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fat_chris
Joined: 10 Sep 2003
Posts: 3198
Location: Beijing
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 Posted: Thu Jul 05, 2007 4:03 pm Post subject: Accented |
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| fox1 wrote: |
| ...but I'm not that fond of a lot of the LOUD, annoying, nasal, ohmygadlikesoooooameezinglikenevershutsup American English I hear behind me sometimes either. You talk about economic allure |
Agreed. Listening to the aforementioned is extremely tedious. The Southern California sorority girl dialect that the rest of the U.S. has unfortunately picked up on is just plain awful. And this is done by women in their late 20s...or...GASP!...women already in their 30s. There's just no excuse for that. I'll never date a woman that speaks in such a manner.
Living in New York City is a true accented treat. You have the Brooklyn accent (light and heavy), the Bronx accent, the Newyorican thing (Puerto Rican English) while the countless different ethnic groups of the City then throw their own style into the mix. One hears so many different accents just ridin' the 1 train from the Bronx into downtown Manhattan.
I dig it. 
Regards,
fat_c |
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gaijinalways
Joined: 29 Nov 2005
Posts: 2279
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| Posted: Thu Jul 05, 2007 5:14 pm Post subject: |
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| I like NYC too, but more for the music scene which is also affected by the melting pot. I like listening to different accents in London too, Italian, French, Russian, Israeli, etc. Makes me feel like I'm in a metropolitan place. Sometimes it happens here, but less often. |
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Lynn
Joined: 28 Jan 2003
Posts: 696
Location: in between
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| Posted: Thu Jul 05, 2007 10:53 pm Post subject: |
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Sorry I didn't read all the responses, but I have a few things to say about this:
1) I seriously doubt Japanese can even hear your accent. Someone somewhere told them that the accents are way different, so they just go along with it.
2) You have one American on your side. I was in a class once and the student talked about Australian accents and said, "They say, 'I'm going to the hospital to die. (today)'" I looked at him straight in the face and said, "That't not funny." And to really hit below the belt I said, "Your joke is very uninteresting." and shook my shoulders like I got the shivers. |
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flyingkiwi
Joined: 29 Jan 2007
Posts: 211
Location: In the Golden Gai in Shinjuku, arguing with Mama-san over my tab
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| Posted: Thu Jul 05, 2007 11:48 pm Post subject: |
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| Quote: |
| 2) You have one American on your side. I was in a class once and the student talked about Australian accents and said, "They say, 'I'm going to the hospital to die. (today)'" I looked at him straight in the face and said, "That't not funny." And to really hit below the belt I said, "Your joke is very uninteresting." and shook my shoulders like I got the shivers. |
Actually, I feel sorry for the student. The poor soul probably didn't have the nerve to speak up in class after that.  |
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flyingkiwi
Joined: 29 Jan 2007
Posts: 211
Location: In the Golden Gai in Shinjuku, arguing with Mama-san over my tab
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| Posted: Thu Jul 05, 2007 11:53 pm Post subject: |
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| Nice one. But you still lost. You lost a SAILING RACE...to a nation that DOESN'T EVEN HAVE AN OCEAN. |
Yeah, but the genius that beat Team NZ was a kiwi, so....
If you want, I will give you nautical directions as to where that tub of yours is. Somewhere on the sea-bed off San Diego, wasn't it? 
You can mock kiwis all you like. I myself laugh and think it's pafectic how flags drop to half mast and the whole country goes into mourning when the all blacks lose at the world cup, esp. when watching in from the outside, now I'm in Japan. |
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door3344
Joined: 26 Apr 2007
Posts: 18
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| Posted: Fri Jul 06, 2007 12:43 am Post subject: |
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| markle wrote: |
I mean many low level students are happy with the language equivalent of sweet white bread, processed cheese and Macdonalds but when you come across students at a higher level, who want to be challenged, stimulated and enlightened then having a inscrutable accent is a advantage.
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Not sure how much "enlightenment" your going to get listening to an aussie accent. I mean honestly, who associates the aussie drawl with high culture, class, and erudition? It can be unintelligible at times to a lot of native speakers. I'm sure I'll be "corrected" here but it seems it consists of a lot of slang, obscure local idiom, mispronounced words and incorrect vowel sounds to me (especially compared to North American English, which, like it or not, is what they want to learn). I actually can see why it has a bad rep with the OP's coworkers. |
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markle
Joined: 17 Jan 2003
Posts: 1316
Location: Out of Japan
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| Posted: Fri Jul 06, 2007 1:10 am Post subject: |
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| door3344 wrote: |
| who associates the aussie drawl with high culture, class, and erudition |
Yes we all know that North American accented speakers (they all speak the same don't they) are known for their high culture ..snigger..class ... gawffff... and eruditHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA are you MOD EDIT
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| It can be unintelligible at times to a lot of native speakers. |
Yes the same native speakers that like white bread, processed cheese and Macdonalds.
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| I'm sure I'll be "corrected" |
I don't waste much time MOD EDIT |
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Mr. Kalgukshi
Mod Team
Joined: 18 Jan 2003
Posts: 6613
Location: Need to know basis only.
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| Posted: Fri Jul 06, 2007 1:18 am Post subject: |
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The MOD EDITS above were because of inappropriate and off topic comments.
If there are any more on this thread, you may assume that what will follow will be more than just a MOD EDIT.
Please stay on topic and address the message and not the messenger. |
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gaijinalways
Joined: 29 Nov 2005
Posts: 2279
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| Posted: Fri Jul 06, 2007 1:50 am Post subject: |
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| I think any English speaker, if they speak a dialect that is not the prominent one, may be ridiculed or looked down upon for speaking a 'nonstandard' English. But as noted before, the majority of English speaking Japanese cannot distinguish between major accents (British English versus N. American), never mind dialects, so why try to start a flaming war? Every country of any size has its regional and rural dialects. |
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TokyoLiz
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Posts: 1548
Location: Tokyo, Japan
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| Posted: Fri Jul 06, 2007 2:26 am Post subject: Don't knock the Commonwealth Englishes |
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Door3344 said
| Quote: |
| I mean honestly, who associates the aussie drawl with high culture, class, and erudition? It can be unintelligible at times to a lot of native speakers. |
It's an unfortunate circumstance that some English accents are considered to be inferior to others. I believe that one of the beautiful aspects of the English language is the great regional and dialect variation. Your Japanese students are going to speak a Japanese-ish English, adding yet another variation to English anyway. Japanese accented English peppered with Japanese-like turns of phrase is still English. Most English speakers on the planet are ESL speakers. Variation is inevitable.
In the English teaching community, it's important to recognize and work with the differences in regional English while teaching a standard of spoken English that reflects educated written English.
FYI, Paul Nation of New Zealand was teaching in Temple Univ Tokyo's M. Ed TESOL program this past spring. He's a noted specialist in teaching vocabulary.
Jack C. Richards, author of the Interchange series of textbooks and many academic works is a New Zealander, too. Both Nation and Richards have distinctive NZ accents.
What gaijinalways said - most of our Japanese EFL students cannot distinguish between accents.
See the study on regional NZ and Australian accents conducted here - http://www.otago.ac.nz/anthropology/Linguistic/Accents.html
There are lots of studies that indicate that ESL speakers cannot distinguish between regional accents which I have abstracts of on my other desk. I'll post references later.
My own experience tells me ESL students at the intermediate level can't tell. I worked in Canada wit ha Scottish guy who had a heavy accent. None of our students were aware that he was not speaking the typical N. American English until we told them.
I once walked into an intermediate classroom and started the lesson with the English I heard at home from my Glasgow and Paisley-born family - Scottish accented RP. When I asked my students what was different, they thought I had a cold or cut my hair or something.
callmesim said
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| Tell them everytime they make fun of the Australian accent, a baby koala dies. They'll soon stop. |
ROFL! That's the best post in this thread so far! |
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fox1
Joined: 22 Feb 2005
Posts: 268
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| Posted: Fri Jul 06, 2007 6:09 am Post subject: |
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I'm amazed at the restraint/politeness of Americans in this thread.
A lot of Aussie sounds bad to me. I can imagine how it would sound to others.. Like, where are the subtitles?
The ironic thing is that there is, actually, kind of something to the Japanese stereotype about bad-sounding Australian English (and I'm the guy who started this thread, remember).
Just that it's not ALL Australians, and not me! |
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drifter13
Joined: 27 Mar 2007
Posts: 124
Location: Fujisawa
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| Posted: Fri Jul 06, 2007 6:48 am Post subject: |
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I'll back fox1 up on that call. But it's the same in any english country. in Canada you have the whole spectrum, from guys who sounds like shakespeare to those who drop "Eh's" and "Yah's" like they're going out of style. But that's just they way it is 'ya noe, eh?'  |
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Mr. Kalgukshi
Mod Team
Joined: 18 Jan 2003
Posts: 6613
Location: Need to know basis only.
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| Posted: Fri Jul 06, 2007 8:48 am Post subject: |
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More inappropriate postings = locked thread.
If and when it is unlocked, that will be the last attempt to keep it active before it disappears forever and some members earn unpaid vacations. |
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