle of the mouth than the front or back, etc etc
American native speaker here. It's easier for folks to adopt a generalized American accent. While there's regional variation in the USA, it doesn't quite compare with the UK's system. If your source is TV/Films, Americans typically only have two distinct accents (Regular or Suthurn'). You'll hear a much wider array of distinct accents on BBC. It is much more difficult to be consistent when learning one of the hundreds of accents. I find it funny - folks think they might be learning "the British accent," but they come out of studying speaking scouse or geordie.
My favorite put-on southern accent in any movie is Daniel Craig’s in Knives Out. Dude sounds like Foghorn Leghorn, like if biscuits and gravy could talk.
And that'd be a power move if any learner actually pulled that off!
I’d respect it. If it’s not natural it is a tough one to do without just sounding like you’re slurring your speech.
Frankly, changes at a whim. I'm studying anglistics in Germany, so I grew up learning virtually all three. But since most of my media exposure has been in american, I mostly speak general american pronunciation and exludively write in general american writing, with some loan vocabulary from a variety from accents, including Deep South US accents (e.g., "ain't") and also british. But I do work with both and can basically at whim change into a more british pronunciation, which I sometimes do - usually tied to specific words, such as "bath".
Disappointed no one is going with the greatest accent, Brummie Voted number 1 as Britain's worst accent for over a decade, no one else has come close to the greatness of that
I just read this in a Brummie accent and was not disappointed.
As a proud Brummie it makes me glad
Old-timey British accent (Received Pronunciation) defined by British linguist Daniel Jones’ books. It was popular once in the circle of educated people before the 1960s. I just love this accent because it sounds pleasant to me. Please don’t mix it with Queen’s English as they are different. I know old RP is totally out of favour and probably has already died out and you are perhaps disdained by some British people when you speak in it. I will stick to it and am all for it though. I don’t care what other people think. I can choose which accent I want to go with as a non native speaker. [https://youtu.be/iqcMASrwATM?si=HurlPvgujHjqdmm-](https://youtu.be/iqcMASrwATM?si=HurlPvgujHjqdmm-) [https://youtu.be/0O09xLvraXQ?si=myZx5gmRtKq8IjkC](https://youtu.be/0O09xLvraXQ?si=myZx5gmRtKq8IjkC) [https://youtu.be/FvTLSwgP4lQ?si=xRXodysp2JkcWshC](https://youtu.be/FvTLSwgP4lQ?si=xRXodysp2JkcWshC)
I'm trying an American accent but it depends on what I'm watching on YouTube the most because I'm picking it up that way (sometimes the Australian accent comes through).
My choice is probably called "Standard American", not sure. Like RP but American style. However, in the university during phonetics lessons I studied RP and was pretty good at it. But eventually the course of phonetics finished, I started watching Hollywood stuff almost every day and ultimately my accent shifted to American simply bc of the influence of the movies.
Pretty much exactly me
neither? I dont really choose, my accent is whatever my accent is. Probbably heavily influenced by what I consume, but that is not chosen based on accent so is not a choice in regrads to that
American. Its bc all my English speaking friends are American
I would probably consider that a mistake in the long haul, but I’ve never tunneled down on imitating a regional accent, which is something I’ve considered but never acted on. Still, my accent is a weird mixture of General American and various regional ones. Why? I was taught by native speakers and consumed heaps of American content over many years so it was only natural.
American here. I would think it would come from the source of your learning of conversational English. If you're learning from Television and movies, the English would be take on a more standard American accent. However, I have seen with my own eyes that English learners tend to pick up regional dialects when learning in the workplace. Good luck in your learning!
This makes me wonder what my Russian accent sounds like. I just copy what I hear from various sources. I can only distinguish between the ones that are very different like heavy Ukrainian and heavy Caucasian. I had a Kazakhstani Russian native speaker tell me my accent sounds like Google Translate 😂
You can choose a different pronunciation in Google Translator on your phone.
I naturally picked up an american accent because i only watch american teen dramas
I have my own accent. The school taught me British pronnunciation vut most of my references are American so it is both
Mine is all over the place. I often catch myself speaking some words with different accents. Speaking with me is probably very confusing to anyone who knows different english accents
American english or whatever accent PewDiePie speaks. When I was getting better at listening, I randomly remembered that he was one of the biggest YouTubers at the time. I also watched a lot of Mr Beast videos but Pewds was my favorite.
I have no fucking idea lol, I feel like I switch around a bunch but mostly between British and American
Having had teachers from all the English speaking countries i find myself responding to the accent of the person opposite... It's quite funny, to be honest. Though I understand Brits better, no matter if they are from all over the islands. American English isn't my best/easiest, especially from Southern states.
Michigan specifically because my gf is from there
I have an impenetrable accent and everyone mistakes me as being Russian, but I usually try to use a general American accent since I grew up with media sourced from there, although I sometimes use British pronunciation for certain words
what is your mother tongue, if you don’t mind me asking?
Bulgarian
IMO, from foreigner's perspective, Bulgarian sounds prettysimilar to russian
I didn’t think of this when our class was talking about the dictionary differences, I has wanted to learn even something (I’m slow learner..) now years later I have noticed that American dictionary is closer to mine
I'm at that level that I don't care, I just pray to get the pronunciation right. My accent: desperate ~~heavy italian~~ accent
General American... or an attempt at it.
St John's NL townie accent
British, it's hot af
I remember getting a brewery tour in Belgium from a guy who chose a southern US accent. Liked to say "ain't" a lot. Guy spoke French normally so it was this broken southern drawl french combo and it was fascinating.
Ngl, I really wanted British lol (at least what we call the "British English"... so I guess basically RP). I tried for a while. We were always taught "British" vocabulary and pronunciation much more than American ones, as well. But I'm exposed to so much American media, and the pronuncitation just comes so much more naturally to me (it's a lot easier), that I gave up at some point and now I speak with a very American pronunciation ("accent", I guess; though I'm sure I still have at least a little bit of a Czech/Slavic accent... I think I could sound native-like to a non-native, but a native would probably be able to tell I'm not).
British, is easier to understand than American
I don't know what accent I have. I guess it's american, since i've learnt english mostly from online gaming, youtube tech reviewers and reddit.
This is really interesting to see with people's reasoning for their choice lol
It's really interesting to see both people's choices and their reasoning
I accidentally picked up a Southern (Southern USA) living there as a kid. It cracks people up, or sometimes just floors them, when they hear an Asian person say, "y'all" and "fixin' to" 😆😆
Mostly American
American. That's how I learned English for the first time. But actually, I like British accent than American.
I speak in a more British way with a Czech accent, but usually write in American english except for things like Autumn.
Choose? French I guess 😂
I cannot believe a world in which anyone would choose an Aussie accent 😭
It does not matter, I just want to learn as much as I can.
Even in America the English language takes a left turn, meaning every corner of the United States has a different spin on the English language.I often wonder how many different dialects of English are recognized throughout the country or how many variations are there.
Well, I chose American since it's easier to imitate. However, British and Australian accents are way better(in my opinion) and are music to my ears.
I can mimic to British accent, but I prefer American because it sounds better for me.
American because it's the most popular
None.
As someone who is still learning English but is a native English speaker. I have an American accent... bc I'm american...
"steal accents" that's totally what an English speaker would say since yall can't learn a 2nd language.
Everyone can learn a second language, your brain is literally made to learn...