Everyone has Accents

Yes, yes even you

Everyone has an accent. It the word to describe:

the way in which people in a particular area, country, or social group pronounce words¹

I’ve been living in the USA for 3 years and I am realizing the differences in the regional accents here. I was used to hearing the standard US accent, maybe a generic ‘southern’ or New York accent to distinguish them but on the ground, I am hearing accents completely new to me. It shouldn’t be a surprise as the current population is 347 million² with the land mass of 9.83 million square kilometers.

This is just one country that has english as one of it’s main languages. It’s spoken in the UK, New Zealand and Australia. It’s also the current lingua franca³ and one of the 6 languages used in the UN⁴. With English as the commonly used language to communicate in the world, why is there a focus on accents? If you are understood but he other speaker, why is there a reason to highlight an accent?

“I understand English; I read and write English perfectly, but the accent won't go away.” - Sofia Vergara⁵

With every person’s distinct accent, it reflects where they grew up. The choice of who the parents will be and what part of the world a person grows up is certainly not up the person; they just pop out and here we go! As we grow, to fit in and adapt to our part of the world where we grow up, we adapt to our surroundings and survive⁶. Examples in English would be accent adaptation⁷. This is where a certain strong accent that is understood well in your hometown but in the city, none can really understand you.

For children it seems appropriate to correct pronunciation of words in their development. The way that they are taught to speak is local to where they are going to grow up and live. But as an adult, if you’re not at finishing or elocution school, it seems strange to correct them in pronunciation of words. If indeed it is pronounced in a way that could potentially lead to a misunderstanding, then I believe it is alright to help out. Good and cheeky example below

“The accent of one's birthplace remains in the mind and in the heart as in one's speech.” - Francois de La Rochefoucauld

When I was younger working at a restaurant, I’d have people say to me as I was working “Oh you have an accent” my ideal response to this comment would be “Why doesn’t everyone?” But that might get me in trouble with HR. This post is the real response to all those customers because everyone has an accent. It’s a reflection of our family, native language and area of the planet we come from.

It seems that the individual is stating the obvious when they say “oh you have an accent” because, everyone has one.

1. https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/accent#google_vignette

2. https://www.worldometers.info/world-population/us-population/#google_vignette

3. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/lingua%20franca

4. https://ask.un.org/faq/14463?_gl=1*1tj8t7o*_ga*MTY5NTg3MDI0MS4xNzUxMzAwMjQ1*_ga_TK9BQL5X7Z*czE3NTEzMDAyNDUkbzEkZzAkdDE3NTEzMDAyNDUkajYwJGwwJGgw

5. //www.brainyquote.com/topics/accent-quotes

6. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7293151/

7. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0388000113000351