Sexiest accent survey in British Isles

Subject: RE: Sexiest accent survey in British Isles
From: bob jr
Date: 27 Jun 00 - 11:53 PM

australian accents are about as sexy as a frog taking a pee

Subject: RE: Sexiest accent survey in British Isles
From: Ebbie
Date: 28 Jun 00 - 12:12 AM

Hey, hey, hey! I love Aussie accents. They're right up there next to Irish. I especially like the Melbourne curl- it's not quite as smooth as the Sydney one.

Ebbie

Subject: RE: Sexiest accent survey in British Isles
From: katlaughing
Date: 28 Jun 00 - 12:49 AM

I am a sucker for accents, Irish, Scots, English, French, and Spanish/Latino/a.

My business partner back East had a degree in linuistics. He used to listen to my brother and me and it would drive him crazy becasue there was not specific thing he could point to which made our accents Coloradoan, yet they most definitely were. My dad has a very slow, thoughtful Western Colorado accent of the old pioneers....I'd give anything, some days, to have that..it is dying out and no one is carryign it on.

But, I might as well be a mynah bird, because I tend to pick up whatever accent I am around...I've had friends tell me I sound like their Canadian friends, the people here in the West know for sure that I've lived out East, and out there, I was a novelty for being from back here!

when I was a kid, a girl scout who'd never met me called one day to ask my fi my troop would liek to come to a meeting of her troop. We started visiting and she asked me if I was from Scotland., Apparently, the whole school thought I was...it was a Scottish year for me, I guess.:-)

katlaughingatthefunthisis

Subject: RE: Sexiest accent survey in British Isles
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 28 Jun 00 - 12:50 AM

My accent is just a mixture of UK regions but even within that range I can see what Alison is saying. People notice the differences in accents to what they are used to and pick up on what to them is the strongest difference or bit that doesn't belong.

I think it is only those who live in an area that pick some of this up, eg. Alison sounds pretty strong Belfast to me (most recongisable bit to me and I don't know the full Belfast accent) but people in Belfast notice the Australian influence that I can no detect...

I find the voice chat rooms interesting. Americans pick up that many UK people have Brittish accents but seem to think them all one accent. The same applies with me. I can tell that some people come fom Southern states in the US but beyond that, I haven't a clue and could not tell a Canadian accent from an American one or, thinking of Alison, an Australian accent from a New Zealand one but I bet there are ifferences an even noticable regional differences to those that live there.

Jon

Subject: RE: Sexiest accent survey in British Isles
From: GUEST,Roger the skiffler
Date: 28 Jun 00 - 04:05 AM

Jon, ask N.Americans to say "round about". If they're Canadians there'd be no doubt about it!
RtS

Subject: RE: Sexiest accent survey in British Isles
From: Gervase
Date: 28 Jun 00 - 05:18 AM

Sexiest accent?
Certainly not mine. I was brought up to believe that I didn't have an accent - until I changed schools in my mid teens, when I found out pretty sharpish that I DID have an accent, and it was one of the most despised accents in these isles; the strangulated RP.
It's taken years of reverse elocution to iron it out (I blame the parents, meself) but it still sometimes causes problems. As GBS said, an Englishman only has to open his mouth for another Englishman to despise him.
Thus singing can be a problem. How the hell do you sing a song about rural hardship/mining disasters/drowned fishermen when you sound like a bloody BBC newsreader? Putting on a cod accent seems to me to be a cop-out, but I can't think of any other way around the problem.
Strangely enough, the accent is only a handicap in England and Scotland; not in Ireland, the USA or any other anglophone country - in fact it's been quite handy in the US, as I'm often dragged on screen by CNN and CBS to talk bollocks about the Royal family and the British constitution solely on the basis that I can sound like an archetypal chinless twat.
Mind you, its' different when I'm drinking. I don't know if anyone else migrates northward with every pint, but I find that after two or three there's a definite Midlands twang, and after five or six I can be unintelligibly Glaswegian! (...so perhaps I should only sing when pissed?!)

Subject: RE: Sexiest accent survey in British Isles
From: GUEST,Airto
Date: 28 Jun 00 - 05:27 AM

I'm fascinated by accents and where they come from, but I'm also completely ignorant on the subject. What were the influences that went to form the New York accent, for example? Where did the pronunciation of 'tube' come from? The Dutch pronounce it the same way as New Yorkers, but so do Corkonians. The Dutch got there first, to Harlem, Brooklyn and Bedford-Stuyvestant so maybe it's a legacy from them? Or from the West country of England?

One mystery to me is the Australian accent. Ebbie above talks about a difference between Melbourne and Sydney, but the vast majority of Aussies will tell you their ear is not sensitive enough to discern any difference in accent from one part of that enormous country to the other. Only relatively few people claim to detect regional differences. Perth is 2000 miles from Adelaide but the twang is (almost) identical.

How come? Something to do with being a new country? In that case, how did people come to adopt such a uniform accent so quickly? And why does it sound like it's part of the South East of England family of accents, without any trace of an input from the Scots or the Irish who went there in big numbers, not to mention those from the rest of England?

It's not at all like North America, another 'new country' for the purposes of this subject, where there is a range of different accents, none of which sound like they they might be British.

It's quite normal for individuals to adopt an accent not originally their own in order to fit in in a new environment. But young people in the middle class parts of Dublin are now speaking with an accent never spoken by their parents. It's a horrible bastardisation in which certain sounds are clipped, that's supposed to sound genteel and cool at the same time. To me it's a sign of lack of confidence in their identity. Are there other examples of whole groups/classes of people adopting a new accent quite so quickly?

You wouldn't want to be hearing the likes of it at the end of the phone when you're looking for a loan, you'd only end up feeling sorry for the lost little things.

Has anyone got any insights to offer?

Arthur O'Malley

Subject: RE: Sexiest accent survey in British Isles
From: GUEST,Hilary in NZ
Date: 28 Jun 00 - 06:19 AM

Hi everyone. Jon - yes there is a big difference between Australian accents and New Zealand ones. We speak English. :) :) :) :) :) :) :)

Subject: RE: Sexiest accent survey in British Isles
From: GUEST,Roger the skiffler
Date: 28 Jun 00 - 06:44 AM

Jon, Hilary was actually saying Yis
RtS
:oD

Subject: RE: Sexiest accent survey in British Isles
From: Bagpuss
Date: 28 Jun 00 - 06:46 AM

I'm a Geordie, who has lived in Glasgow and Yorkshire. Most places, they can tell immediately that Im a Geordie, but when I go back home (gan back hyem), I get people asking me whereabouts in scotland I am from!

When I studied English Language at Glasgow uni, we had to do phonetic transcriptions of our accents - the professor asked to see me, cos he didn't believe that was actually the way i spoke!!

By the way, there is an english to geordie translator somewhere on the web. I'll try and find the link if anyone is interested in having a laugh.

Bagpuss (wake up be bright, be golden and light).

Subject: RE: Sexiest accent survey in British Isles
From: Nicole Leonard
Date: 28 Jun 00 - 07:57 AM

To tell the difference between an Australian and a New Zealander just ask them to say 'fish and chips'. If they say 'feesh and cheeps' they are Aussie, if they say 'fush and chups' they are Kiwi. When I visit Australia, they think I am English. People from Perth actually sound more like New Zealanders than people from Sydney and Brisbane do even though its on the other side of Australia. In general we do not have regional accents in New Zealand other than in Otago and Southland (the lower half of the South Island) where they roll their R's strangely. This has nothing to do with British accents, but I find the whole subject fascinating.

Subject: RE: Sexiest accent survey in British Isles
From: Kim C
Date: 28 Jun 00 - 11:50 AM

Well, just READING Mr. Cameron's posts makes my heart pound! Do you really talk that way?!!?! Ohmagawd. Back in the 80s I used to love to hear Stuart Adamson of Big Country talk even though I could barely understand him.

Sometimes I listen to international radio feeds on the Net and it's sort of amusing that the broadcasters in Ireland and Scotland, just like in the US, have very little accent.

Now me, I have lived in the South all my life and don't have that really telltale "peel me a grape, Sugar" accent, although there are elements of my speech which would immediately identify me as a Southerner to a linguist. Plus I say y'all, and fixin to, and most of those expressions the "educated" detest. (Well, I'm "educated" too, so kiss my tattooed behind.)

My friend LuAnne from Mississippi (who is also "educated") has a REALLY Southern accent and people stop her all the time and want to know where she's from and start talking to her just so they can hear her speak. When I visited England many years ago, our pals there were quite taken with the way we Tennesseans talked.

when I was there I met an Irishman I gladly would have married right then and there if he had only asked me. He was from Galway. He could have talked to me all night and I would have been perfectly content.

Mr. Cameron, keep talkin' tae us, please.

KFC

Subject: RE: Sexiest accent survey in British Isles
From: Irish Rover
Date: 28 Jun 00 - 03:33 PM

Och well lads, de Irish, well der ya havit den. T's from da north yer talkin somewhere jest sooth a bel-fast mebe aroond lurgan, well damned if that's not where I from ah muust have the sexiest brogue sooooooolive with et.

Subject: RE: Sexiest accent survey in British Isles
From: Morticia
Date: 28 Jun 00 - 04:53 PM

Gervase you have a lovely speaking ( and singing) voice, I won't hear a word against any accent that doesn't use words like bu'ah, or wa'ah ( butter and water).Having had the crap beaten out of me for any trace of an irish accent and having lived all over the place, I suspect my accent is both neutral and dull, until the second pint or when I'm speaking to anyone with any kind of strong accent; in the first instance it reverts to soft irish burr and in the second to whatever the other accent is, which has had me accused of taking the p**s many a time. Used to be a sod when I wasn't allowed to play with some liverpudlian kids down the road ( now that's a great accent). As soon as I opened my mouth my mother knew instantly I'd been over there.

Subject: RE: Sexiest accent survey in British Isles
From: kendall
Date: 28 Jun 00 - 05:01 PM

Sean Connery by far.