Do you think you have an accent?

Something I could never understand, maybe someone here has input: how is it quantities of people can spend their entire lives in a specific location yet have no noticeable accent, while others in same situation/location do have noticeable accents?
 
I was in a Guess where I’m from conversation, while living in Phoenix.

Most guesses were Chicago-Cleveland …. I was superprised my midwest (Ohio) upbringing stayed with me all these years later.


MACKTEXAS said:
I probably do, but I don't get any comments about it. What I hear more is "slow down, you're going too fast."
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I always thought fast talkers were in the NE, not Texas.
 
jujube said:
Born and raised in the Midwest, I never thought I had an accent.

When I lived in Virginia, I was told I "talked funny". I guess that was due to the fact that I pronounced Norfolk, Portsmouth and Suffolk like they were spelled, rather than "Nawfuk, Potsmuth, and Suffuk".
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I understand that, I purposefully avoided saying those name when I lived there for that reason. I was corrected in Wisconsin for pronouncing it
Whizconsin :ROFLMAO:
 
Sunkist said:
Something I could never understand, maybe someone here has input: how is it quantities of people can spend their entire lives in a specific location yet have no noticeable accent, while others in same situation/location do have noticeable accents?
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Familial influence?

I've been asked if I'm from Missouri because I have a Missouri accent. I have no idea what that is, but most of the relatives on my father's side are originally from Missouri, and some of them still live there. So maybe I picked up some sort of Missouri inflection from my Dad.

That's my guess.
 
KSav said:
I get that a lot, too. And now I say it to my older daughter, who speaks even faster than I do!

I don't think I have an accent. I think I sound just like everyone else here in ND, but I clearly do have some sort of accent, because I have heard time and time again, on the first time meeting someone, "You're not from here, are you?"

My daughters' friends, back when they were in middle school, said they would even call to just to listen to our answering machine message, which had been recorded by me. You'd think I had some sort of cut-it-with-a-knife Bronx or Brooklyn accent, or something. I honestly don't hear it. But it's clearly there. 🤷🏻‍♀️
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I'm with you. I don't think we can hear our own accents. It's what other people tell us.
 
911 said:
When I first returned home from the Marines and being in Vietnam, I did. My best buddy at the time was from Arkansas. My mom asked me almost right away, why was I talking like I was a southerner. I told her I didn’t know what she meant. She said I sounded like Andy Griffith. Later, my friends noticed it, but I don’t think it lasted very long.
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Not hard for me to slip into a southern accent while in the South, having spent summers with relatives in North Carolina, along with being stationed in the South first couple years in the Army. When I would come home on leave my friends would laugh at my sounding like Gomer Pyle, I couldn't tell by hearing my own speech.
gruntlabor said:
Californians speak with a 'northern' accent or that's what I've always heard it called.
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I'm not seeing that, myself. While in Vermont visiting DW's relatives the Northern accent they speak is pretty distinct. The Northern Californians do sound a bit different than here in SoCal(don't ever say "Cali") perhaps like the "Sierra Man" like Murrmurr mentioned.
 
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