Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
You don't have a discernable accent though your soft voice could be mistaken for mumbling or lack of annunciation which, is a tendency for the deep south.
You might be able to call BINGO on that one. I think she apologizes in her videos about the sound level but i noticed it wasn't the microphone that was the problem. I just didn't pick it up like you did.
Extremely neutral. You have an American accent which means that to Americans you sound like you have no accent. Are you born and raised here? I would assume if yes it was either a metropolitan area or around a military base.
It's interesting that Californians would think you have an accent because being neutral is the kind of accent they want in Hollywood most of the time. You should sound pretty much like anyone in L.A.
Try this. Next time someone asks you just say the Pandoricawill never the be the same.
Or start your response with a loud stressed Oi! in a British accent.
I'm from NC. I moved to the suburbs of Chicago for a year in my late teens, and my family all swore I had a "city" accent.
Meanwhile, everyone around me in IL thought I was from the Deep South.
I suspect this is more a case of people in CA noticing subtle changes than you sounding like you're a native of NC.
That's what I suspect as well. I'm from Western NY and I became friends with a girl that moved to my part of town. She was from SC. Her parents always accused her of "sounding like a damn yankee," whenever she called home. I sure didn't think so. She sounded Southern to me.
Please don't get mad, I'm just wondering because my family from California said I do.
I've only been here for almost two years and I'm from the North. No, you do not have a southern accent. I can pick up the southern accent quickly, as they can pick up my accent in no time.
There really is not such thing a "A" typical NC accent. There is the Appalachian "mountain" accent (think Dolly Parton, even though she is from Tenn--that's the idea); the coastal plain accent typical of eastern NC about as far in as Rocky Mount often called the "Charleston" accent (our former governor Mike Easley had one--a soft dropping of final -Rs is a recognizable feature), and there is the Piedmont accent which might be more "general NC" which is close to "general Southern".
This is not even true because people in the coastal plain, east of Hwy 70 tend to talk quite fast and get faster the closer you get to the coast until the worst sound like Boomhauer from King of the Hill. There is no typical NC accent. It has about 6 main accnts and 16 variations. The cadence gets slower the farther west you go. You're most likely to find the drawl in the mountains.
Your rate of speech is too fast to be pinned as a southern accent. My folks are from South Georgia and I grew up in Jacksonville, FL and spent nearly 20 years in the mtns of Western NC. I now live in Fort Lauderdale and get called out on my accent all the time. I speak slowly and the following distinguishable for WNC:
Light..LITE with a long I, very long
Tight..TITE with a long I, very long...etc
Make one syllable words three syllables long like the name Will becomes Willlll and Tracey becomes TRaaaaacy.
Then there are the country sayings and the colloquialisms I use but the tone is low, friendly, calm and gracious...It is not what you say...it is how you say it that counts down south. But hey what you say counts too !! lol.
Thanks for the charming video and don't those kin folks git cha down kiddo !! Work on slowing down and using good eye contact..better communication with or without the accent can really take you places in this ol world !
There really is not such thing a "A" typical NC accent. There is the Appalachian "mountain" accent (think Dolly Parton, even though she is from Tenn--that's the idea); the coastal plain accent typical of eastern NC about as far in as Rocky Mount often called the "Charleston" accent (our former governor Mike Easley had one--a soft dropping of final -Rs is a recognizable feature), and there is the Piedmont accent which might be more "general NC" which is close to "general Southern".
Actually, when speaking of strictly pronunciation, it's accent. Dialect includes vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation. Edit: actually it seems we both could be right As Francois talks of dialects but uses accents to describe the differences.
You have a generic American accent, I think. You do not sound like a Valley Girl, so maybe that's why they think your accent is different, therefore Southern?
My relatives in Rochester, NY, think my son has a British accent. He's lived in Raleigh since he was 5 and is now an adult. I think HE has a generic American accent, too. His "A's" aren't nasally(which is a Rochester trait), so maybe that's why they think that.
When I'm around Southerners (such as my husband) and no Northerners for an extended period of time, I begin to think in a Southern drawl, and then I have to work on speaking "Northern." I was born in the South and have spent 40 percent of my life here, so I guess it's to be expected. Once I speak with Rochester relatives, I snap out of the drawl.
There was a somewhat long interview with a sheriff on some story outside of Raleigh a few nights ago on the local news. My husband and I LOVED listening to his accent. It reminded us of all the Southern relatives who are no longer with us. It was a specific dialect, I suppose. Not sure of its origin.
Oh, and nice people are E V E R Y W H E R E, not just in the South.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
