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Fun Stuff => CHATTER => Topic started by: Pilchard123 on 19 Aug 2018, 03:41

Title: Voices in jokes
Post by: Pilchard123 on 19 Aug 2018, 03:41
In England, or at least in the parts of England I've spoken to people in, jokes will almost always make certain nationalities speak certain ways:

Irish people are slightly higher-pitched than English people, and will usually says things like "to be sure and begorrah", or "that's an <X>, so it is". They usually also swap "th" for "d", such as in "pull de udder wun, et's got bells on et".

French pippl cannot airvair, 'ow you say... pronounce words zat start with "th" or "h". The one exception is sometimes if they are saying "hon hon hon".

Germans vill all tok very sharply. Zey vill svap vords viz w for vords viz v.

Swedish people are all chefs (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Qj8PhxSnhg).

I'm not good at recognising American accents, especially ones in jokes. I think the usual ones in jokes are Texan or generic-deep-south. The person is probably called something like Hank (if Texan) or Cletus (if deep-south).

As I understand it, there is a running joke between some of the Scandinavian countries that (for a pulled-out-of-the-air example) that Danish sounds like drunken Swedish and Finnish is Norwegian spoken with a potato in one's mouth.

But (being English, in England, so very rarely the butt of nationality-based jokes) what do voice(s) people from other countries do when making fun of the English? Or, for that matter, anywhere else?
Title: Re: Voices in jokes
Post by: War Sparrow on 19 Aug 2018, 06:36
In my experience (Canada), English people all get very thick, London or Buckinghamshire accents in jokes, or whatever the accents of Monty Python are. Scots and Irish people get stereotypical accents, and no one makes fun of the Welsh.

I was astonished when I learned that accents across England, and really most other countries, vary wildly. In Canada, there's the generic accent of most of us, some very slight regional inflections in small pockets throughout, and the Maritimes. I think most non-Canadians are most familiar with the Maritimer accent.
Title: Re: Voices in jokes
Post by: LTK on 19 Aug 2018, 07:25
Quote
As I understand it, there is a running joke between some of the Scandinavian countries that (for a pulled-out-of-the-air example) that DanishSwedish sounds like drunken SwedishDanish and FinnishDanish is Norwegian spoken with a potato in one's mouth.

FTFY  :wink:
Title: Re: Voices in jokes
Post by: Pilchard123 on 19 Aug 2018, 14:15
Ah, I knew I'd get them wrong somehow!
Title: Re: Voices in jokes
Post by: jwhouk on 19 Aug 2018, 15:03
Southern accents have a longer drawl, generally. "Hey y'all" is a common greeting. "Oh, bless your heart" is a common derogatory term used by females.

Bahstan accents are pretty much what you're hearing at times in QC - "Let's go dahn to tha Hahvahd Yahd and get some wicked pissah with some clam chowdah."

New Englanders (Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont) sound more like the guy from the Pepperidge Farms commercials.

Midwestern accents are pretty much normal, except for the cheeshead ("Yah dere hey, aina?"), the Yooper ("oh cripes sake dere"), and the Fargo ("oh, you betcha").

Texas is longer and with more of a drawl than most Southern accents.

There's the Spanglish accent you hear in the Southwest (SoCal, Arizona, New Mexico) that sound essentially like something between Spanish and English.

SoCal also has the surfer dude type accents that you hear in Fast Times at Ridgemont High. "AWESOME! TOTALLY AWESOME!"
Title: Re: Voices in jokes
Post by: Akima on 21 Aug 2018, 15:51
Bahstan accents are pretty much what you're hearing at times in QC - "Let's go dahn to tha Hahvahd Yahd and get some wicked pissah with some clam chowdah."
Hey! I resemble that remaahk!
Title: Re: Voices in jokes
Post by: Ignominious on 24 Aug 2018, 14:32
In my experience (Canada), English people all get very thick, London or Buckinghamshire accents in jokes, or whatever the accents of Monty Python are. Scots and Irish people get stereotypical accents, and no one makes fun of the Welsh.

I was astonished when I learned that accents across England, and really most other countries, vary wildly. In Canada, there's the generic accent of most of us, some very slight regional inflections in small pockets throughout, and the Maritimes. I think most non-Canadians are most familiar with the Maritimer accent.

I think the Cockney or Home Counties accent is the default perception for most non-English people. Outside of that small corner of the country I don't think there's any real understanding as to why an accent is different other than it is. To English people this is confusing because the difference is often very stark to us. We can pin most accents down to a tight region if not a specific county. More so we can get even more specific in our own local area. For instance I can tell the four different Yorkshire accents (South, West, North and East) and in South Yorkshire I can generally discern between the four main districts.

If you were to ask what the accents for people like Sean Bean, Ian McShane or Joseph Gilgun are then I suspect few outside the UK would be more specific than "northern".

I remember when we were in Manitoba, my partner and I were amusing ourselves with comedy northern accents with associated TV in jokes while playing pool. Someone asked where we were from and were not convinced that we had been speaking in any kind of English accent.

As for the Welsh, I doubt many could spot it.
Title: Re: Voices in jokes
Post by: Dandi Andi on 11 Sep 2018, 19:15
To the best of my knowledge, Welsh is kind of sing-song with elongated vowels and soft R's. I could probably pick it out of a line up if you said "Here are three accents, one of them is Welsh." but not if I heard it without context.
Title: Re: Voices in jokes
Post by: Ignominious on 12 Sep 2018, 12:21
There's 5-ish different Welsh accents. Two from the Marches and three from the coast. The one non-Brits are most familiar with is the one that stretches from Cardiff to Fishguard. Typified by the likes of Rob Brydon and Anthony Hopkins. Thats the lilting "sing-song" one you refer to.

However, Iwan Rheon is from that area and sounds more like Rhys Ifans who hails from Ruthin.