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Post by MOLEY on May 21, 2012 13:25:14 GMT -5
Limmy is great too
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Post by marisol on May 21, 2012 18:05:47 GMT -5
Yes I like it, I'll watch it again.
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Post by Tofu DeBeast on May 21, 2012 20:30:33 GMT -5
I still like the sound of a deep fried mars bar that dances Aye! Phil aye got me whoolly haton today, indeed, well this week actually....I me-arn, all fukun week! So I have. My complaint is Lloyds PHAR-MARCY ARE RIP ORFF SHITE!! Lol, I had no idea American words were getting popular in GB. I think it's a two way street, as I've noticed "innit" starting to crop up around here, and despite some initial reservations I've managed to choke down my rage and found that the word is actually useful. A good trend, I say. Brings the language(s) closer together. Maybe we should encourage the process; after all half the time I can't understand teh BBC sitcoms without the subtitles. Here, how about we split up the language. We'll take "innit" if you take "pharmacy" (stress is on the first syllable, btw). Now what to do about all those extra "u"s??
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Post by marisol on May 21, 2012 22:26:43 GMT -5
Pronunciation is a problem at times, polis I had a problem with that one for a minute.
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Post by philipkduck on May 22, 2012 4:29:09 GMT -5
Lol, I had no idea American words were getting popular in GB. I think it's a two way street, as I've noticed "innit" starting to crop up around here, and despite some initial reservations I've managed to choke down my rage and found that the word is actually useful. A good trend, I say. Brings the language(s) closer together. Maybe we should encourage the process; after all half the time I can't understand teh BBC sitcoms without the subtitles. Here, how about we split up the language. We'll take "innit" if you take "pharmacy" (stress is on the first syllable, btw). Now what to do about all those extra "u"s?? Like every aspect of the 'special relationship' it's more of a one-way traffic than cross-fertilisation - US cultural imperialism. So many US TV shows over here, plus pop music. Teenagers who are not cool enough to do da black fing (think Ali G without a trace of irony, sounding very silly from da moufs of middle-class white kids) have adopted the US cadences and vocab of Friends, Sabrina the Fucking Teenage Witch, Buffy etc - all that 'no way, yes way, totally awesome, I so totally don't even want to go there' stuff. We have discussed 'innit' on YA I am sure. I think I first heard it from London Greeks, and then other immigrant people. Useful expression for getting round the difficulties of "am I, are you, does it, could we, ought they not to have had" etc. After all the Germans have nicht wahr and the French n'est-ce pas. ARE YOU SERIOUS about the Brit sitcoms ? ? ? Can you really not understand the accents, and do they really have subtitles ? ? ? (I know the film Trainspotting had subtitles - fair enough.) Here's some more Limmy :
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Post by StormInateacup on May 22, 2012 4:50:13 GMT -5
I have a complaint - it's about the dearth of linguistic diversity on this goddess forsaken sun baked rock from whence I hail. Anywhere you go in Britain you can hear different accents. Travel 10 miles in any direction and the lingo is distinctly different from what you were hearing in the place you just left. In London you can travel ten blocks and get that same effect. Dubliners don't speak like those from Donegal or Belfast. Edinburgh and Glasgow accents are miles apart. Regional dialects also abound in the good old US of A - Brooklyn and the Bronx ferfuxake - you can spit between them, but you know precisely from which Borough that speaker has come. Louisianans and those from Kentucky announce in a sentence their geographical origins. Are you from New York city or Upstate New York - just order a coffee and we'll know. But travel anywhere you like in this wide brown land and all you're gonna hear is that ficking awful rising cadence from the great unwashed - and the half arsed imitation of an Oxbridge nob from those who like to think they're upper class. Adam Hills - Australian Accents. www.youtube.com/watch?v=KpBYnL5fAXE&feature=results_video&playnext=1&list=PL31AA16F5B0861A54It's dull.
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Post by philipkduck on May 22, 2012 5:44:58 GMT -5
I have a complaint - it's about the dearth of linguistic diversity on this goddess forsaken sun baked rock from whence I hail. Anywhere you go in Britain you can hear different accents. Travel 10 miles in any direction and the lingo is distinctly different from what you were hearing in the place you just left. In London you can travel ten blocks and get that same effect. Dubliners don't speak like those from Donegal or Belfast. Edinburgh and Glasgow accents are miles apart. Regional dialects also abound in the good old US of A - Brooklyn and the Bronx ferfuxake - you can spit between them, but you know precisely from which Borough that speaker has come. Louisianans and those from Kentucky announce in a sentence their geographical origins. Are you from New York city or Upstate New York - just order a coffee and we'll know. But travel anywhere you like in this wide brown land and all you're gonna hear is that ficking awful rising cadence from the great unwashed - and the half arsed imitation of an Oxbridge nob from those who like to think they're upper class It's dull. I know next to nothing about Australian culture (an oxymoron?). Prisoner Cell Block H and Neighbours really. I can only distinguish three accents, the almost eradicated / could pass for British one that you speak of, a quite well-spoken one and a yobbish one. There must be more to it than that. Know what you mean about British accents. You are so right about having to travel only a very short distance to hear something different. It fascinates me. My favourite is the way the southern country voice starts only 20 miles or so west of London (Ricky Gervais, Reading, 40 miles w. of London) and goes through subtle changes all the way from Land's End to Kent, up into East Anglia in the east and Shropshire in the west. Most actors have their 'country bumpkin' voice - it used to be called Mummerset - and it is a laugh to hear them in something like Lark Rise To Candleford. A couple of people got it right and the rest were Devon, Gloucestershire... you name it. And they were supposed to be people (like my mother's siblings) who had never moved out of Oxfordshire. Same with Ooop North and Scottish accents. There are dozens of them. That rising intonation thing !!!!! It's becoming more common in Britain now. ! The worst case I ever heard was a New Zilland guy who did it for every utterance. And he was a chatterbox. And he had an effeminate gay affectation as well. And he spoke in short sentences. And he never stopped. He like got on your nerves. After about two minutes. But he kept going. And it was impossible to stop him. I think it was an insecurity thing. It was almost as if he was saying- whatever I say please don't disagree with me. He was a pain. Do you know what I mean ? How might it be possible to post sound clips? I keep thinking of things about British accents that would interest our American friends, that could not be expressed in writing.
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Post by Jenne on May 22, 2012 7:48:05 GMT -5
*puts on applied linguist hat* (this is what I studied as a Master's student back in the olden times)
In linguistics it's called "upspeak." Men use it to seem non-aggressive, girls use it to be colloquial. Proliferation of media is one reason a lot of American cadences have been picked up, along with slang and vocabulary. The social value of these linguistic devices of course varies across different cultures. Regional dialectization of a language is also a fascinating subject to study. I rather think the more tribal nature of how England grew to be, well, ENGLAND (or even Great Britain and its discrete parts) is how the regional accent still pervades to this day.
Whereas Ozland had less of this going on, being transplants. The near-isolation of many communities as well as the native language (other than English) of many of the immigrants coming to America most likely contributed to the regional accent development of much of the US as well. It wasn't until the advent of the railroad and then later on the radio, tv and talking movies that people heard a Bostonite vs. a Texan speaker.
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Post by Tofu DeBeast on May 22, 2012 11:06:15 GMT -5
In America we have a generic American TV accent, which I assume is what mostly makes its way overseas. Growing up in Connecticut, I used to think that it was the same accent (or lack of accent, lol) that I spoke with. Going down and living in Texas for a year did nothing but confirm this, as the southern accent there was common (but not all-pervasive; Austin had a lot of immigrants), just think of the "y'all" and so forth.
Then I moved out here to Idaho, which has a very slight accent. It sounded almost dainty compared to what I was used to. And here I was told that *I* have an accent. Surprising, to be sure. I'm told I occasionally drop the R's, especially in words like "quarter". Being self-conscious, I have tried to eliminate it.
Now when I go back to Connecticut I notice the accent. It seems almost heavy and thugish, like the Brooklyn accent except much more subtle. It really messes with me when I talk to my sister, who is otherwise rather classy and feminine.
It's interesting how we can hold two accents in our mind and not even recognize them. A high school friend of mind had parents that came from Romania or somewhere like that. He asked me once, "Does my mom have an accent? I can't even tell." Oh it was a thick Eastern European one, too. I thought he was joking at first. I believe it is the same way with this American TV accent - probably no where do people actually speak like that, it's just been developed by TV producers to be stripped of all regional flavor so as to seem natural and acceptable to everyone across the country.
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Post by Jenne on May 22, 2012 11:10:26 GMT -5
Yes, that "generic" American accent is one that actors work hard to attain. It's a "western US" accent--Californians tend to have it if they were born and raised here. The habituation of accents means that your ear tunes them out and the comparisons are not stark, so that's why those growing up natively here with an English language learner as a parent may not hear that 1st language carryover in the accent most of the time. Unless they have the differences highlighted for them.
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Post by Tofu DeBeast on May 22, 2012 11:57:03 GMT -5
Yes, that "generic" American accent is one that actors work hard to attain. It's a "western US" accent--Californians tend to have it if they were born and raised here. The habituation of accents means that your ear tunes them out and the comparisons are not stark, so that's why those growing up natively here with an English language learner as a parent may not hear that 1st language carryover in the accent most of the time. Unless they have the differences highlighted for them. Yeah that makes sense. California is the home to Hollywood which produces so much TV, and the west is more recently settled and is an amalgam of people moving in from a lot of different places, meaning the accent is "middle of the road" and doesn't have much in the way of unique defining characteristics.
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Post by Deleted on May 22, 2012 11:57:45 GMT -5
The more I drink the more suth'rn my accent.
Without alcohol, there are a few tells, especially the long I. As in ice or nice, otherwise I think I've become fairly accentless.
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Post by Random Panther on May 22, 2012 12:00:24 GMT -5
Walk five minutes up the road from Sallynoggin to Glenageary and you hear a slightly different accent,another five minutes from there to Dalkey and you hear a slightly different accent from Glenageary and so on.
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Post by philipkduck on May 22, 2012 12:13:55 GMT -5
Keep it coming you guys. (I can't believe I said 'you guys'. See what i mean about cultural imperialism.) I could read any amount of stuff about accents and language.
Jenne - I would be very grateful if you could say more about what you mean by 'unspeak'. Googling it has confused me somewhat.
Do Americans do glottal stops much, or is it only the ones who have lived in Britain, especially London ? You know - missing out the T sound in the middle and end of words.
(Thread derailed in a most fertile way.)
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Post by BadBeast on May 22, 2012 12:25:37 GMT -5
I can tell which town in Wiltshire someone comes from by their accent. Mind you, there's only half a dozen or so towns. (We don't count Swindon)
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