Aidan, Gaynor and Sophie react to an expert teaching us how to do different accents around the USA. Link to original video: • Accent Expert Gives a ...
I notice that with a lot of Brits. Party is paw tee For most Americans it’s usually par dee. Except I hear some people from places like Rhode Island who don’t pronounce R. They say im paw tant for important. Erik is awesome.
Erik Singer is a world renowned master dialect coach. He is fluent in French and Italian and speaks conversational Japanese and Russian. I have to say , his American accents are extremely accurate.
I don't know where he is from originally, but I would not say his natural accent is any kind of identifiable Southern accent. I would guess Mid-Atlantic or West Coast of some kind.
I love what he had to say in reference to the generic "American" accent. The thing that doesn't get mentioned enough is how Hollywood forces actors to break their accents. Learning American English through movies/tv gives a very narrow education, considering few actors are allowed to sound like where they're from. If Matthew McConaughey were an actor back in the 60's, Hollywood would have made him break that southern drawl...
Matthew McConaughey didn't change his accent (much), which speaks to how much that mindset has already changed. Hollywood used to force actors to speak in an artificial "general America," but that's in the past. If Anthony Mackie was told to lose his New Orleans accent, it may have been for a specific job where that accent was wrong for the character. The important thing for actors to be able to do is 1) use their own accent when there's no reason not to and 2) lose it and adopt an appropriate accent when necessary.
Yes. For some it was fairly natural; that was the way their parents and teachers spoke. For others, it was learned. It was a supposedly "neutral" accent that was considered appropriate for American actors to use on stage, rather than assuming a more RP accent. It's still taught by some speech teachers, unfortunately.@@michlo3393
By "unfortunately," I mean that it's unfortunate if they teach their students that they still have to use that accent when not doing a specifically regional one. It's a useful accent to be able to do when playing someone of a certain class in a role set in the appropriate period.
@@halicarnassus8235 he flew to a big rock out in space, bounced around for no apparent reason and flew back home to earth a super star of pointlessness but that dude that invented antibiotics is an absolute legend.
11:10 Fascinating how you caught that breathing thing! In the Caribbean, we Puertoricans and Dominicans “aspirate” or “sigh” some of our letters. For example, in some of our accents, we sigh the “s” so estas might sound like ehtah. Really nifty you caught that!!!😊
Gaynor saying the welsh accent is totally different than an English accent…that’s the point. In the same way you might not be able to tell differences in American accents because you’re not used to it, the same would be true of many UK accents. I stayed for a little bit in Aberystwyth, a town on the Irish Sea side of Wales, and there’s no way I could have spotted the difference between them and an accent from England. I’m way better now at spotting local English accents because I watch a lot of English content, and have watched a lot of accent videos similar to this about the UK.
As someone from DC I can tell you that the sound of our dialect depends on who's listening. To people from the North East we sound southern, but for southerners we sound northern. However, both of those groups can almost immediately tell that you're from DC.
It's hard to determine a true DC accent because people are constantly moving. There aren't a ton of native Washingtonians (and surrounding area) that still live here. My mom is a native but moved away and then moved back. I have lived in Montgomery County for over 35 years and I can tell when someone is a native Marylander versus someone who moved here. I've never truly developed the accent because of the people I'm surrounded by.
Mid Atlantic accent is probably the hardest to distinguish of all east coast accents where as I can tell who’s from Baltimore in two seconds even tho DC n Baltimore are only an hour n change away from each other
I grew up in Montgomery County but left. I went to my 50th high school reunion and met a lot of people who never left. I felt surrounded by strong Maryland accents, and I think I'm still recovering.@@victorialopez9717
You can ALWAYS tell a Canadian apart. Like when I watched Katherine Ryan (whos on British TV) I knew in her first two sentences she was Canadian. Its word choice and subtle things, like the "O" pronounciation, my cousins were born and raised in Canada, they also say things more British, like Mum not Mom, Washroom not Bathroom, subtle things
No, you cant only some Canadians. Most Canadians just sound like typical Americans with a few words here and there that might be a little different but not noticeable most of the time.
It’s about exposure, I think. I used to think we sounded exactly the same but even the lighter accents go up at the end of their sentences. Almost like valley girls.
I moved from Long Island, NY to eastern Connecticut a distance of 130 miles and although there is little difference in accents, the locals would ask, "you're not from around here are you?' just by the way I pronounced certain words.
Yeah his accents are quite good. His Pittsburgh accent is right on. I’m from there but don’t speak like that too much. Our mother didn’t want us to use that accent too much. 😆
I wish more yinzers would speak like that. It's not good that our accent and dialect is dying out, just because it's not a "sophisticated" way of speaking.
@@GiuseppeDAntelmi I like the different words than I do the accent. Like “redding” up the room (Pa. Dutch I think). I don’t know, I don’t like the accent too much just like I don’t like the New England accent. I lived in NH for a few years and that accent got on my nerves. I don’t think the accent will die out though. It’s true you can tell a person is from the burgh with it though. 😃
As a latino born in Spain, raised in the US south by parents from the US north, I totally get the inheritance of accents over their localizations. It truly is a melting pot, especially in the cities.
It's always fascinating to me. People will insist that the accents where they are from are SO DIFFERENT. They aren't more different, you're just trained to tell them apart because of exposure. I can almost immediately tell Scottish, Irish, and British accents apart for instance, but it would take me a few sentences to tell a Northern England and Southern England accent apart most likely. That doesn't make them less different, I'm just not trained on telling them apart.
Love seeing reaction vids like this- for so long I’ve seen too much “How Brits are better, Americans suck” instead of a cultural exchange- love hearing the other perspective and the how/why with a lot of it.
It's always been popular to hate americans. Most ppl with strong negative opinions about america, dont even rly know that much about it, aside from eye-catching headlines that are especially designed to cause strong emotions (for them clicks, baby!). It will never stop, ppl will always hate us, cuz they ain't us. But it is nice to see people's reactions to this type of stuff. It shows that people are curious or willing to learn, and it's incredibly flattering and humbling. And it makes us more curious about their cultures as well. 🇺🇸 🤝 🇬🇧
Maryland native here (and lived several years in Baltimore City). The accent he was modeling is a thing, but it is most often heard on the eastern side of the city, and mainly among older, white folks. It was common in this part of the city, which was the industrial core, throughout the 20th century but is less common now. Vowels come out a bit differently in this accent. As he said, long "o" sounds come out like "ay-oh" and long "U" sounds come out as "ee-oo." Hard to describe unless you hear it. There are folks who say "Bawlimer" or some variation, but the most common pronunciation is something like "Ball-da-more." The "t" is converted to a "d" and the word is said very fast.
When someone says Eric Singer Noone thinks about this guy. We all know who people think of when the name Eric Singer comes up. But again this Eric Singer in just a youtuber.
Wow, his Baltimore accent! Sounds amazing, that is one tough accent to learn unless you are native. I know Kathy Bates tried to learn and used a Baltimore accent on season four of American Horror Story: Freak Show. Well, I thought it was good but she got flak from folks in Baltimore. One of the most talented actresses, and The Baltimore Sun asks if she is using some form of “Baltimorese?" Lol 😂 I can’t even comprehend how they developed linguistics to say Baltimore the way they do. Pretty fascinating to me. Back in the day I listened to Robert Blumfield dialect lessons. I think I’ll stick with what I know, a good ‘ol Texan accent. This was a great video guys!!! Daz…LET’S GO ASTROS!!!!
Growing up in northern Missouri, I learned I was mistaken by my pronunciation of Washington D.C. as 'Warshington'. It actually took me concerted effort to stop being wrong and placing that 'r' sound in the middle of Washington. I still will continue to pronounce Washington without the 'r', but I won't feel ashamed for pronouncing with the 'r'. Walter Cronkite was raised within 50 miles of where I was, and his accent was totally standard 'American' :)
*I always wondered why the Irish, Scottish, and Welsh accents (brogues?) were very different from the Anglo English accents. Later I learned that the first three groups were originally Gaelic speakers so they speak English as though it's a second language.* Because once upon a time, like the Indians, Africans, and non-Anglo Europeans in American, it was a second language.
I'm a Marylander and have lived most of my life 20 miles north of DC, but went to college up near Baltimore. There is definitely a difference in accent between Baltimore and DC. It's so interesting.
Of all the people you might find on RU-vid who discuss dialects and accents, I reckon Erik Singer is one of the few who is actually extremely knowledgeable and whose accents are quite accurate. Of the ones I’m familiar with, his American accents all seem pretty spot on.
As an American, it's quite difficult to pick out a Canadian accent unless there is that prominent "Canadian Raisin'" sound that Erik Singer mentioned in the video. Canadian English and American English can be very similar.....for obvious reasons.
Some Canadians I have to catch some clues and others it’s extremely obvious the moment they open their mouths. Especially if they are from a rural area. Have you never heard anyone from Newfoundland?
Yes!! You guys FINALLY went on a tour of the U.S.! Well, through our lingo at least, lol. Erik Singer is phenomenal. Please react to all 3 parts! You won't regret it. 😁🌎🇺🇲
I lived in the UK( London area) for 5 yrs 75-79. I worked in a gift shop for awhile and I was constantly asked if I was Canadian or Australian ! Canadian I could kind of understand , but Australian?? I never got that!
Yes! I’m from Pittsburgh. Our accent isn’t regularly heard. So,When you hear it outside of Pgh it’s odd. Lol You know we’re all familiar with the NY accents,Jersey and LA not Pgh😂😂
And then you have people like me. Born and raised in the state of Michigan to parents born and raised in Arkansas and spent many summer vacations in Arkansas and Missouri. Spent 6 years in the Navy based in Norfolk, Virginia and after being discharged, went back to Michigan and ultimately (for now) moved to southwest Missouri where I've spent the last 17+ years. I was also a long-haul truck driver for over 20 years. And because I was tongue-tied as a child I spent a lot of time in speech therapy. Good luck figuring out where I'm from by listening to my accent. The best you'll be able to say is "you're not from around here, are you?"
Have you tried talking to the folks in Des Moines and Omaha? This area is well known to have 'the most colorless pronunciation' in America. At least during the late 20th century.
Heh. I have heard “you’re not from around here, are you?” all my life…Service Brat…added the local speech patterns from every place we lived, and mixed them all together, but I can sound like whatever I want to. It’s amusing. 😉
Erik Singer is not from Texas, Georgia, or anywhere else in the South. He grew up in Connecticut. He does speak Southern accents beautifully, though. (I’m from Texas).
Classic line from the play, then film, "Streetcare Named Desire" starring Vivian Leigh and Marlin Brando: "I've always depended on the kindness of..strangers".
As a born and raised Maryland eastern shore girl I can tell you that the accents are vast and different depending on what area in Maryland you are in. I know in my county alone there are 6 or 7 different accents depending on what part of the county you grew up in and its a tiny county. Most of the accents from my county get mistaken for southern accents by Northern people and even by Marylanders from the western shore who have not been around it may confuse it.
Aidan's face when Erik did the Pittsburgh accent (where I am from) was a WTF?-face as though he did not understand what was said. Welcome to Pittsburgh!! :). Here is what Erik said: "Yinz wanna meet dahntahn, go shoppin' fer cahches"---let me translate for you: Do you want to meet downtown [i.e., in the city], to go shopping for couches? The word "Yinz" is the Pittsburgh version of the southern, 'Y'all"--Pittsburgh is the only place in the worlds where people say Yinz (in fact, we sometimes refer to fellow Pittsburghers as "Yinzers")--and Yinz is not the only word you will find used only in Pittsburgh. It is a truly baffling dialect that I, living in New Jersey now for 30 years, hide from the locals.
Eric is great! As an Army Brat that moved all over the country, I can attest that we have a lot of different accents and word differences. The diversity of settlers created this and it is always changing.
There are certain sounds that typically identify a Canadian from an American, but much of our speech patterns/sounds are shared. Some upper midwestern Americans may be confused with certain Canadians. I can see how it's difficult to identify a Canadian from an American if you aren't from North America.
I'd love that guy to visit my area... I'm in Pennsylvania and the dialects differ by county, or even town. I can drive an hour in any direction and hit at least 2 different local dialects, certain directions 4 or more
Matthew McConaughey is from my hometown, Uvalde, TX. He was raised 50 minutes from the Texas-Mexico border in two directions. He came from a primarily Hispanic community, so his accent is odd because no one from that town sounds like that. Perhaps he purposely learned it for his film career?
Your family is awesome! Thank you for the educational aspect. Most of my lineage is British, but I have never been “home.”I was an American Sailor that loves my country more than my own life. However, I grew up in the Midwest(Missouri). Typically, a very neutral accent.
Fun fact, the Scottish Highlands and the Appalachian mountains were once part of the same mountain range when the continents were together. Ironically, a lot of Scottish immigrants moved to Appalachia probably because it was familiar terrain. I'm a descendent of Scottish immigrants, and my family is from North Carolina. Fun little tidbit
Erik Singer is amazing at what he does. I think he's from New York. Unless it's a huge geographical boundary, I am awful at identifying American accents, and I'm American. I'm from West Virginia, and I honestly think I sound kinda "generic" when I speak, but when I hear myself on a recording, I probably sound closest to the lady at 18:35, and I'm white. When I talk to people from other areas, they either know exactly where I'm from, or nowhere idea where I could be from. No guesses in between. My dad would throw those superfluous R's in words, like telling me to "warsh the car" or would pronounce creek like "crick." And I definitely pronounce Martin without the T. I don't know why, but adding that T 'akes effort.
I’m an african american who speaks with a mixture of accents from the more northern midwest (wisconsin) and southern midwest (kentucky). So my family from the north think i sound more southern and my family from the south think i sound more northern. But my accent is a mixture of both. And i flip between the two accents. But i can thank my parents for the mixture. Because my mom sounds more proper in her english because she’s from the city. And my dad sounds more southern like he’s from the boonies deep down in kentucky (they say he sounds more like a redneck). Lol.
I found it funny Englis (from England) get US accents very well, there's the lady who plays Beth in Yellowstone is English by season 3 i heard her in an interview 😮 WOW!?! She's great!❤
A while back, I came across an author's blurb where Erik Singer mentioned he was from Connecticut, with a Scandinavian mom. He stated he mostly grew up in CT but also lived in England for some time as a kid.
As a native New Yorker in North Carolina I sometimes use a hybrid dialect when in rural areas just to get along and fit in. "I'm a fixin' to get me some coal pop at dat dar shop up yonder".
Always interesting to learn about the ways that we speak. Also to hear reactions to this diversity. I hope that you will do the other videos that take us across the country linguistically. Peace
Probably a regional thing. I typically pronounces the T in both these words. I do hear words like Trenton pronounced as Tret-en, leaving out the first N, with a separate syllable for the last EN.
Always interesting hearing the different dialects after moving from Sacramento to western NC………heck there’s even local variations to saying y’all !!! I’m starting to pick up different British accents just from watching footie every weekend
Where Canadians sound very Irish in Newfoundland. And I challenge you to tell the difference between someone from northern Minnesota and central Canada (locals can do it but I doubt you could).
Im from Pittsburgh Pennsylvania he is Dead on with our accent ... We smooth out all words... We have also been a city for over 260 years, which for America is a minute... We are a very diverse city with tons of Italian, polish, black, greek communities and thats just the tip of the ice berg, its a very friendly town, very southern honestly... Despite being North. I love your channel, just found it ❤
To give an idea how much accents vary in the states, and how easily they can change: I grew up just north of what's considered the South (five miles north of Kentucky), and when I went to college deeper into the Midwest, people said I had a southern accent. Then, after a couple years of college, I was working over the summer and a customer said my accent sounded like I was from up north -- likely because half the people at college were from Chicago and I picked up some of their accent.
I've lived in Washington, DC since 1990 and yet I still get people asking me if ... or telling me that ... I sound like I'm from New Jersey or Philadelphia. (I was born and raised in southern New Jersey outside of Philadelphia.) I'm amazed that random strangers, who are not linguist experts are able to tell where I'm from, especially since my accent has been smoothed by education at higher university, exposure to other accents, and living in other parts of the country since 1990.
My master's thesis on the linguistics was about dialect phonology of my home region. It is Gyeongsang-do (Province) (a historical region now reorganized into 5 province-level divisions) and makes a single and quite unique dialect group within Korean language. My thesis focused solely on the tonal accent of various subdialects. The region's size is about 1.5 times large as NJ (about 30 thousand square kms, or about 14 thousand square miles). After reading the preceding studies, I was astonished that solely based on the tonal phonology, the region can be quite easily and clearly divided into at least 5 subregions. Even the laypeople can readily distinguish at least 3 different patterns, and you can learn much more about a person's birthplace if you know some simple tricks. During the fieldwork, I succeeded to prove that even within a single county, a trained linguist can detect small but staunch differences, and attribute them to geographical or historical reasons. And there are about 50 counties in the region! The region is fairly mountainous, and valleys are separated from each other, so you can expect that there are at least 100 distinguishable subdialects within the whole region. Solely based on tonal accents!
You shouldn’t be amazed that people can tell because a lot of times are it has to do with how you hit your vowels and how long you hold on to the vowel sound.
That Piney Woods section is probably the first and only time that someone has discussed my own accent from North Florida. That sections describes it to a T ;p
For real. 😂 I remember asking in the comments where a RU-vidr was from because her accent was so odd to me. I wrote it sounded sort of like New York. Then someone from New York said hell no to NY and it definitely sounded Southern. Then I pointed out a bunch of things the vlogger said that I had never heard a Southerner pronounce that way. Turns out the lady was from Baltimore 😂😂
I live in Connecticut, for all of my almost 41 years of life. And I have noticed a different speaking pattern, like a mix between Boston Mass and New York.
As a native Marylander, yes. Some people her to say Balmer, Merlin Hon. That is more of a Baltimore City accent and those just on the outskirts of the city. Other parts sound more southern especially in the southern part of the state and out on the eastern shore.
my grandmother was from near Pittsburgh (PA). She would say "go warsh the tahl with the tahl" (go wash the tile with the towel). Creek became crick, and it's CarNEGGie, not CARnegie lol
I realized my own accent watching this lol. I have a mostly generic American accent with hits of southern sounding words due to growing up in the sounth most my life but moving around a lot. Watching this made me realize I don't often pronounce T's unless they are at the start of a word. I replace the T's in the middle of the word for a D most of the time and altogether just don't say the T if it's at the end of the word. So, for example for Martin I say Mar-inn and for water I say Wa-der. For the word accent I sat Ax-cen and for student I sat Stu-den. Interesting considering I never even realized I have an accent lol
So I am someone that is obsessed with accents. I love to listen to people from different areas. I have specific accents that I’m obsessed with and they are as follows: Boston (#1), New York, the Midwest, and finally Miami I don’t know if people realize this, I’m from Miami so I hear it but there is a specific Latino accent in Miami that I just love. Maybe it’s because I grew up there.
As he said this wasn't all of the accents but wow Maine has a really strong accent I am surprised he didn't talk about. Down east Maine is hard for even inland southern Mainers to understand.
I'm from very southern Maine and I don't have a very thick accent at all but it was always interesting having a few key students at my highschool that had thicker accents. Definitely wish we had been included
I have lived in the US my whole life (in 10 different states) with my longest time being in North Carolina. We are now in California and I am always asked where I am from.
Hi, I enjoy your channel. You mentioned that you thought Eric Singer was from Texas. He didn't sound Texan to me as I know people from Texas so I checked on Google of course, hehe This is what I found: "I grew up in Connecticut. My mother is Swedish, but moved to south-eastern England at the age of 12. I grew up surrounded by all kinds of languages and accents, and imitated them all..." It seems he is east coast American but surrounded in his growing up years by multiple languages. I think one picks up an accent if they are around someone from day to day. My brother moved to the UK decades ago but whenever he speaks he sounds quite British to me. I lived with someone for awhile who was from Tennessee and had a very southern drawl. After several years I noticed a change in how I sounded on a recording and I am on the west coast of USA. My father though was from Ireland and my mother from Oklahoma so I grew up rather uncertain of which was the proper way to pronounce certain words. I got strange looks when I said "orange". Thank you for your videos. This was a really good one.
Actually, Erik Singer is from Euclid, Ohio which makes sense in his typical American accent. You can hear the “ON” sound and it’s very apparent. However, the prosody of the accent he uses makes him sound very much like Matthew McConaughey, just from the north as opposed to the south.
I’m American and have always pronounced the t in Martin as do people where I’m from. I moved to the Midwest and people kept referring to this woman’s last name as Mar’in and it surprised me. But most people here also say moun’ain and impor’ant and I pronounce the T.
