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Kooyeen Posted 20 years ago
Speech & Pronunciation
listen to this awful American accent... and why?
Hi,
I found this guy that tries to imitate accents. He's not a native speaker of English, anyway. I'd like you to take a look at his "Standard American Accent" here:
The comments say that it's awful. An American I know listened to that and also said that it's awful. She said he has a moderately strong Eastern European accent.
Now, I'd like to know where he's making mistakes because I can't figure it out. I thought he sounded American, but everyone says he sucks... would you be able to point out the features that make him sound not American?
Thank you
PS: at that link there are other accents, I'm not interested in comments on those accents, anyway they're funny! LOL
I found this guy that tries to imitate accents. He's not a native speaker of English, anyway. I'd like you to take a look at his "Standard American Accent" here:
The comments say that it's awful. An American I know listened to that and also said that it's awful. She said he has a moderately strong Eastern European accent.
Now, I'd like to know where he's making mistakes because I can't figure it out. I thought he sounded American, but everyone says he sucks... would you be able to point out the features that make him sound not American?
Thank you
PS: at that link there are other accents, I'm not interested in comments on those accents, anyway they're funny! LOL
Top answer
My non-native ears can't figure it out, either To me he really sounds "American", there seems to be some uncertainty the way he speaks that would have made me think he's not a native. But he does a good job anyway, for it's really difficult to imitate accents, even in my own mother tongue I'm able to imitate convicingly not more than 2 or 3 accents.
- My non-native ears can't figure it out, either To me he really sounds "American", there seems to be some uncertainty the way he speaks that would have made me think he's not a native.
- But he does a good job anyway, for it's really difficult to imitate accents, even in my own mother tongue I'm able to imitate convicingly not more than 2 or 3 accents.
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53 Answers
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My non-native ears can't figure it out, either To me he really sounds "American", there seems to be some uncertainty the way he spe
To me he really sounds "American", there seems to be some uncertainty the way he spe
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Awful. The redneck one was terrible. But hey, I can't imagine speaking in another language and trying to figure out how to make it sound like a certain region where they speak that language, so he gets credit for trying.
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Hi Grammar Geek,
What was there that made his 'redneck accent' so terrible? Unfortunately, my connection seems a bit slow at the moment, so I cannot watch his videos myself. Yet, I think you should explain why his attempt to sound 'redneck American' was unsuccessful. Are we talking about the way he pronounces individual sounds, intonation, or prosody?
Speaking a second lan
What was there that made his 'redneck accent' so terrible? Unfortunately, my connection seems a bit slow at the moment, so I cannot watch his videos myself. Yet, I think you should explain why his attempt to sound 'redneck American' was unsuccessful. Are we talking about the way he pronounces individual sounds, intonation, or prosody?
Speaking a second lan
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You should listen to his cockney, lol.
The standard American doesn't sound awful to me but it still doesn't sound native either. I guess non-British people would hear something a bit off with the cockney accent but not realise how awful that is either...
I think that as a non-native English speaker he is doing an excellent job. He says in his introduction that he knows his accent
The standard American doesn't sound awful to me but it still doesn't sound native either. I guess non-British people would hear something a bit off with the cockney accent but not realise how awful that is either...
I think that as a non-native English speaker he is doing an excellent job. He says in his introduction that he knows his accent
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Hi nona the brit,
You wrote:
Englishuser
You wrote:
I guess non-British people would hear something a bit off with the cockney accent but not realise how awful that is either...What exactly is there that makes his Cockney sound awful? I think it would be important to focus on where he actually fails in his attempt to mimic different accents.
Englishuser
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Hard to pin it all down exactly. It's just generally 'off'. However, some specificic points are that all the 'i's sound Australian rather than cockney. the th should sound like v. Wiv not with. The 't's are not right either - he can't do the glottal stop at all. The 'o's quite often sound wrong. The l needs more of a w pronounciation. I'm not sure what he did with the word '******'. He seems to be
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Thanks, nona the brit, for the explanation. You might like to know that th-fronting, that is, the replacement of the 'theta sound' with /f/ or /v/, is common in Cockney.
Englishuser
Englishuser
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Thanks for the replies.
Anyway, since I'm learning American English, I wanted to know why that standard American Accent was awful. What are the mistakes he's making? Would you be able to point out the wrong features in his speech?
(even though I'm interested in that American accent, you can still comment on the other accents if you want, as did Nona)
Thanks
Anyway, since I'm learning American English, I wanted to know why that standard American Accent was awful. What are the mistakes he's making? Would you be able to point out the wrong features in his speech?
(even though I'm interested in that American accent, you can still comment on the other accents if you want, as did Nona)
Thanks
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Well to start with, I am an American. I was born and raised here, but the reason that every one else thinks that he stinks, is because no matter wich accent he uses, you can always tell that there seems to be a slight under tone in his pronuciation. Another thing about his diffrent accents was the fact, that we goofy Americans, never say things like when I was a baby. Instead we say things like w
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Yeah, but what is he pronouncing wrong? I mean, is it the Rs, the Ts, some vowels... that's what I can't figure out, or at least what I'm not sure of.
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