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When did Americans lose their British accents?

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Re: When did Americans lose their British accents?

#51

Post by auiya »

> GenAm now considered generally confined to a small section of the Midwest

The GenAm is way more prevalent than just a small section of the Midwest. It's all over the West coast and generally every large metro area regardless of region. Even in regions of heavily divergent accents, like New England or the Southeast the GenAm is quite prevalent in the cities. Atlanta for instance isn't made up of people who all sound like Scarlett O'Hara and Houston isn't made up of people who all sound like Boomhauer from King of the Hill.

Re: When did Americans lose their British accents?

#52

Post by OJFord »

naasking wrote: post #35

Technically, there is no "British accent". There are many accents. Even people who grew up in different parts of London have different accents.

The article opens by stating that since it is 'not a book' it is addressing only RP vs. 'General American'/'GenAm' (new to me). So that there is a wealth of non-RP British accents - and indeed non-GenAm American - is irrelevant to a discussion that began by setting those aside.

Re: When did Americans lose their British accents?

#53

Post by mumblemumble »

telesilla wrote: post #12
david_draco wrote: post #10

I read somewhere that the American accent is closer to what British was like in the 1700-1800s. Later the Queen's family, which came from a corner of England, established its accent as the norm. So the American pronounciation is original, and the British one changed in the meantime. Not sure if this is true.

Yes, this is basically considered fact. American is old-English. The same with Québécois and French.

That's a common stereotype of Québécois French, but I think it's more accurate to say that, just like for pretty much all widely spoken languages, there was a lot more regional variation in the French-speaking world a few hundred years ago, but it's been consolidating over time, and different places happened to consolidate differently.

IOW, Parisian French also retains some primitive features that have largely disappeared from one Canadian region or another. But we don't talk about those as much. I'm guessing because doing so wouldn't jive well with certain stereotypes about Québec being a backwards hinterland.

Re: When did Americans lose their British accents?

#54

Post by arethuza »

throwaway894345 wrote: post #44
jeffadotio wrote: post #3

This is an interesting read but the article cites no sources for its claims. Even the claims that refer to linguistics debunking other theories have no citation. It also makes some suspect statements. I live in New England and saying that it is hard to find someone who does not have an accent that links them to some New England locale is just silly. Then there is the claim that the “general American” accent heard on…

> I imagine NPR must recruit reporters exclusively from this region because it would be difficult to find the accent anywhere else People can learn other accents. In the UK, there is (was?) a "BBC accent" which presumably didn't imply that every BBC personality was hired from a particular region.

I think it's been a very long time since there was a "BBC accent" - I'm in my 50s and I can remember presenters from my youth (e.g. John Noakes) with very distinct regional accents.

Not to mention the idea of BBC Scotland all talking in RP is quite amusing...

Re: When did Americans lose their British accents?

#55

Post by dmos62 »

dragonwriter wrote: post #31
dmos62 wrote: post #14

Anyone else cringe at the choice of words in the title? If you migrate and your pronunciation gradually mutates away from what you had originally, and if you then say that you lost what you had, you're invalidating the evolution you've gone through. Or, if the "americans lose their british accents" implies that [english accent = american accent + something you can lose], it's an American-centricity that treats the En…

No, the title asks a popular question and, like, the first sentence of the article directly addresses why the popular question isn't actually the right question to ask.

That very well may be true, but whether or not the article acknowledges that this isn't the right question is independent of whether or not this specific wrong question makes you cringe.

Re: When did Americans lose their British accents?

#56

Post by Spooky23 »

auiya wrote: post #51

> GenAm now considered generally confined to a small section of the Midwest The GenAm is way more prevalent than just a small section of the Midwest. It's all over the West coast and generally every large metro area regardless of region. Even in regions of heavily divergent accents, like New England or the Southeast the GenAm is quite prevalent in the cities. Atlanta for instance isn't made up of people who all sound…

I think they confused origin with practice.

GenAm is the most common accent (probably 50-65% of speakers), and was originally (1900-1930s) associated with the migration path through Pennsylvania/Western Mass/Upstate NY as far west as the Upper Midwest.

That pattern has changed though, and there are some shifts in these regions.

Re: When did Americans lose their British accents?

#59

Post by arethuza »

foldr wrote: post #42
dragonwriter wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but it's quite wrong to ascribe the diversity of accents in Britain to this. No one, AFAICT, did that. The reference to “modern British English” is not, as I read it, a reference to “the current diversity of British accents”, but rather “the current dominant British accent”.

The current dominant British accent, if there is such a thing, isn't a marker of social status. If you're referring to RP, then hardly anyone even speaks RP nowadays (even the Queen only makes a half-assed effort...)

I would say accents in the UK are a combination of social status and location.

Re: When did Americans lose their British accents?

#60

Post by leoc »

azangru wrote: post #32
gowld wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Related, it's such a farce that people will recite and listen to some of the best-regarded _poetry_ in history, and do it in a totally different accent from the original, ruining its auditory aesthetic, and then say that people who don't like it are boorish and low.

> and do it in a totally different accent from the original Take William Blake's The Tyger: Tyger Tyger, burning bright, In the forests of the night; What immortal hand or eye, Could frame thy fearful symmetry? How are we to know how the word "symmetry" was supposed to be pronounced by Blake? No-one has recorded his pronunciation. Did it rhyme with the word "eye" (as such words must have done several centuries prior)…

That's what professional students of linguistics are for. Presumably when you see multiple instances of a word or family of words being rhymed in a particular way by different authors of a particular place and time, you start to get a reasonable idea of how it was originally pronounced. Sometimes people also directly comment in writing about contemporary pronunciations.
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