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British & American accent | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 6003 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes  Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 25 of 31 21 March 2009 at 7:41pm | IP Logged | ||
Almost right, but you don't need the first "I", thanks to ellipsis. Going back to the original sentence: "I thought London accent sounds graceful,nobel,classic and hated American accent because I felt American accent is...". I thought X and felt Y is perfectly normal -- and allows us to "reuse" the first part of a sentence, is I thought X and felt Y is identical in meaning to I thought X and I felt Y, and in many contexts more natural. Also, on a similar note, I wouldn't repeat "the American accent" -- that's what the word "it" is for! "I thought the London accent sounds graceful, nobbl and classy and hated the American accent because I felt it was [alternativly, I feel it is] too "sweet", too "soft", or in other words "it sounds like someone speaking with a hot potato in his mouth". Oh, and just while we're off-topic for a moment. "I like when people tell me" Did you know that in the UK we say "I like it when..."? The US form is gaining in popularity (thanks to TV and Hollywood). But there you go. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Dark_Sunshine Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5757 days ago 340 posts - 357 votes Speaks: English*, French | Message 26 of 31 21 March 2009 at 10:21pm | IP Logged | ||
Better to try and be an arse IMHO ;-) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| portunhol Triglot Senior Member United States thelinguistblogger.w Joined 6244 days ago 198 posts - 299 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: German, Arabic (classical) | Message 27 of 31 22 March 2009 at 1:22am | IP Logged | ||
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I think it's funny how most of us who have responded are native English speakers.
I get asked this question a lot and this is what I tell people: It depends. If you think that you will have more contact with the Aussies, then learn Australian English, not American or British. If you see yourself rubbing shoulders more with the Brits, it makes little sense to learn the American way of speaking. What's even more important is not to stress. It's all the same language and after the beginning phase of learning you realize that it's not too big a deal which one you learn. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| eoinda Tetraglot Senior Member Sweden Joined 5940 days ago 101 posts - 113 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English, Spanish, Mandarin Studies: French | Message 28 of 31 22 March 2009 at 11:36am | IP Logged | ||
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I agree with portunhol and that is why I've been learning British English. I also feel that British English sounds more
pleasing. It annoys me that I haven't had the time to change my google spelling devise to British English according to google neighbour, offence and metre are horribly wrong. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Dark_Sunshine Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5757 days ago 340 posts - 357 votes Speaks: English*, French | Message 29 of 31 22 March 2009 at 1:02pm | IP Logged | ||
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'offence' and 'metre' ARE the British spellings.
EDIT: Sorry, I think I misread your post- didn't see the 'according to google neighbour' part... Edited by Dark_Sunshine on 22 March 2009 at 1:04pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| SlickAs Tetraglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5869 days ago 185 posts - 287 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, French, Swedish Studies: Thai, Vietnamese | Message 30 of 31 22 March 2009 at 4:27pm | IP Logged | ||
I am not talking politics, but history. Do you really want us to edit out of the history books the Vietnam war (complete with bombing of Laos and Cambodia), or the Latin American communist wars (that culminated with the Iran-Contra affair). The locals havent forgotten. That is what we are talking about. I assure you, you go to Nicaragua, the peasants want to tell me (an Australian / Canadian, mistaking me for a gringo, about what happened to their crops in the 80's and 90's). I don't really need to remind you about this, but here is some reasons that the American accent is not welcomed: Second Indochina War (Vietnam including Laos and Cambodia) The El Salvadorian War Nicaraguan war I speak honestly when I say that I am well travelled and the British accent is more well received. The British conducted themselves well even as colonisers. That is before we start talking about Israel / Palestine and the Afghan war of 1979, and all the circles of influence there. America for its 50 years of heavy handed foreign affairs is not seen well. I think it is fair to say that the Estuary Accent is inoffensive. I will be in Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam in May / June (for the 2nd time). I have been to every Central American country and spent 1.5 years in Latin America. Canadians commonly sow small Canadian flags onto their luggage so as not to be confused with Americans, and they did that always ... 2001. None of this is political. In China it is illegal to disagree with government policy. The beautiful thing about America is that you can disagree with what Obama is doing. Disagree with what Nixon or Reagan did. Vote for small government, but disagree with selling guns to Iran to fund the Contra war in Nicaragua. That is not political. So at the end of the day, for the Chinese Original Poster, you will be better received with a British accent (and it does not matter which). Edited by SlickAs on 22 March 2009 at 4:48pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 6003 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 31 of 31 22 March 2009 at 6:45pm | IP Logged | ||
You might want to read up on the Indian "Mutiny", for one thing. Remember that we got away with a lot more in those days, before people stopped seeing the importance of people in inverse proportion to the darkness of their skin, and before they invented TV news. And then if we're going to talk about heavy-handedness in the Middle East, remember who it was that created the stupid, illogical borders that barely respect geography and never respect ethnicity or cultural groupings -- all the imperial powers. We did the same in Africa, too... but worse. We introduced minorities as an intermediate level between the white government and the local population. One minority ruling a larger minority who rule the majority on our behalf; leaving massively inequitable societies when independence was granting, resulting in inevitable bloody civil war. Not to mention the slave trade. Is that good conduct in your book? All we've got going for us is that most of this was a long time ago and has faded from many people's memories. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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