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I appreciate the thoughtful reply. I don't think you're rude, and I get what you're saying as someone who thinks a lot about accents and languages. However, I s
by keerthiko 3y ago
I appreciate the thoughtful reply. I don't think you're rude, and I get what you're saying as someone who thinks a lot about accents and languages. However, I still think you missed my point.
There is no "no accent". An accent is a baseline feature of intelligible human speech, like a voice, or a volume, or a language. You can't say stuff without those features. When you say "the Chicago accent", or the "Midwest accent", that's an accent! Not "no accent".
I understand it's common usage to refer to the default "radio accent" as "no accent", but in a country like America, all kinds of people with all kinds of accents speak English. Reinforcing an expectation that a certain (usu. majority-white-spoken) one is the "default" by referring to it as "no accent", implicitly suggests all others are erroneous affectations, even if I trust that is not your personal intent.
All that said, I think your idea for a translation device capable of revocalizing what is said with an unfamiliar accent into one you are used to is not a bad one, and likely easier than translating between languages while retaining expressiveness.
- kortilla 3y ago> reinforcing an expectation that a certain (usu. majority-white-spoken) Wow, you just keep digging in don’t you? When these Americans you deride say “no accent”, do you think they are referring to the “majority-white-spoken” Scottish accent? No, of course not. Get that race baiting out of here.