Ac’centuate the Positive

Since accents have played a major part in my life, I would be surprised if they had not come up here before. 

Hello, my name is Tonette, and I pick up accents. 

Do any of you do this when speaking to people with another accent from yours? 

How about watching movies or listening to audiobooks or podcasts? 

It took me until I was a young teen to realize that I was doing this. When I brought it up to family, oh, they had noticed, they had noticed. Apparently, I had been a born mimic; I’ve always been able to do many other voices or copy some. 
Why didn’t they stop me? They found it amusing, a quirk, and my family seldom called anyone down. 
 I found myself highly embarrassed more than once. 

If you heard me speak, you’d wonder why, if I can do other voices, I sound like I do. My default speaking voice is not the nicest in the world, (and easily recognizable), but what can I do, except to slow down and measure every sound that comes out of my mouth and remember to speak in one particular way… 

it’s unsustainable, take my word for it. 

Nevertheless, as I grew up Washington, DC area, (if by chance there is anyone reading this who does not know by now), we had people there from all over the country and  all over the world. I never had a problem understanding anyone from anywhere. My mother, on the other hand, could not understand anyone unless they had most American, Italian or Spanish accent. She had a lot of problem with British accents. 

My mother was born in America, but her parents were off-the-boat Italian and Italian was spoken at home. My grandfather left for political reasons and always hoped to go back with his family, so perfect, northern Italian was to be maintained. 

My mother and her siblings went to schools run by strict, mostly Irish, teachers. They had to be. They had students whose families were from all over Europe, all of them speaking their languages at home, at their churches and synagogues, but by golly, they were going to get those kids educated…and they succeeded. My mother and her sisters all became executive secretaries, all six of them, all right under the bosses, (one at an African nation’s embassy). Their full brother and two half-brothers all ran their own businesses. The youngest half-brother dropped his accent, but one kept his because, I believe, the ladies found it charming, but no one ever guessed that English was not my mother and those siblings’ first language. 

That is until someone heavily accented tried to talk with her. God forbid she try to watch a show with French people speaking; I would have to translate, no matter how clearly they spoke English. 

So, here I have been listening to audiobooks, podcasts, and vlogs from all over, though mostly from Scotland, England and some from Ireland, 

and I find myself speaking afterward with a mid-Irish lilt, a Yorkshire accent, different Scottish brogues, (or even going arownd talking like a Canadian). 

However, I have not found myself speaking with the clear, fine accents of some of the English, drat it.  

A few of the people speak softly, and some have heavy accents and for the first time, I absolutely have to use my earbuds to understand them, which I dare to guess does not help in fending off their ways of speech entering into my own. 

Do you get affected by accents, I mean, do you find yourself speaking like others?