Autism and accents

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In another thread I posted this, and I did a pretty good job so I will just quote myself.

I have been listening to Numa Numa on repeat all day (which is in Romanian) and for the last few hours my accent has picked up a lot of Romanian elements like in the way I pronounce my R's. It will probably be gone by tomorrow if I don't continue obsessing over that song, which is not going to happen any time soon.

If I moved to another country then my accent would probably change to match the local one in just a matter of days, although it probably wouldn't be perfect just as my normal American one sounds a bit British. The topic of autism and accents is definitely an interesting one.

Perhaps we should start a thread about it sometime.

I apparently spoke with a stereotypical NYC accent when I was around four or five years old. I'm not sure how long it lasted or when it started. I'm from Oregon and I think I speak in a fairly "normal" pacific northwest accent now, so maybe it just took a little bit longer to pick up on the regional accent than usual.

Although, I was born in Iowa and lived there until I was almost three, so maybe that had something to do with it. Hard to imagine that a New Yorker accent would come out of those two though.

I can't even watch a foreign film without picking up an accent. I have to deliberately try not to speak with an accent afterward. I'll also very quickly pick up on slang and other sayings that people around me use. It can be very annoying, because I don't do it on purpose, and I feel as though I want to retain my own speaking style.

Although it does mean that I am able to accurately pronounce words from other languages, and to imitate accents if I want to.

If I were to move to another English-speaking country, or a different area of the United States, I'd probably sound like the locals within a few months, and be accused of faking it.

I've always had a Midwestern accent. Most of my family is from Western PA, southern tier of NY....and Illinois. That's how we talk.

The past few years I have been around a lot of NYC types and have picked that up. Not intentionally but it just comes out.

I THINK that I sound British immediately after coming home from England.

But it turns out that my New York City accent is alive and well, with nary a variation.

I notice that I will mimic the accents of people around me (without meaning to). It can be a little embarrassing sometimes, especially when the person whose accent I'm copying picks up on it and starts asking about where I'm from. I have to consciously try to talk "normally".

People have asked me several times if I have an accent because I have trouble pronouncing my R's. Also, once I was in a play and another actor was doing a fake British accent, and I think I unconsciously imitated her when it was my turn to speak.

I don't (usually) notice accents, so I wouldn't be aware of my accent unless someone pointed it out. I think I have a normal accent for where I am from.

When I was 8 and 9 the kids on my bus who also went to my elementary school would sing "Shelby is a Cockney" to the tune of 'Ring Around the Rosie'. At the age of 11 as the the last month of school was approaching, I was telling a school mate of mine on the bus ride that two boys in my regular class were mocking my speech because I have a deepish voice. He asked, "Are you German?"

My first two months of Grade 6, we had three visitors from Scotland. A boy, a girl and a teacher. The teacher asked how many of us in my regular class have Scottish in their family trees. When I put up my hand, the teacher said, "You have a bit of a Scottish accent in your speech." As I was starting out Grade 7, two girls in my PE class kept on telling me that I sound like Mr. Jones. I asked the teacher's assistance in my Learning Centre who Mr. Jones was. She said, "He's the other Grade 7 teacher. He's from London. You should feel honoured!" It turned out that he was a Cockney.

I remember when my Job Preparation class in college did video job interviews for practice. It seemed that I had two separate voices. One sounded like a male Cockney accent and the other voice sounded like an androgynous German accent. It drove me crazy to find that my voice was probably swinging back and forth throughout the day.

One member at Stepping Stones told me that I sound American - she has a strong South African accent. Another member told me that I sound like an Irish guy. A guy who grew up in London but no longer has an accent mentioned to my friend and I that I have a Cockney accent.

I like both Cockney and German accents.

When I was a kid, my family and I would visit my aunt and uncle in North Carolina once a year. The kids and adults in their neighborhood all spoke in strong southern-U.S. accents, which was way different than my own. But each year, I'd pick up their southern accents right away, and would speak like a southern kid until vacation was over and we returned back north.

I grew up close to the U.S.-Canada border, and picked up a Canadian accent from watching a lot of Canadian TV shows. In particular, I ended up speaking very much like a Canadian hockey play-by-play guy since I watched and listened to him call so many hockey games while I was growing up. My own family thought I was unusual for doing that, but they didn't try to make me lose that accent or give me a hard time about it.

I can't learn phonetically - I've always had to learn speaking by hearing a word spoken and repeat it back (several times). So, as a result, I've picked up a whole lot of different accents over the years.

As a bonus I'm very good at doing imitations. You should hear me imitate all the characters on the Muppet Show

Some times, if I get really lazy I can sound a bit hoserish. But I try to control my ''raise'' most of the time...

When I took German in school, my voice sometimes switched to something more German at random. Same when I took Japanese. I love the Irish language but for the life of me I can't do an Irish accent!

I sometimes begin to subconsciously pick up the way people I'm around talk. Not just like accents, but even things like speech impediments, I'll end up picking those up too. I worry about offending people, like if they think I'm mocking them, but really, I can't help it.