I'm a regular radio, podcast and audiobook listener and my mind wandered to who I would choose to read Angharad's 'Easy As Falling Off A Bike' - British of course with maybe a slight regional accent - suggestions welcome.
Why stop there though? I remember one BC link to a short TG themed audio story but imagine readers know others which I'd like to hear about. In the meantime if anyone wants a challenge how about posting a-reading-a-day from the beginning of Bike?
Comments
I find it weird that in a
I find it weird that in a country so small, there are so many regional accents. Come to the Antipodes and you'll find very little across the entire country.
Joanna
Antipodes
I spent last summer in Australia and hope to spend the coming summer in New Zealand but I would be lynched if I suggested the two nations sounded the same Joanna!!!!
Rhona McCloud
Blame wireless transmission of television and radio programmes..
The USA, once famous for highly-distinctive regional accents (quite often based upon the origins of early settlers from the "old country," wherever that happened to be, is gradually becoming more-or-less "Mid-Atlantic" amongst the "educated classes" and cinema actors, with notable exceptions for the types of speech associated with particular social groups, i.e. "Urban" dialects used in certain crime genres, more-or-less exaggerated "cowboy" dialects used in "Westerns," and so on. Almost every word one hears spoken by an actor or presenter is carefully studied to appeal to a more-or-less global audience, in one way or t'other.
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Cheers,
Puddin'
A tender heart is an asset to an editor: it helps us be ruthless in a tactful way.
--- The Chicago Manual of Style
Regional accents
Actually, as a recent visitor to the US, I have noticed some regional accents beyond what would be considered normal.
For example, people brought up in California seem to have quite flat, nasal accents. This seems to be a recent thing as I don't recall such accents occurring maybe twenty years ago.
Perhaps influences from the far east?
Penny
California accent
The nasal accent is common to a large part of CA from LA county and inland up through the Big Valley. It's actually a carryover from the Oklahomans, Kansans and Missourians who settled a lot of that part of the state but there is a difference between the Coastal, Inland Empire and Big Valley versions. There's a reason Bakersfield is known as West Tulsa. :)
The Bay Area has another accent, with palatalized dental stops you don't hear anywhere else in the US, "tyoo" for "two" and "dyoo" for "do". San Diego has a rhythm that is different from LA, it all sounds like people are thinking in Spanish; it's also faster than LA. Sacramento has an almost East Coast Big City flatness to the vowels, probably from German and Irish immigrants a hundred and fifty years ago. The northern parts of CA sound more like Oregon, Idaho or Wyoming. All these effects are pretty subtle.
The radio/TV age has had an odd effect, leveling some accents but not others and in fact, there has been a spread in the US of a new vowel shift around the Great Lakes that only started after television. It ain't that simple, apparently.
Hugs,
Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
It's embarrassing to see
It's embarrassing to see actors who are supposedly claiming to be from a hometown then throw out the natural accent in favor of the hammed up, over top bogus accent only authentic to a dying number of people in a small section of one neighborhood.
I made it no secret that I'm from the Boston area. You have probably heard the exaggerated "pahk tha cah" joke at some point. I have met people from out of state who were shocked that I was from so close to the city and didn't speak with the Hollywood exaggerated accent. They wouldn't place me within 100 miles or more of the city yet multiple generations are from there and none of us talk with that accent.
I'm told STFU more times in a day than most people get told in a lifetime
Some of the UK accents would need subtitles
I watched a movie recently, based in Glasgow. Should have had subtitles or been dubbed in "real" English.
As far as the Antipodes: Oz and NZ very different. Within Oz some differences but often more to do with the cultural background than location. Different ethnic background e.g. Greek and Italian will have their own accents like ethnic groups in US. For example the Greek "Effie" accent is one classic.
Try the North East of Scotland
I agree with the Glasgow accent but try the North East coast where the fishermen sail from. There was a documentary on the fishing industry made by I think the BBC and this was subtitled because unless you have lived up there it's a separate language loosely based on English.
And girls I'm the same as Rhona the Ozzie and Kiwi accents sound the same to me sorry - maybe one is a regional dialect of the other?
And I'm not getting into the argument which is the regional one.
Christina
Kiwi and Strine (Australian)
They sound very different Christina with Australians tending toward a slang-full American drawl while the New Zealanders sound like nobody else…
Rhona McCloud
Strine
feels like it has elements of Cockney in it, without the rhyming slang. Also they love to abbreviate words, eg address becomes addie. Not sure where Kiwi came from, but the All Blicks can't half play a mean game of rigby.
Angharad
Depends
on where you come from in the" land of the long white cloud" whether you say rigby or rugby.
Rhyming slang in Oz used to be a regular thing (dog & bone - phone, hit the frog & toad - road, etc) but has fallen out of regular use
Joanna
When the boat comes in
This was the title of a BBC TV series a few decades ago.
It is also the title of a traditional folk song but the alternative lyrics used as the theme tune were sung in the lovely rich Geordie accent.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/When_the_Boat_Comes_In_%28song%29
shows the two sets of lyrics
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=utkMQJeiK50
enjoy.
If you want another wierd accent then proper Norfolk is a good one. Disappearing fast though.
All You Others
Have funny accents. We don't!
Agree Joanne
Agree Joanne
audible.com
Doesn't seem to have many TG books. If any.
How long do you think it will take before one comes out?
I'd love Drew/Gaby to be done, or the New Style of Education or Breaking Cover.