Irish accents, why do some people say they sound American? (house, move)
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Oh yeah, I have heard that Newfoundlanders had a close connection to Ireland.
I've met a handful of Maritimers though, and maybe they sounded like Irish 200 years ago, but certainly sound different than Irish do today.
That being said, I've never personally been to the Maritimes, so maybe there are more entranced locals with stronger accents than the Maritimers I've met outside of the Maritimes.
That being said, I think it's still safe to assume though that either Maritimers or Irish don't 'sound American'.
The only people who would confuse an Irish accent with a Canadian or US accent are those that lack exposure or who are not native speakers. It's like confusing British and Australian accents - only happens if you are not really familiar with either.
Oh yeah, I have heard that Newfoundlanders had a close connection to Ireland....
Yes, there were many Irish who settled there; and Nova Scotia had a thriving Scots culture, including the use of Gaelic. NS has produced a notable Gaelic literature.
I have never had anybody say I have anything taht sounds remotely American. Everybody immediately picks up that I am from a different country, most say Ireland but some say Austrailia :S
To the poster who said they heard Irish youth are losing their accent and its becoming American has heard total false information. I dont think you can just lose your accent because of an American influence in tv/culture. It has always been there. You get your accent from what you grew up with and what you are around the most.
Of course one can hear the difference after about 5 seconds max, but still, among all non-American variants of English, Irish sounds the closest to American English, probably because of its vowels and 'r' sound (some vowels sound similar to the Tidewater pronunciation, which I heard a sample of recently).
I grew up listening to and learning American English instead of British English. I understand Irish English pretty well, especially that spoken in the SE, i.e. Wexford, Waterford etc. Any British or Australian dialect is much harder for me to understand (Yorkshire is the toughest for me), not to mention Nigerian or Indian English
who are these ''people'' a very, very, very few i suspect, if you have half a brain you can tell an irish accent from north american one
there is no North American accent.
i think that's kind of the point of the thread --- you have all these obscure accents across North America that many people don't know about, especially among rural old people. The outer banks brogue. the lowcountry accent, the tidewater accent... and those are just our local ones. I've heard some people from Canada that sound downright bizarre to me.
along the same lines, I can barely tell the difference between South Africans, Australians, and certain Brits... doesn't matter that these places are scattered across the globe.
i know theres no north american accent, but every accent in north america sounds different from an irish accent, and neuling, try scouse (liverpool), weegie (glasgow and lanarkshire) and brummy (birmingham and west midlands) i sometimes can't understand them!
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