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I work in an office setting and sometimes have a hard time understanding true southerners and have to ask them to repeat themselves the funny thing is they have to ask me to repeat myself also! I'm from MI and am told I have an accent.
As far as picking up southern traditions and ways of living, heck yes. I love the way of life over here in eastern NC.
Lol...Everyone thinks I sound funny. My Northern friends who I moved away from 23 years ago think I have a Southern twang and my Southern friends still detect a Northern twang!
Only southern euphanishms that rake on my nerves are "How are yooooooooooooouuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu" and "cold chill." Duh, that is like saying ice is cold.
In my experience, people's accents will change in the eyes of their northern peers - back home, people might say "You sound like a southerner". But southerners will still think they sound like a northerner.
I met a guy yesterday, who said he'd been living in North Carolina since 1979. From his accent, I thought he was straight from Boston (turned out it was Connecticut).
I think if someone moved south when they were a teenager, then their accent would be more likely to change. Adults often start saying southern words like "y'all", but the accent still stays northern.
When I was 12, my family moved to Florida from Alabama. Although georgraphically southern, most of my friends were from the northeast and midwest. Slowly I was picking up on their accents. My father, on the other hand, was 37 at the time and worked with many northeasterers and midwesterners and his accent did not change. I did know quite a few southerners down there as well, but it was the older ones who kept their original accent. We left Florida when I was 20 (31 now) and moved back to Alabama, but to this day, I still sound like I did when I lived in Florida. I just can't pick up the southern accent..weird, huh? I guess our accents are learned through our maturing years and is hard to change as an adult.
Last edited by markdalton; 06-01-2007 at 06:47 PM..
Definitely true,I have to say the same for my friends who relocated in the south and they might have certain undertones but their accent still sounds quite the same.
Location: Some got six month some got one solid. But me and my buddies all got lifetime here
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I think that 99% of adult northerners who picked up an accent really didn't but are just trying to be act like a southerner. My closest friend is from New Jersey, been down here since 1999, his girl is a southerner yet there's not even a hint of an accent on him. Other people I've spoken to who've been here for quite a few years don't have it either.
Maybe it's like a Jedi mind trick...a wave of the hand, "You will speak with a southern accent"
I have lived down here for 11 years and haven't picked up the southern drawl. i did learn to speak much slower when talking to the locals, they would just get that dud look and i knew i lost them. When i first came down i couldn't understand some of the locals, i really tried but didn't get but 1 or two words every sentence. Now its scary because the same people i couldn't understand i i dooooo now and without a problem. my youngest son has picked up some of it but he was only 4 when we moved. I have a older son who had alot of problems getting use to saying yes mam and calling women miss whatever there first name was. The teachers always made him say it before they would answer him. But i have to say the kids down here have way more respect for their elders, its nice, i love it here and would NEVER go back to long island. I do miss the food and the people.
Yeah one of the girls I dated when I first moved here live in Blacksburg SC and was raised near there. I was about 27 or 28 and she was a few years older than me and I couldnt understand her on the phone most of the time and I probably still wouldnt be able to.
Location: Sunny Phoenix Arizona...wishing for a beach.
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I've met several people from up north that now speak with a southern accent. Some have been here for less then 3 years. I've been here a few months and I think I'm getting one. LOL
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