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Which is strange to me because I was born and raised in Cali--went to HS, going to college, partied, eat at every restaurant and to this day I believe I have meet a total of 1 Canadian in my life time. Where and how could someone pick something like that up. And don't say TV because I have a problem believing anything could have that kind of influence on anyone.
How do you know how many Canadians you've met before; do you ask everyone you meet their country of origin? Hollywood as an example is chock full of Canadians who are living and working down there. You could have easily had dinner with them at the same table and not noticed.
How do you know how many Canadians you've met before; do you ask everyone you meet their country of origin? Hollywood as an example is chock full of Canadians who are living and working down there. You could have easily had dinner with them at the same table and not noticed.
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Same Canadians could easily pass for Americans, most you can tell by a few words, and some really stand out as sounding distinctly different. The difference is definitely smaller than Australia and NZ, or say northern and southern US.
One of the biggest changes recently in Canada has been the vocabulary people use becoming Americanized. For example, people now call sandals flip flops, whereas in the past they were always referred to as thongs. A derogatory term for an English-Canadian used by French-Canadians is "bloke", although English Canadians no longer actually this word in our language. Schedule is increasingly being pronounced the American way, rather than as shed-jul.
Well that's unfortunate. Do you think it is because of television or is it more a result of cultural cringe? I mean Canadians have been watching predominantly American TV since TV was first popular in the fifties, though then again people watch a lot more TV now than they did two generations ago.
I think television could indeed change vocabulary or the pronunciations of individual words but I'm pretty skeptical about claims that it could cause entire vowel or consonant shifts. For example I highly doubt that watching too much Jersey Shore or Baywatch is going to cause Australians to start speaking rhotically, though I have heard anecdotal claims that some Aussie teenagers do pronounce certain words rhotically now.
Well the accents have never been vastly different since the founding of the continent - remember, it was the same people from the UK that split up into Canada and the US, it's not like they came from different countries aside from the French Canadians.
TV and media definitely have a huge influence on how you speak. Otherwise, how do you account for people in say Texas or New York having a neutral sounding accent? I know people that sound like newscasters even though they grew up around people with heavy Jewish or Italian New York accents. They sound more like someone from California than someone from New York - it's partially because of media influence growing up and hanging out with friends that also have a neutral accent. Sometimes it's also an urban vs suburban influence. Often people from the suburbs in any state sound fairly neutral, whereas in more of the urban pockets, they have heavier local accents.
Quote:
Originally Posted by RumNCoke
Which is strange to me because I was born and raised in Cali--went to HS, going to college, partied, eat at every restaurant and to this day I believe I have meet a total of 1 Canadian in my life time. Where and how could someone pick something like that up. And don't say TV because I have a problem believing anything could have that kind of influence on anyone.
From first hand experience - I think this is very accurate! Those damn aboots!! There are some other key words that just SCREAM i'm not from here - I'm Canadian lol.. On a 'positive' note - they are often surprised that I spoke 'fluent' English.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Trimac20
Same Canadians could easily pass for Americans, most you can tell by a few words, and some really stand out as sounding distinctly different. The difference is definitely smaller than Australia and NZ, or say northern and southern US.
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