Irish with American accents

3ndahalfof6 · 23-07-2012 02:16AM

I knew this Irish guy he lived in America most of his life, when I met him there recently you would want to hear the American twang on him, anything for attention ehhh.

ElvisChrist6 · 23-07-2012 02:18AM

Saul-Goode9 wrote: »

Actually, I believe 90% of the people who say "Oirish" are from the Greater Dublin Area

No one I or her knows even if that is the case!

irishbarb · 23-07-2012 02:29AM

This is one of my pet peeves. I've met a few people like this. The funniest one was a girl from Belfast who had a full on American accent, even though they never stepped foot in America before. How you'd be born and raised in Belfast, and come out with an American accent I don't know. I used to hang around with a lad with an American-even-though-he-never-stepped-foot-in-America accent as well, and my Dad told me if me or any of my siblings ever started talking like that, he'd kick the ****e out of us. I too have noticed it's mostly rich kids who are ''emo'', into punk music like Green Day, are obsessed with American culture, and like to think their lives are **** who have this accent.

I personally think young ones who talk like that should be sent to live with no telly or Youtube on a farm in the middle of no where until they learn that they are actually Irish, and not American.

Brian_Zeluz · 23-07-2012 02:34AM

Nuke them all and let god sort them out

SusieBlue · 23-07-2012 03:12AM

My nephew has a complete American accent, he even says tomato like "to-may-to" and garbage instead of rubbish.

I once rang my sisters phone and he answered, apparently she couldn't come to the phone cause she was doing the laundry.

The child has never even left the country

I blame my sister, he watches Playhouse Disney for about 9hours a day, I'm guessing its where he picked it up!

giant_midget · 23-07-2012 11:07AM

All these fake american accents are funny, One person in particular i would like to punch is the bint from the 123.ie add.. The blonde one with a mouth that looks like a fish going for a hook when she speaks

€ = ewwwero , I'ts "EURO" ye cnut! :mad: speak properly!

fishy fishy · 23-07-2012 12:25PM

DEFTLEFTHAND wrote: »

My old man has a friend living and working in Chicago since the early seventies. About 3 months after moving there he returned home to watch Tipp in the 71 AI final. When they met him at arrivals they noticed the twang, the straw that broke the camels back however was when they were paying for pints at the hotel and he pipes up with "Geez guys I can't understand this goddam money".

didn't the money change in the early 1970's?? Could that have been the reason he couldn't understand the money?

Solair · 23-07-2012 12:38PM

The same thing happens everywhere. Accents change due to exposure to other accents. Irish accents will disappear / seriously moderate and blend with American-media influenced accents. There's nothing odd, strange or pretentious about that. It's a consequence of telecommunication and cheap travel!

Irish accents have characteristics that are more similar to US/Canadian accents than English accents so we are much more likely to slip into a US accent than a British one.

Even in the US regional accents are being replaced by California-inspired accents. Bostonian teens suddenly sound like they grew up in "the valley". Phrases, accents and dialects vanish!

Ireland will retain an identity in our accents but you can be 100% sure that our accents will slip ever increasingly towards mid Atlantic. There's nothing necessarily wrong with that either. Language is about communication more than its about a cultural badge.

Often non US English accents, even Londoners, struggle to be understood in the world of second language business English speakers where as sometimes D4 Or RTE standard English works fine as its close to US broadcast English!

MJ23 · 23-07-2012 12:45PM

My 2 nephews and niece have slight American accents. I think its from watching so much American tv shows. Hannah Montana, Barney, Josh and Drake and various others.

Plazaman · 23-07-2012 12:48PM

I occasionally put on an American accent just so I can say "fannypack".

downwithpeace · 23-07-2012 12:52PM

I had an American accent for a long time because I lived and went to school there, took about two years to pick up and a lot longer to revert once I had moved back.
Can't say I've met anyone else putting on an accent but I have found that if I'm talking to people with certain accents my accent can change to match theirs.

dlofnep · 23-07-2012 01:22PM

downwithpeace wrote: »

I had an American accent for a long time because I lived and went to school there, took about two years to pick up and a lot longer to revert once I had moved back.
Can't say I've met anyone else putting on an accent but I have found that if I'm talking to people with certain accents my accent can change to match theirs.

Living there is different. Your accent can slowly change to accommodate the society you live in, so that people can understand you easier. I know that when I worked in a call-centre I definitely had a 'phone voice', which I pronounced words more clearly with less of an urban accent - as our clients were British and sometimes had problems understanding our accents. I think your mind subconsciously works out that it takes much less energy to speak with a more neutral accent, than having to routinely repeat yourself.

The case of children growing up with an American accent from television - well that's just a case of piss-poor parenting. No child should be immersed in front of their television more than they are in the society they live in. Moreover - children don't have to speak back to the television, so they don't have to change their accent to accommodate a conversation. So I still find it peculiar that it occurs when everything else around them is an Irish accent.

I'm sure people in University spend years studying this phenomenon - My views are just from my own experiences with accents.

shortys94 · 23-07-2012 04:24PM

I wonder if it would be possible to create a sub forum in after hours for complaining, we do it a lot

RikkFlair · 23-07-2012 04:29PM

shortys94 wrote: »

I wonder if it would be possible to create a sub forum in after hours for complaining, we do it a lot

And a sub sub forum for people complaining about people complaining.

Rented Mule · 23-07-2012 04:37PM

I lived in Artane/Coolock for four years and my American accent got thicker.

It beat the alternative.

Fuinseog · 23-07-2012 04:38PM

eth0 wrote: »

That often havn't even been to the States and if they have it was only for a few weeks. Whats the story with these people, do they put in a concious effort to put on this accent?

The accent would usually be picked up from watching shoite American TV or Youtoob. Worst case the lads actually think and act like they are a character in their favourite American sitcom, these are the most annoying type; absolute insufferable gobsh1tes of the highest order. I have met a few of these, one of them is obsessed with a certain piece of kit called a Pandaboard. He started blathering on about this and using it as a media server sending TCP packets like he was a proper Starbucks-drinking San Francisco nerdhead.

Another lad I used to know seemed to reject anything traditionally Irish so he must have put on the accent for this reason, last time I seen him he was on some anti-religious rant. Went to college with him, one day someone asked him where in the States he was from. The lad was from Knocknaheeney, he should have been saying "c'mere to me boy, you're a tool!" not "Hey Guys check out this awesome CAUW-ffee".
In the same class there was another happy-go-lucky sitcom fella, he was seriously annoying now. Like the pandaboard lad the blood pressure would just start to rise as soon as he opened his mouth.

Craig Doyle

Caliden · 23-07-2012 04:45PM

I've been over here 8 months and I can safely say that I could see it happening if you were hanging around and living with Americans for a few years.
Since I'm living with 2 other Irish people, my accent has only become stronger but I do have to speak slower and more clearly when talking to Americans.

Any J1'ers that come home after 2/3 months with an accent though are pathetic.

Mars Bar · 23-07-2012 04:46PM

My sister has this going on sometimes. It doesn't bother me too much when it's just me and her as sometimes it enhances her humour.
Other times she puts on a big bogger accent and that is equally as bad.

I only really become conscious of it when she's talking to people she doesn't know coz I know that deep down inside, they are judging her!

Funglegunk · 23-07-2012 04:56PM

There were some sand doons on the nooz today.

Helix · 23-07-2012 05:05PM

im from balbriggan and living in canada now, and in many cases people don't notice that i have an accent any more

stick me in a room with another irish person though, and it comes back ten fold

shortys94 · 23-07-2012 05:10PM

RikkFlair wrote: »

And a sub sub forum for people complaining about people complaining.

Pretty sure there was no complaint made

sink · 23-07-2012 05:47PM

People sometimes say I've an American accent, don't know what they're on about tbh, to an American I sound nothing like it. Besides American accents are even more varied than Irish. I would say have a fairly nondescript accent when surrounded by thick Irish accents, but if I'm abroad and you hear my voice contrasted with foreign accents you would definitely be able to tell I am Irish.

bluecode · 23-07-2012 06:01PM

It isn't an American accent. It only sounds slightly American to another Irish person. Everyone else hears the Irish accent. Mostly it's probably picked up from TV or movies.

I grew up in Dublin with parents from Limerick and Wexford. But my accent isn't close to any of those. People from outside Dublin would ask if I was English but to an English person I had a thick Irish accent.

As far as I was concerned I didn't even have an accent. I doubt if many people put on a fake accent.

rKossi · 23-07-2012 06:22PM

Like this? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9X9Dy25zNQo

Helix · 23-07-2012 06:28PM

rKossi wrote: »

Like this? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9X9Dy25zNQo

that's not close to an american accent

newmug · 23-07-2012 07:02PM

Helix wrote: »

that's not close to an american accent

Pwortner, explewsions, hearry podder spaawls? If its not an American accent, where in Ireland would you place it then?

Helix · 23-07-2012 07:18PM

newmug wrote: »

Pwortner, explewsions, hearry podder spaawls? If its not an American accent, where in Ireland would you place it then?

its a south side dublin accent

it's also called speaking properly

Il Trap · 23-07-2012 07:22PM

http://http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k03XT-GVMLILeo the American!

newmug · 23-07-2012 07:29PM

Helix wrote: »

its a south side dublin accent

it's also called speaking properly

Its a spud-in-the-mouth accent. I know there are a few muppets in the South of Dublin who talk like that because they think it elevates their social status while ironically doing the opposite, but there's not a drop of a real Dublin accent in there. Its anything but speaking properly.

Helix · 23-07-2012 07:34PM

newmug wrote: »

Its a spud-in-the-mouth accent. I know there are a few muppets in the South of Dublin who talk like that because they think it elevates their social status while ironically doing the opposite, but there's not a drop of a real Dublin accent in there. Its anything but speaking properly.

they don't talk like that because they think anything. they talk like that because that's the accent they pick up when they're growing up. it's the exact same reason you talk like you do

Irish with American accents

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