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[LoneWanderer]

Why get rid of your accent?? It's super cool I looove Southern accents, they're about the best things ever.

That's kind of you to say haha. I used to get made fun of for it, so I started working on getting rid of it. Now I only have the slightest of accents, but I can live with it

[CeeGBee]

Here is my attempt at the challenge

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/ugP56J8XEc4" target="_blank" class="new_win">http://www.youtube.com/v/ugP56J8XEc4</a>

Why get rid of your accent?? It's super cool I looove Southern accents, they're about the best things ever.

My parents are/were both academics, so my own accent is very slight.
I've always kinda wished I had a strong natural accent of some sort.
(I can fake lots of 'em, but it's all put-on).

Now, my sister works at Emory University, so I imagine she hears all the Georgia
she can stand and then some, but really... embrace the drawl.


EDIT fix flash BBC -lentower

[Indja]

Why get rid of your accent?? It's super cool I looove Southern accents, they're about the best things ever.

That's kind of you to say haha. I used to get made fun of for it, so I started working on getting rid of it. Now I only have the slightest of accents, but I can live with it

I used to be super-posh, and while I was at primary school it was fine but then it basically got mocked out of me through secondary school xD Now I've gone to uni, and it's sort of semi-reverted back to Southern but with the odd bit of Northern that sparks through just to keep it interesting. It's a shame people can get teased out of speaking in a way that is totally natural to them. I love accents in general, life's a lot more interesting with them than without.

[spider jerusalem]

It might be interesting to see what you're taught though, because there are so many different ways of speaking English that it'd be cool to see what kind you get taught at school. I know the European kids I met often got taught quite American English, which was strange because they're so close to England. Also, I bet you have a funky-ass accent

Point made. Will try to record something these next days.

Oooh, maybe it's the television that has such a big influence then? That would make a lot of sense.

Probably. It is the same here - TV (series in general), music and films has a hug influence on people who are learning english.

[slyvia k]

It might be interesting to see what you're taught though, because there are so many different ways of speaking English that it'd be cool to see what kind you get taught at school. I know the European kids I met often got taught quite American English, which was strange because they're so close to England. Also, I bet you have a funky-ass accent

regarding that, I used to have a quite heavy american accent, partially because my mom is american and I grew up listening to country music when I was a little kid (don't judge me ), and I remember it being ostracized by many of my teacher and professors. Especially at highschool and university, though they couldn't actually penalize me for it because I did speak very fluently, a lot of professors sneered at my american accent... not for that particular reason, I think my accent has changed quite a bit, and it's a mash of british and american...

[CeeGBee]

It might be interesting to see what you're taught though, because there are so many different ways of speaking English that it'd be cool to see what kind you get taught at school. I know the European kids I met often got taught quite American English, which was strange because they're so close to England. Also, I bet you have a funky-ass accent

Point made. Will try to record something these next days.

Oooh, maybe it's the television that has such a big influence then? That would make a lot of sense.

Probably. It is the same here - TV (series in general), music and films has a hug influence on people who are learning english.

I've been watching True Blood on DVD, and it struck me as odd that one of the
caption options was "Brazilian Portugese".... I spoke with a friend from Brazil, and
she told me, sure enough, there's a distinct difference of dialect.  In college, I
had a classmate who was a native Spanish-speaker, but who failed the placement
test for fluency because she couldn't understand the Mexican guy who recorded
the test clips.

...and, of course, the can't English speak their own language anymore.   

[spider jerusalem]

regarding that, I used to have a quite heavy american accent, partially because my mom is american and I grew up listening to country music when I was a little kid (don't judge me ), and I remember it being ostracized by many of my teacher and professors. Especially at highschool and university, though they couldn't actually penalize me for it because I did speak very fluently, a lot of professors sneered at my american accent... not for that particular reason, I think my accent has changed quite a bit, and it's a mash of british and american...

My teachers told me that for exams like ESOL, it does not matter if you have a Welch accent or a Canadian accent, as long as you keep a pattern (i.e not changing how you pronounce words)  and speaks it fluently.

I've been watching True Blood on DVD, and it struck me as odd that one of the
caption options was "Brazilian Portugese".... I spoke with a friend from Brazil, and
she told me, sure enough, there's a distinct difference of dialect.  In college, I
had a classmate who was a native Spanish-speaker, but who failed the placement
test for fluency because she couldn't understand the Mexican guy who recorded
the test clips.

...and, of course, the can't English speak their own language anymore.   

 

Yes. Our portuguese is slightly different from european portuguese. We have some differences on how we say some words, a little with verbs (present continuous), and with spellings - all that but the cultural aspects of the language. However, the most differences comes from how we speak. Meaning, I can fully understand what they write, but sometimes their portuguese sounds uncommon. It get awhile to start understanding.

To reduce these writing differences, there was an agreement signed by both countries and some other portuguese speaking countries. At the end, these differences tried to make portuguese more unified, but it failed. Kinda complicated to explain it in english without having to teach portuguese grammar that I dont know by heart....   sorry.


Edit: I wouldnt say dialect. maybe 'idiom', since when writing or speaking we follow the same rules.
 

[Rob]

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/dHICQCTlQw8&amp;feature=youtube_gdata_player" target="_blank" class="new_win">http://www.youtube.com/v/dHICQCTlQw8&amp;feature=youtube_gdata_player</a>

[CeeGBee]

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/dHICQCTlQw8&amp;feature=youtube_gdata_player" target="_blank" class="new_win">http://www.youtube.com/v/dHICQCTlQw8&amp;feature=youtube_gdata_player</a>

I hate it when that happens.......