3 ms·

I love dialects and grew up in New Orleans. It's an absolutely fascinating city if you have an ear for accents since there are so many distinct ones. People of

I love dialects and grew up in New Orleans. It's an absolutely fascinating city if you have an ear for accents since there are so many distinct ones. People often tell me that I have "no accent" even though I grew up in the South. The answer is that I used to have a very strong east Texas accent. When I moved to the New Orleans area at ten, I was surrounded by so many distinct accents that I guess my brain didn't know which one to latch onto and I ended up with a sort of generic American one. I have a distinct memory of a classmate in fifth grade referring to a pen as an "ink pen" (as if there is any other kind) and realizing it was because in his accent, "pen" and "pin" are otherwise indistinguishable.

WorldMaker 3y ago
I also grew up around an interesting mixture of Southern and Midwestern accents and wound up with what people receive as "no accent". It may not be as "generic American" as you think, though. I've found in my own case that my own accent is just naturally incredibly accommodative (also the fun technical word for it) and I reflect back the accent of the person I'm talking to more and more the longer I talk to them. It's generally not a conscious thing and it's weird to try to catch it consciously or consciously trigger it. When I do try to consciously watch it, it is very subtle (it's not trying to mock or parody the other person, as you might if you were trying to consciously "put on" an accent). (Also, I don't think it is necessarily restricted to cities with mixtures of accents. TV has done a lot to build both a rather homogenized "generic Middle American accent", but also I think has been one of the forces for creating the very accommodative accents from hearing what diversity there is between local/regional accents and the TV generics and how those influence each other, particularly because TV hasn't been intentionally homogenizing things in a specific direction.)
- munificent 3y ago
  > It may not be as "generic American" as you think, though. It definitely is. I've had people from a variety of US states tell me I have "no accent" (which roughly means, "American standard West Coast television actor accent"). > I've found in my own case that my own accent is just naturally incredibly accommodative (also the fun technical word for it) and I reflect back the accent of the person I'm talking to more and more the longer I talk to them. My brother is like that. His speech patterns are chameleonic and follow whoever he's talking to. He does it totally unconsciously and naturally, and it seems to work well for him. I'm too self conscious to do that to the degree that he does. I would notice myself doing it and it would feel inauthentic (even if it wasn't). I have a fairly consistent accent regardless of who I'm talking to.
rahimnathwani 3y ago
I was born in London. When I was a kid, there were two types of pen: - ink pens (aka fountain pens) - biros (aka ball-point pens)
- wyclif 3y ago
  That was before fountain pens became almost exclusively hobbyist. Also, Americans don't say "biro"— that's something that I've only heard from English people or people from Commonwealth countries. Yanks would probably just say "ballpoint."
  - seabass-labrax 3y ago
    'Ballpoint' was the term used in the first patent for such a device. Later, the name 'biro' was coined from the name of László Bíró, who created the first commercially successful ball point pen. Finally, there is of course the famous company Bic, which was named by its founder Marcel Bich after himself. I would say that in my experience as a British person, 'ballpoint' is used frequently, 'biro' is probably the most common and has an almost colloquial feel to it, and 'bic biro' is used to refer to specifically to ones made by Bic, where people are usually imagining something like the Bic Cristal as a sort of 'standard' pen.
    - wyclif 3y ago
      Fascinating. I've never heard anyone say "Bic biro" but I don't doubt it's in usage somewhere.
      - WorldMaker 3y ago
        I do know Americans that colloquially use "bic pen" as their preference for "ballpoint pen", but that's partly pressure from the other direction of the genericization that they associate "bic" alone more with lighter. So "a bic" is a lighter and "a bic pen" is a ballpoint pen.
  - ksenzee 3y ago
wyclif 3y ago
In Filipino English, they call it a "ball pen." I suspect the reason why is the same as the Southern US.
- MichaelZuo 3y ago
  Are you certain? I’m fairly sure I’ve heord at least one fillipino pronounce the difference…
eesmith 3y ago
Where I was, it was a "writing pen" or a "sewing pin". If I try hard, I can make the two sound different. Just like I've struggled to be able to pronounce "Dawn" different from "Don".
selimthegrim 3y ago
The so-called traditional New Orleans accent (“Yat”) is almost by now entirely confined to the suburbs of Kenner, Chalmette, Arabi and parts of the Northshore.

WorldMaker 3y ago

I also grew up around an interesting mixture of Southern and Midwestern accents and wound up with what people receive as "no accent". It may not be as "generic American" as you think, though. I've found in my own case that my own accent is just naturally incredibly accommodative (also the fun technical word for it) and I reflect back the accent of the person I'm talking to more and more the longer I talk to them. It's generally not a conscious thing and it's weird to try to catch it consciously or consciously trigger it. When I do try to consciously watch it, it is very subtle (it's not trying to mock or parody the other person, as you might if you were trying to consciously "put on" an accent). (Also, I don't think it is necessarily restricted to cities with mixtures of accents. TV has done a lot to build both a rather homogenized "generic Middle American accent", but also I think has been one of the forces for creating the very accommodative accents from hearing what diversity there is between local/regional accents and the TV generics and how those influence each other, particularly because TV hasn't been intentionally homogenizing things in a specific direction.)

munificent 3y ago
> It may not be as "generic American" as you think, though. It definitely is. I've had people from a variety of US states tell me I have "no accent" (which roughly means, "American standard West Coast television actor accent"). > I've found in my own case that my own accent is just naturally incredibly accommodative (also the fun technical word for it) and I reflect back the accent of the person I'm talking to more and more the longer I talk to them. My brother is like that. His speech patterns are chameleonic and follow whoever he's talking to. He does it totally unconsciously and naturally, and it seems to work well for him. I'm too self conscious to do that to the degree that he does. I would notice myself doing it and it would feel inauthentic (even if it wasn't). I have a fairly consistent accent regardless of who I'm talking to.

rahimnathwani 3y ago

I was born in London. When I was a kid, there were two types of pen: - ink pens (aka fountain pens) - biros (aka ball-point pens)

wyclif 3y ago
That was before fountain pens became almost exclusively hobbyist. Also, Americans don't say "biro"— that's something that I've only heard from English people or people from Commonwealth countries. Yanks would probably just say "ballpoint."
- seabass-labrax 3y ago
  'Ballpoint' was the term used in the first patent for such a device. Later, the name 'biro' was coined from the name of László Bíró, who created the first commercially successful ball point pen. Finally, there is of course the famous company Bic, which was named by its founder Marcel Bich after himself. I would say that in my experience as a British person, 'ballpoint' is used frequently, 'biro' is probably the most common and has an almost colloquial feel to it, and 'bic biro' is used to refer to specifically to ones made by Bic, where people are usually imagining something like the Bic Cristal as a sort of 'standard' pen.
  - wyclif 3y ago
    Fascinating. I've never heard anyone say "Bic biro" but I don't doubt it's in usage somewhere.
    - WorldMaker 3y ago
      I do know Americans that colloquially use "bic pen" as their preference for "ballpoint pen", but that's partly pressure from the other direction of the genericization that they associate "bic" alone more with lighter. So "a bic" is a lighter and "a bic pen" is a ballpoint pen.
- ksenzee 3y ago

wyclif 3y ago

In Filipino English, they call it a "ball pen." I suspect the reason why is the same as the Southern US.

MichaelZuo 3y ago
Are you certain? I’m fairly sure I’ve heord at least one fillipino pronounce the difference…

eesmith 3y ago

Where I was, it was a "writing pen" or a "sewing pin". If I try hard, I can make the two sound different. Just like I've struggled to be able to pronounce "Dawn" different from "Don".

selimthegrim 3y ago

The so-called traditional New Orleans accent (“Yat”) is almost by now entirely confined to the suburbs of Kenner, Chalmette, Arabi and parts of the Northshore.