DA RESPUESTAS - English

100% GOOD (8 votes)ContestadoCuestión Lingüística
It’s a fake accent. Why?

Why some people say "it's a fake accent" when you are trying to learn a native English pronunciation or accent?


PS: Take a look at these free English educational resources: Instruction: Allow, permit and letAlmost and nearly; practicallyDifference between verbs See Watch LookHealthy Habits

DA RESPUESTAS

AussieInBg profile picture AussieInBgJanuary 2021
Usually, what happens is that some learners work very hard on trying to sound ”native” in a particular way - it could be speaking British English ”with Received Pronunciation” (that’s the very formal accent used by royalty and the BBC a few decades ago but which perhaps only 2% or so of British English speakers use) or people learning American English attempting to ”sound Californian” and so on.

The problem is, they work very hard on the accent but ”forget” all the other elements of speech such as elocution, intonation and the elements of pronunciation of individual vowel and consonant sounds. That’s not even taking into account basic grammatical mistakes or poor/unnatural word choice.

So, while someone is trying to sound like an upper class English person or a ”cool Californian”, they are making all sorts of mistakes in their speaking - along with grammatical mistakes and strange word usage that a person who normally speaks with such an accent would never make. So it all comes across as being fake and ”trying too hard”.

It’s not just language learners who speak with fake accents. It’s also seen among native English speakers when they try to imitate the accent of another English dialect. Often, these people make mistakes with vowel sounds, use slang that’s 50 years out of date, don’t use modal verbs ”correctly” for the particular dialect and so on. They end up sounding like parodies of the dialect that they are trying to imitate.

A popular hobby among native English speakers is spotting fake accents in films - British trying to sound American, Americans trying to sound Australian and Australians trying to sound British. Part of the fun is finding all the mistakes that the actors make when trying to imitate an accent
vincent profile picture vincentJanuary 2021
Many thanks for your comments, it’s very interesting... Personally, at one time I wanted to try to imitate the Native American accent as best as possible but I did have the feeling that I sounded ”fake” and then it took a lot of effort to speak. finally I decided to keep a French accent, it seems more natural and authentic
  • vincent profile picture vincentJanuary 2021
    True! When you have an accent that is as close as possible to a native accent, you try to impress people, but it’s not by impressing people that you will really show who you are.
exRanger profile picture exRangerJanuary 2021
re: ”It’s not just language learners who speak with fake accents. It’s also seen among native English speakers when they try to imitate the accent of another English dialect. Often, these people make mistakes with vowel sounds, use slang that’s 50 years out of date, don’t use modal verbs ”correctly” for the particular dialect and so on. They end up sounding like parodies of the dialect that they are trying to imitate.” THIS is a very real phenomenon; How many times -- too numerous to recount -- have I encountered Americans in Europe who try to pass themselves off as ”British” w/ terribly concocted ”faked” British-style accents. I was raised in a household that included a genuine British-born mother and her (very) English parents, so ”my ear” cannot (often) be tricked by an English speaker from, say, USA, Canada or OZ/Kiwiland who attempts to ”fake” a genuine ”English” accent. Some Irish natives can pull it off; most Scots cannot. The Welsh fall somewhere between the two. South Africans - forget it... too many vocabulary items that are unique to their dialect that they tend to forget to omit from their ”spoken” language.
nmesomtoChukwu profile picture nmesomtoChukwuJanuary 2021

Honestly, I think it’s the same love of culture that drives people to learn the languages of others drives them to want get them to a ’T’. Truth is most times, the celebrated native speakers mightn’t have sufficient education in their language as aliens.

 

Some people think that to fit in, feel welcomed, and possibly get ’more equal’ opportunities they need to blend in. Unfortunately, these kind native speakers, exRanger and AussieInBg have pointed out that in doing so many are making themselves as alike as chalk and cheese 😄.

 

Some people are born natural impressionists, some aren’t. Some enjoy faking it for the mere sake of faking it. They might be trying to be comical, get attention, or whatnot.

 

All the same, for whatever reason it’s grand to be oneself (even if ”faking it” is oneself). In Vincent’s words, be ”natural and authentic.” 😉

exRanger profile picture exRangerJanuary 2021

In academic, learned and (especially) the East Coast circles of the USA, the so-called ”Cool California” accent (note: AussieinBG is correct - there is a ”Californian” accent, particularly in/around Los Angeles region), strong regional accents, including the so-called ”cool Californian”, are dismissed as substandard dialects, i.e., crass regionalisms. Some feel this way also about () Southern accents in general and especially (2) African-American / Black ”english”, which we call ”Ebonics”. SEE LINK: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ebonics_(word) - to the latter we assign little to no respect. Sure, it is ”fun” to hear in RAP and other musical forms, but @ the end of the day it is grammatically and syntactically corrupt(ing).