Why does the North American accent differ so much from the British accent?

"Makoto Taniguchi" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
"]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

I was wondering, why does the North American accent (mainstream, not ebonics) differ so much from
the British? when you look at other countries like New Zealand or Australia, you can clearly see a
British element to their accent. So why does the North American accent differ so much from the
other Anglo-occupied countries?

An educated guess would be that other British colonies had a large anglo-saxon population. Canada,
Australia and New Zealand had a lot of anglo imigrants, since they remained part of the British
empire. the USA didn't and as a result it gained imigrants from countries other than Britain. These
others, mostly european, spoke other european languages. Hence they contributed to a less Anglo
sounding accent.

(Just an educated guess).

Quoted message said:

I was wondering, why does the North American accent (mainstream, not ebonics) differ so much from
the British? when you look at other countries like New Zealand or Australia, you can clearly see a
British element to their accent. So why does the North American accent differ so much from the
other Anglo-occupied countries?

Oh I say! It is very likely because those other countries had so many British immigrants and the US
had a great many other nationalities besides.

TWINBLUE

In article <[email hidden]>,

Makoto Taniguchi said:

I was wondering, why does the North American accent (mainstream, not ebonics) differ so much from
the British? when you look at other countries like New Zealand or Australia, you can clearly see a
British element to their accent. So why does the North American accent differ so much from the
other Anglo-occupied countries?

The explanation is obviously that the British consume lots of marmite, and the Australians have a
counterpart, vegemite. As Canadians and Americans aren't into either, their accent has diverged.
Thus the correlation is perfect, indicating that we need look no further for an explanation. The
argument is just as strong as many of those advocated on this newsgroup as explaining evolution of
various traits.

--
Joe Felsenstein [email hidden] Department of Genome Sciences, University of
Washington, Box 357730, Seattle, WA 98195-7730 USA

Makoto Taniguchi said:

I was wondering, why does the North American accent (mainstream, not ebonics) differ so much from
the British? when you look at other countries like New Zealand or Australia, you can clearly see a
British element to their accent. So why does the North American accent differ so much from the
other Anglo-occupied countries?

What's all this? As a Brit, I think you foreigners all sound the same.

My guess is that there is variation in the origins of the British immigrants, and this may have made
a large difference. Certainly, Australian English has a large cockney influence (i.e. from working
class London).

Another point to bear in mind is that accents in Britain are much more varied than in our former
colonies, so what you may think of as sounding British may be very different to what I think sounds
British. The film Trainspotting springs to mind as an example of a very different accent.

Bob

--
Bob O'Hara

Rolf Nevanlinna Institute
P.O. Box 4 (Yliopistonkatu 5) FIN-00014 University of Helsinki Finland Telephone: +358-9-191 23743
Mobile: +358 50 599 0540 Fax: +358-9-191 22 779 WWW: rni.helsinki.fi~bohOpen ↗

"Makoto Taniguchi" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
"]news:[email hidden]...
: I was wondering, why does the North American accent (mainstream, not ebonics) differ so much from
: the British? when you look at other countries like New Zealand or Australia, you can clearly see a
: British element to their accent. So why does the North American accent differ so much from the
: other Anglo-occupied countries?

I didn't know there was a "the North American accent." We have hundreds of different accents here:
splinters, off splinters, off splinters. I was born near Boston, Massachusetts and while living in
Texas I was often asked if I were British. Beauty must be in the ear of the beholder, but most
likely the original settlers must be given blame for the main elements of each accent.

Also, think of "My Fair Lady" has there ever been a single signature British accent?

[moderator's note: I've always thought of Auntie Beeb (that is, the BBC) as the "signature" accent.
How about Grytpype-Thynne? - JAH]

Jois
----------------------------------
"Once you know, you know"
The Unified Field of Know Theory

:

Quoted message said:

In article said:

I was wondering, why does the North American accent (mainstream, not ebonics) differ so much from
the British? when you look at other countries like New Zealand or Australia, you can clearly see
a British element to their accent. So why does the North American accent differ so much from the
other Anglo-occupied countries?

The explanation is obviously that the British consume lots of marmite, and the Australians have a
counterpart, vegemite. As Canadians and Americans aren't into either, their accent has diverged.
Thus the correlation is perfect, indicating that we need look no further for an explanation. The
argument is just as strong as many of those advocated on this newsgroup as explaining evolution of
various traits.

American accents preserve a degree of middle and north country English accents of the 17th and 18th
centuries, as well as having a strong Irish influence.

And this is on-topic only to the extent that it explains why G.C. Williams is in such agreement with
Maynard Smith and the Haldane school of evolutionary theory.

And Vegemite is *waay* better than Marmite, although I will admit Marmite can also be used as axle
grease if necessary.
--
John Wilkins DARK IN HERE, ISN'T IT? wilkins.id.au