Thank you for watching me, a humble American, react to Why the Australian accent is so difficult . I hope you enjoyed laughing at my Aussie accent attempts. Happy arvo!
Another problem is that people assume there's only one Aussie accent, when (as far as I'm concerned) there are at least five or six most notable Aussie accents. The differences are very slight, but Aussies can pick up on them, and I think because our accents are so complex we have a good ear for accents in general.
My brother, sister and I all have slightly different accents due to what we've done in our adult lives. We all started with a slightly English accent due to our father but I'm the only one who kept it, also affected by my living in England for a while. Our sister stayed city living and dropped back to a general Aussie accent. Our brother's accent is the strongest because he moved to the outback for years and the English inflection was treated with suspicion out there.
@@kristyl933 I don't know about that. I live in Melbourne and there are many different dialects here. I have an old Kensington dialect, which is very similar to northern English dialects (such as Manchester, Sheffield, even some southern Scottish ones), and the accent is unlike any I have ever heard around Australia. Whenever I go travelling people ask me if I'm Scottish or English, and I have to say I'm an Aussie hahaha. We also have very different slang words, such as Madra, Black Mariah, Tuppence, and many more. I've never heard these elsewhere in Australia.
@@aimeen843 Yes me neither. I'm not sure where you're from in Melbourne, but have you heard any of the slang I listed? They seem to be extremely rare words these days
Its good to see an American learning about Australian culture and just enjoying learning about our way of life. I give big props to ya Ryan 👏 you're a top bloke in my book champ
40 years ago I was in Central Australia 🇦🇺. A man spoke with a Irish accent yet never travelled out of Australia 🇦🇺 His father was from Ireland 🇮🇪 and his mother was Aboriginal. Being so isolated his accent had developed.
@@robertmurray8763 Yes, I sounded like the. Queen when I went to school, rather odd since I was going to a school in a remote part of Australia but my mother was perfectly bilingual and her accent was unfortunately posh. I adopted her accent from being isolated. Yet people have assumed I'm lying about coming from where I do. It's strange indeed!
I was born in Australia but I started kindergarten with a Scottish accent. I learned pretty quick from school how to do an Aussie accent. I sometimes get caught out on a few words so I just avoid them in my vocabulary.
@@tinfoilhomer909 I find inverted snobbery really funny. It's as bad as garden-variety snobbery. My mother would correct my accent if I was adopting phrases or word that were grammatically incorrect. She told me: "you will thank me in the future". She was right because I can move in any circles and changing down is dead easy. I can talk with farmers and country people, and ordinary working people, or the toffs. Unfortunately doors can close if you don't express yourself well. So maintaining the Aussie accent and bad grammar can be a block. I just like to communicate clearly. Australians tend to mumble and don't speak clearly and that makes it very hard for others. I once found myself actually translating to a Canadian English speaking hotel receptionist what an Australian was trying to say ....in English! She had to get him to repeat himself twice after the initial request. She was incredibly grateful that I stepped in and clearly said what he wanted (are there any rooms available and if so how much?). This is kind of funny and not so great if you think about it! Plus the nasal accent can be grating. 'NIIIAAW' instead of 'now'. OMG it's horrible sounding. On grammar: Learned 'pretty quick' = learned 'pretty quickly'. I don't personally mind but others do and it can undermine your message. These days I help students with their English and they say they never have any difficulty understanding what I'm saying unlike with other Australians. It's just the way it is. Inverted snobbery is not so great IMO.
In Lion, Dev Patel actually had an Accent coach for around 3 to 4 months, Its pretty pretty close. Dev actually went to the producers and BEGGED to be cast, but they had to put him through audition, but he still got it.
I’m from Perth, Western Australia. When I visited the states I got asked if I was British, Bostonian and Southern. I never got asked if I was Australian though haha. I love accents. I found that really video really interesting. Thanks Ryan. Happy arvo mate. Have a good one.
Years ago when in Europe I ran into an Australian couple who had fairly broad Aussie accents (not as strong as Steve Irwin but still pretty ocker). They said I was lying about being Australian because of my accent (which is a general Aussie accent with a touch of Cate Blanchett). They told everyone there that I was lying! They were from Melbourne, so I told them (truthfully) that I was born in Wagga Wagga and that it doesn’t get much more Aussie than that! 😂
Wagga is Aboriginal for “piss”. When the word is repeated it denotes ‘a lot of’. The term “piss” in the Australian vernacular means beer. So Wagga Wagga translates as “The place of many beers.”
I'm from Junee living in Wagga and there's a shit tonne of us with the broad accent here. If anything, the broad accent is getting stronger here. Most of the children have good broad accents
lol, you pretty much nailed some weird combination of cockney and the British Royal Received Pronunciation accent. Not easy to do I would imagine lol, so well done on that :)
I'm going to start saying 'happy arvo' to my friends and family... you never know, it might catch on and Ryan will have contributed a new addition to the Australian lingo.
I’m from, what was, a very conservative part of Queensland. I’m now 50. I was horrified when I first “heard” my accent. I was in LAX, getting my luggage, because I had a lay over and was on my way to NYC. The fact I was in the USA to complete my Shakespearean actor training made me terrified. I thought I sounded so stupid and I have what was then considered the “cultivated” accent - like Cate Blanchett. The course I was on was very prestigious and I didn’t have to audition for it. An American director had seen me performing and invited me. After hearing my accent, I thought he was stark, raving mad. It really knocked my confidence as I thought I sounded like a “slack-jawed yocal”. Thankfully I had a week in NYC before the course started. It really got to me, especially when I learned my vocal coach was the Head of Voice at Juilliard. I just thought, “Why the Hell did they bring me here?” Still got the gig after training.
Good on ya for realizing your own accent and doing your best to work thru it. The Juilliard dude would’ve helped. I’m from rural WA and as an entertainer, teacher and now health care worker I have been fighting to keep the accent intelligible all my life.
@@sherrylovegood Same. I was living in the States for about 3 months. Was in San Fran to catch a Qantas flight back home. And all of a sudden the Australian accent actually hurt my ears lol Fortunately an Australian accent in the US opens far more doors than it closes
If she thinks the broad accent isn't really a thing anymore she hadn't visited Queensland in a very long time. Must of been produced in Victoria or New South Wales
Depends where in Qld you're talking about. I was raised in northern Brisbane suburbs and have a general accent. When I moved to Sydney, no one guessed I was from QLD. The broad accent is more regional Qld, far north Queensland. They have a slower drawl.
In Las Vegas in 2013 for a trade show, some Yanks I met took me to an Aussie restaurant (Sands Casino). We were waiting in a room with about twenty customers waiting for a vacated table. I got a bit bored so, put my bush hat on, went around to each of the customers and said in a broad Outback accent, G'day, my name's Keith from the Outback Down Under, welcome to this restaurant! People were looking at me with open mouths probably thinking who is this guy? Lots of laughs, cured the boredom, and the Yanks I was with loved it. Spur of the moment thing for me. At the time I was living in remote village in outback Western Australia about 4 hours north of Kalgoorlie Gold Fields. At the time, I was living on a WA cattle station of about 500,000 acres.
When I hear people trying to impersonate the Aussie accent, I tell them to imagine themselves as a two-stroke motorbike or lawn mower trying to speak English.
Kate Winslett played an Aussie called Tilley in the movie called The Dressmaker. She got our Accent right. Here is a clip of her in that movie, also staring Liam Hemmswoth ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-IjXLVgyOQJs.html
I totally agree, she nailed it. I think it's easier for Brits to pronounce our accent than Americans. We drop the "R" sound whereas I think the Americans drop the "O" sound.
Two great examples of non Australians speaking in an Australian accent are Robin Wright and Kate Winslet, Robin plays and Australian in a movie called Adoration and Kate plays an Australian in The Dressmaker, if you had never heard them speak before, watching those two films, you'd swear they were Australian women, they're both great talents!
As a dutchie i find the ozzy accent the easiest and most comfortable of all accents. Actually makes speaking english a lot easier because the pronunciations feel more natural (should probably also mention two of my best mates during childhood were australian and i basically learned how to speak english by hanging out with them and i guess i kinda took over their accents)
I love how all of the content you put on your channel is fun and interesting; how you sound genuinely curious and intuitive about each subject or topic; makes for an interesting viewing. But I especially love it when you put anything, about Australia 🇦🇺 on. You also come across as an awesome bloke. Great work mate. 👍💖🥳
I am fully Australian and just listening to them all trying an Aussie accent is hilarious. I never knew it was that hard for others to do the accent but I wouldn’t know because for me it comes naturally. I loved watching this though. Please keep doing these videos.
I would never lose my accent, I've witnessed a few Aussie's that have been to America for a couple weeks, come back home sounding like an American.. 🤦♂️
My son has autism and when he was younger he couldn't talk but when he finally did he had a slight American accent from watching American educational DVDs. Like the alphabet and stuff it blew my mind 😂
I can't explain why but I literally love your channel :D You are so nice. I've been binge watching you on my tv account since I found you. I only found you last week from watching your reaction to John Farnham singing Help. I'm Australian by the way. See you again this arvo for more binge watching x
I remember having lunch with a linguist. He was saying that there was a ranking to accents. Towards the bottom of the lists are accents like the general US one. Towards to top is the Australian. The average person finds it easier to do accents equal or lower on the scale. This is why the Aussie accent is so hard for so many.
Dont forget Australia was flooded with American culture in 1956 when we got television. This enables us to replicate various American regional accents.
I tried to buy a lighter at a servo in New York and the bloke handed me a lotto ticket. Probably took about 2 solid minutes for him to finally understand what I wanted 😂
cheers! Ryan, much better.thanks for letting us hear what there talking about before you give your opinion. way better. keep up the good work love your videos. congrats on new bub. hope all is going well. ange from oz
The American accent came from England. At the time America was first settled the accent in southern England was rhotic (pronounced all /r/ sounds). It was the south-eastern English accent that later diverged from American English to become non-rhotic.
Did a bus tour of Hawaii (Big Island) and the coach driver (originally from Texas) swore that he thought I was from Virginia. As you said, Ryan maybe we do sound like southern Americans. I was born and raised in Sydney, Australia. Our other coach driver on Oahu picked the Aussie accent straight away. He was Samoan.
Yep, I'm with you there. Lived in Vic for 40+ years, originally from FNQ. Talk like a Melbournite, but, 5 minutes conversation with anyone with a strong FNQ accent, back I go to that! And ending every sentence with "AY!" Weird! 🤣
Same here. It’s pretty funny how versatile I can be depending upon where I am & who I’m with. There’s one word I haven’t been able to just let go & do. “Ya” instead of you. It just doesn’t sit well. I find myself saying “see you!” instead of “see ya!” The looks I get sometimes 😅😂
I agree completely and I actually find it quite advantageous being able to be able to relate and understand to different people on different levels..That has also served me well being Scottish born but Aussie raised where I also find my more Glaswegian side coming out when I'm around other Scots and of course acting as the interpreter to my Aussie mates who don't understand a single word my fellow Scots are saying 😂
The funniest moment of the Simpsons episode when they came to Australia was Marj and Lisa walking past a building that had AUSTRALIAN CULTURAL CENTRE and underneath that a sign saying cart your arse on in.😂
There is a really subtle joke in that episode when Bart gets the letter from Australia. The stamp was issued to celebrate 20 years of electricity in Australia
On the other hand we're pretty good at mimicking other people's accents. My Brother met a Pretty English Tourist and Followed Her Home from Australia to England. They got Married the following year. Apparently He has a British Accent none of us have ever heard. Because whenever he thinks or speaks about Australia he subconsciously switches back.
loving the aussie content, it's really heart warming to see people from other cultures experiencing Australia. you should check out Tasting History's ANZAC biscuit episode, it really shows aussie mateship, and how, despite being enemies, the Turks and Aussies respected each other from across the trenches
When Meryl Streep acted as Lindy Chamberlain in the Aussie film Evil Angels - she said the Aussie accent was the most difficult accent she had to master.
Liev Schrieber pretty much nailed it ( pretty much ) because his wife ( Naiomi Watts ) is Australian . I imagine him imitating her accent around the house all the time . That's what I'd do . When I hear an American accent , I hear a very strong Irish influence . Now it might just be me but they seem fairly similar in quite a few ways . In particular , the "R" sound is very pronounced in both .
One of the best things about an Aussie accent in the USA is that it can instantly get the local Police to chill out. Cop walks up to your car in a traffic stop, one hand hovering over his weapon. "Giday officer, howzitgon' What can I do for ya?" They relax instantly. Unless you are drunk, or have been a total FWit it will usually end with them recommending you drive differently & send you on your way.
Australian English sounds Southern to an American because the south of the US was colonized mostly by English and Scottish people. The rest of the US was colonised by mostly German people or by people from within German majority states in the US. That means the closest American accent to Australian is the southern accent.
I'm an Aussie, lived in SA my entire life and don't swear Because of my accent when I say sittin' (sitting) it sounds like I say sh**tin' I also don't say all letters of words In the sentence "I need an editor to edit it" It sounds like "I need an ed-did-der d ed-did di" But the dashed bit is fast (I wrote it like that to try to have it make more sense)
Your rolled R's come directly from Yorkshire in england. I have a Yorkie friend in Cairns and everybody mistakes him for an american on first meeting. I had a 2nd generation dutch flatmate who always said color because her dad said it that way.
😄😄😄 Haha I love it when you try and do the Aussie accent!! Lol 🤣 I suppose it is hard to do! We are a nutty bunch! None of those actors got it right! Lol
When my dad was in Hospital the nurse was from Asia, maybe China or Singapore and she spoke with a N.Z. accent which shocked me. My Uncle and Aunty who were from N.Z. didn't notice.
Hey Ryan, don't forget we started as a Penal colony. The English spoken then by the majority, convicts, would have been pretty guttural and uncultured. Good on them.
You're right 👍🏻 I'm British and from the south west , I spent time in the States for work and 9 times out of 10 they thought I was Irish or Australian !! When I told them I was British the reply was usually " really " 😂
Happy Arvo Man, you sound like a pome!🇬🇧🤺🇦🇺 The English look down on us because of our accent - and we don't care, because we've got better weather!🤣🇬🇧🤺🇦🇺
I was born in Perth, WA but am from Anglo-Burmese/British colonial heritage so my grandparents/mum spoke with an RP British accent. I moved to Melbourne and have also lived in rural Sydney and California so my accent can go from Cate Blanchett to NorCal to British and Aussie ocker as I grew up with lots of Aboriginal friends in WA and lived/worked on farms in NSW. I am pretty quiet/introverted and Americans could never ever hear me as they speak so loudly in comparison. Even after 10 years Americans can still hear a NorCal accent when I speak actually but I can't tell at all lol.
If you’ve never taken much notice of international journalists, have q listen to them more closely. They travel so much and hear so many accents, that it affects their own without them realising it. Over time, you start to hear English with about six or seven different accents creeping into their speech.
Liev Schreiber did a very good accent because he was married to Naomi Watts, an Aussie. If you want to find out about the history of English in America there’s a great BBC documentary that explains how the language changed once it hit America. The Adventure Of English - Episode 5 English in America - BBC Documentary m.ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-oBqlVl0K9tw.html
When I try to do an American accent, the first thing I think of is holding my nose half closed to get the squeak sound. The tongue raises in the center to the roof of the mouth. In Oz, the tongue is relaxed, and not used like a muscle.
LOL at 10:37 you have a strange version of Forrest Gump happening there. I like that you keep trying though. If you like learning about Great Austalian moments then on Netflix is the "Untold" series "The Race of the Century" is about how Australia won the America's cup back in 1983. I think you would enjoy it very much.
I like the fact that you send yourself up when you're doing the Aussie accent - which you acknowledge you're not good at. One of the things you would need to do is get rid of the automatic "oo" pronunciations that you have for words like "new", "due", "dew" and "emu"... all of them have a "you" pronunciation in Aus and NZ English - similar to a number of UK English accents. So "eem-you" for emu, "n'you" for new, "d'you" (often sounding more like "dj'you" or "j''you") for due or dew. Basically "dew" and "due" sound closer to "Jew" than to "do". Drop terminal Rs - people in the USA pronounce Rs way more aggressively than Aussies and New Zealanders. In Aus the R may lengthen the vowel - "car" becomes "cah" (in New Zealand it's just "ka") or may not - "bugger" becomes "bugga".
The way I describe the Aussie accent is that it's "slack-jawed UK english", so your idea about it sounding like "deep south of the UK" is pretty accurate, in my unlearned opinion.
Interesting on one of those later points about the internet and the world communication being the way it is that it might be changing our accent. I’ve seen my young nephew pick up saying words like ‘fast’ and ‘past’ with an American ‘a’ sound. Picked it up entirely from TV shows.
