Accents...

[fajrdrako]

This interested me, because I am not only fascinated by accents, I am relatively accent-blind and have trouble understanding unfamiliar accents, or hearing them properly, or recognizing them. The idea of losing one's own accent and gaining another boggles my brain. I suppose it's better than aphasia.

I looked in Wikipedia and learned what a satsuma was. I'd never heard the word before I heard it in Doctor Who. The Wikipedia article confused me, though, by impling that in Canada a clementine and a tangerine were the same fruit, while they are not - they taste distinctly different, and even look different - tangerines tend to be slightly larger and the skin is more red. I like clementines a lot, and I don't like the taste of tangerines.

See, fandom is educational.

Comments

[silverwhistle.livejournal.com]

Satsumas are very popular at Christmas. Possibly the most user-friendly of oranges.
Satsuma-ware is something entirely different, however, being a kind of Japanese pottery.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

Well, clementines at Christmas are exactly the same here. They sell them by the crate in the supermarkets.

I've never heard of the pottery, either.

[jonquil.livejournal.com]

That's the thing that sometimes gets me about British movies and TV shows that aren't meant for export -- there are are all sorts of subtle class signals being transmitted through accent that sail right over my head. I tend to class all British accents as Cool, but that's not the way they're seen in-country. I really miss the magnificent ajhalluk, who had a lot to say about having a Northern accent and being told by teachers that she'd never succeed because of it.

[lauradi7.livejournal.com]

Satsumas are more tart than clementines. Still (mostly) seedless the way clementines are, rather than full of seeds like tangerines.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

That sounds really good. Do they not sell them in Canada, or do they sell them under another name?

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

I love northern British accents. Love listening to the voices. That doesn't mean I could identify it out of context, or reproduce it, or remember from one moment to another how it differs from a southern accent. Or maybe I could - but not reliably. Not consciously.

When I lived in London I used to hear stranger's voices and think, "That sounds like my friend so and so" - and then realize that the voice was entirely different, but the accent was the same, and I was picking up on it.

Seems to me that no two people in London spoke with the same accent. It made a kind of variety and diversity you don't hear in Ottawa.

[lauradi7.livejournal.com]

I have very little shopping experience in Canada. I live in the US, but bought satsumas in London.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

My guess, then, is that they aren't sold in Canada. Not yet.

[silverwhistle.livejournal.com]

I love northern British accents.

By that, do you mean Scottish or Northern English, or both?

What galls me here in Scotland and northern England is that there's an inverted snobbery: the more un-educated and uncouth you sound, the more "authentic" you are regarded. (I was bullied to hell at school in Hull, because of my bookishness and the fact I spoke pretty near RP and didn't swear in every sentence.)

Hence the plethora of Scottish-set films, novels & c which assume that the only "authentic" Scottish accent is something from a tough East-End of Glasgow housing scheme - and apply that even to Highlanders.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

do you mean Scottish or Northern English, or both?

Both.

there's an inverted snobbery

That seems unfair!

I remember reading a book owned by my host when I was staying in Edinburgh, about the Glasgow accent and dialect. It was very funny and I couldn't understand a word of it without explanation.

[silverwhistle.livejournal.com]

I remember reading a book owned by my host when I was staying in Edinburgh, about the Glasgow accent and dialect. It was very funny and I couldn't understand a word of it without explanation.

Yup... The idea that one should try to be comprehensible to others doesn;t seem to be taught these days: hence, people stay in a self-imposed ghetto of not-getting-above-themselves.

I loathe and detest the glottal stop (failure to pronounce 't'): it's sheer laziness/ poor diction. My father (a Highlander) had never heard (or not heard) a glottal stop until, during WW2, a lot of Glasgow slum kids were evacuated to the islands. He found them incomprehensible, besides causing outbreaks of various parasites and infections.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

I've only heard the glottal stop in movies and TV, I think - maybe occasionally when I was in Scotland. And when I was in Malta.

I have more trouble understanding when people change their vowels - which I think is common - and I suppose it's at least partly why languages mutate. (or should the word be, evolve?)

[wijsgeer.livejournal.com]

I've heard a English man who had an other accent after a stroke, he spoke about it on BBC4's Home Truths (he got some Italian accent though it precise location was not traced yet).

Do you think you could understand my accent?

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

I don't know whether I would understand your accent; probably. I don't recall having had any difficulty with Dutch accents in the past. But it's all so individual - if we ever get a chance to talk face to face, we'll find out!