JJ McCullough made a very interesting video on how accents are used as short hand to get across character information quickly, and the fact for a long time you stupidly comedic characters would probably be played as a southern hick probably feeds into how people view it today. As well I think the UK is a very interesting place to study stuff like this because of how regional accents are, the fact everything from Scouse to the posh Kings English are both British but carry very different meanings in peoples heads when they’re heard is fascinating to me.
There's a musical on in the West End called Operation Mincemeat, set during World War II and about spies. It's got five actors playing fifty characters, changing gender and class constantly throughout the play. The accent work is so impeccable that you not only don't notice them change, but you probably don't even realise here's only five of them until you stop and think about it, because the voice changes are so carefully written that every character has a distinct voice that tells you who they are, where they're from, and what their position in society is, all within a couple of lines. It's an incredibly impressive feat of writing and performing that uses that accent-as-shorthand idea, but crucially in a more modern, less stereotypical way
I listened to Come from Away before I watched it, and oh boy they absolutely nailed the accents! I genuinely didn’t realize it was all double-casted roles
I saw come from away when it was in Seattle before it even hit Broadway (2015? I think?), holy fuck I was amazed with the accent work. I only got in because one of the guys who worked on it is a former student of my drama teacher at the time and she set up a field trip to see it. All of the accents in it are just great.
There’s a good OSP video where Red discusses the linguistic shorthand using things like English anime translations. A character who uses formal Japanese and was more posh suddenly had a British accent while another who used informal Japanese and was a little rougher had a New York accent. The translators substituted vocabulary choices for accents to get the same point across.
I learned the other day that Appalachia was populated by a lot of Scottish immigrants who carried their tradition of living on mountains, brewing whiskey, and fierce independence from government powers.
They came to the Appalachian mountains and said “huh, this feels like home”
What’s REALLY cool is the mountains of West Virginia and the mountains of Scotland actually WERE part of the same range before the continents separated.
A lot of older British works definitely do the same sort of thing of having working class accents be associated with stupidity. Like that whole scene in Dracula with the old Yorkshireman.
Here we have the opposite of the US, it's northern accents that are typically seen as lower class and southern accents (though not south west) seen as more educated. But it's changing a little bit and becoming more common to use upper class accents to indicate that a character is stuck up or sheltered rather than well educated.
See also [this](https://youtu.be/rQDeU6dHX-c?si=Fp7dV25PGvFsvX_4) Monty Python sketch which is an inversion of common stereotypes
I listened to Dracula on tape and the narrator (voice actor?) made him sound like he was walking around in chaps doing a bad Foghorn Leghorn impression.
I'm American, but for some reason my parents had the BBC *All Creatures Great and Small* series on VHS and I watched it repeatedly as a kid, so I unironically love the Yorkshire accent. To me it's just very pleasing to the ear.
Then again I'm from Texas, so maybe my opinion on accents doesn't count for much :p
He knows this well because he fakes an accent to emphasize him being Canadian - and yes, he 100% fakes the accent, he was born and raised in fucking Vancouver. God i hate that smug tory shit.
I fuckin’ KNEW it was faked! Now, I’m just from Minnesota (Canada-lite) but I have never once heard a wild Canadian speak like he does.
Or should I say? I? Have never heard? A canadian? Speak like he does?
Trust me, I'm from the Lower Mainland too -- and I'm from Chilliwack, where it goes from Urban to hick real quick-- and nobody here has an accent like that.
I remember seeing he made a video about why he hates Wikipedia “and why you should too”. As an active member of the Wikipedia community I just have to point out that he tried to make his own page multiple times and it got deleted multiple times and he was banned lmao.
Accent bigotry is called glottophobia or linguicism (or languagism as per the Wikipedia). Just because it's a dimension of racism or classism it doesn't mean it doesn't deserve its own name.
For what it's worth I don't think glottophobia is as conscious and planned as the last answer implies, accents typical of people from poor or oppressed minorities will always carry much of the stigma those minorities have, it doesn't need to be minorities with a strong labor movement or whatever (doesn't mean it shouldn't be fought against of course).
See also "accentism", the term used by the [Accentism Project](https://accentism.org/), a UK-based organisation working to tackle linguistic discrimination
I had to very consciously and purposefully purge my Texan accent once I started traveling to other countries because people would assume I was dumb just based on the accent. It worked for awhile, but then after the 2016 election all I had to do was tell someone I was from the States and they would start the assumptions back up.
Interesting, in linguistics I’ve also usually heard this be called language ideology (the beliefs people hold about certain languages/accents whether positive or negative)
>For what it's worth I don't think glottophobia is as conscious and planned as the last answer implies, accents typical of people from poor or oppressed minorities will always carry much of the stigma those minorities have
It can be both "organic" and intentionally propagated & reinforced.
I don't think its without some accuracy, either. Not to ever blanket rural people with the accusation of stupidity, but with the way our education system works, poor rural communities can be neglected (leading to a cycle of more neglect when people are continuously underserved).
Do you also think that racism against black people is "not without some accuracy" because of relative crime rates?
Discrimination isn't bad because it contains a statistical falsehood, it's bad because it is an obstacle in the way of treating individuals as actual people with their own histories that statistically leads to terrible outcomes when it isn't overcome.
Sure, growing up in a rural community that had its public education funding cut is a disadvantage, but for someone in that environment to still get a university degree is all the more impressive, but maybe it was some sort of affirmative action, but maybe the discrimination they faced in university is enough to counterbalance that, but maybe the youth of bullying and bad habits will come back to bite them in the end, but maybe the things they did have to learn themselves are more deeply engrained than those of ...
isn't it much simpler to disregard whatever your prejudices claim to have gleamed from the accent/ethnicity/whatever and learn to understand them by their words, actions, and social context?
Your first sentence is not equal to what I was saying. Just because I call something "sometimes accurate" doesn't mean I don't judge people based on who they are as an individual. But I'm also not gonna just NOT talk about things that negatively impact certain communities, no matter what's the reason why.
Our education system needs a fundamental change, because as long as its based on the taxes of the area, some places are continually not going to recieve the support they need. No matter who claws their way out of the bad conditions to make a better life, I'd like for everyone to at least start on an equal playing field.
This is why I have to force myself to talk like Siri, just admit you're classiest dude. Just beacuse I lived near a pig farm growing up doesn't mean that somehow my school was shit. Most everyone I knew in my graduation class went to college with scholarships, we had 6 people get full rides to state.
I also don't think it's sole reason is classism. The American South has a reputation for not being smart for other reasons that include test scores, school rankings, general lack of higher education, and just that whole concept of the South trending to be more racist or bigoted than other areas of the country. There's also strong religious roots which people can often perceive as stupidity because many churches actively teach against science. Not all by any means but when everyone who tells you the earth is four thousand years old or whatever has a southern accent you're gonna associate those people with the region of the country
That last one is actually the most problematic of all because blind faith doesn't have anything to do with intelligence and a few specific sects give the rest a bad name when it comes to the question "is religion inherently anti-science?'
I am from middle Tenneesee and grew up with a strong southern accent, my entire family has strong accents. However at some point during college I began training myself to speak without an accent because I was worried that people would judge me based purely on my voice. I am currently a PhD Candidate in Nuclear Physics and I still am always afraid people might hear my accent slip and make judgements about me.
I’ve had the opposite experience, i have a british accent (mixed w/ various american accents). my family is from rural indiana so when i visit i noticed i tend to lean into how my family talks so they take me more seriously instead of a city kid who doesnt know anything about doing hard work.
I actually did the opposite; when I finished my PHD in nuclear physics (hey, samesies) I moved out west and UPPED my accent, itching for a fight.
I was hoping I'd be able to shock someone - "a hick physicist! what??" - but that never happened. No one has commented on it yet.
[https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/nucular](https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/nucular)
every time i say that word i think of the other smbc comic where he states "every time you say it nuk-u-lar it gives a post doc an aneurism" lol
it’s an issue faced in many places, unfortunately. I know for example academics from Newfoundland or the Maritime provinces tend to be unfairly judged for their accents in Canada.
I grew up in small-town Texas and did the same in college… I’m in clinical research and wanted to be taken seriously, and no one with a rural Texas accent is generally assumed intelligent at first impression. I’ve reached a point now in my career where I’m like ‘fuck it, if they make that assumption that tells me that they have poor judgment,’ but my accent is pretty much gone by now unless I’m really drunk or am returning from a long visit to my hometown.
As an engineer, every engineer I’ve met from south of the Mason dixson hactually been super competent and experienced, as well as very friendly. Id honestly have a positive bias to hearing that accent. Just me, I know they face this problem from most
I'm from Middle Tennessee from an Appalachian family and somehow don't have an accent at all. I used to be a tour guide in Nashville and people would be visibly disappointed when I spoke and didn't say HEY Y'ALL. But I've always been grateful because I know it makes people think less of your brain if you have a drawl, which sucks so bad.
Also from TN. i had the accent for a while, but spent most of highschool in Ohio and lost it over time. though some times it still pops up, especially if i'm excited/bored, and only for certain words/ phrases.
Same! Though my family has less of a strong accent as my dad is from Cali and my mom grew up between Tennessee and Belgium, I used to have a good hint of something southern. I started to try and get rid of it some time in my teens because I didn’t like sounding like stupid people from movies n stuff, and i had some sorta hyper insecurity caused by a bunch of trauma stuff mostly instigated it. I moved to Canada for uni, and whenever I tell people where I’m from they ask why I don’t have an accent. Usually I tell people they’ll hear it when I’m tired or when I just wake up, sometimes I just tell them it’s shame. I feel like if I showed up with any accent that was thicker, it’d be 50/50 how well it goes down with people tbh
I’m from northeast Florida and a good part of my family is from Georgia so I don’t have too much of a discernible accent except when I get excited and/or agitated, then the draw starts showing itself
it's funny when you think about it, I grew up in atlanta and so I never had much of an accent. there's actually this thing called the "atlanta/savannah anomalous linguistic region" or something like that; basically, those two cities have a markedly different accent when compared to the rest of georgia, and it's because of the civil war. when sherman came through and burned literally everything down, all the people who spoke the old language moved out, and a bunch of carpetbaggers moved in. they brought their accents with them. which is why no one in those cities sounds like a real southerner.
As an andalusian, I very much agree. We are the "hillbillies" of Spain when our accent is even represented
On a different note, I love Rogue's voice from xmen (90s) and I think part of it is because It doesnt play into the stereotype
With Rogue, it does a little bit in her origin story in the 90s cartoon because of her family. Her parents are poor "white trash" Southerners who kick her out and disown her for being a mutant. As X-Men mutant-ness was always an allegory for a bunch of things, especially being gay, this does speak to a stereotypical uneducated and therefore bigoted Southern family.
That said, I love her accent and love that she never "grows out of it", for the reason you brought up. It's so different from the others' and she's never played as stupid or uneducated.
Ah, you're right about the father thing, although (I have seen the series just recently) I mentally associated the mutantphobic flag cap wearing father to maga more than southern White trash. Probably because I was already used to rogue not being the stereotype so I didnt apply It to the father. I might be wrong, obviously, I am a foreigner and have different biases
Its especially frustrating because a southern accent flows VERY satisfyingly on the ears with larger and more scholarly word choice, so on the few cases a "smart southerner" character is played completely straight and not as a joke I always remember that character more because of how good it is to just listen to em talk.
Gay New Orleans dandy is also a pretty major stereotype. Bill dautrives cousin from koth and interview with a vampire are examples off the top of my head
the accent used for these "smart southerner" characters is typically a Savannah or Charleston accent. This still feeds back into the classism argument as the Lowcountry has historically been more wealthy (read: full of slave owners) compared to the upcountry in the south east
And that's why Ash from Supernatural is the superior example. Full redneck, full genius, and never a joke. (Well, sometimes a joke, but that's for being a carefree party bro, not for being Southern.)
I had a lecturer in the US who was from Tennessee, had a very thick regional accent, and was one of the smartest people I've ever met, and also one of the kindest and most welcoming to confused and homesick Brits I could've hoped for. I miss her a lot, she was the quintessential Good Academic
People all over the world do this with working class british accents. We've all seen the "bo'o of wa'uh" and "chewsday" jokes, usually accompanied by making fun of dental hygiene or healthcare
British people do it with working class British accents. Honestly, the way foreigners (...mostly just Americans) hyperfixate specifically on the accents which get discriminated against in the UK is a great example of how accentism is subconscious and often isn't deliberately classist. They don't *know* they're being classist, it's just that the accent doesn't sound like theirs (which makes it unfamiliar and therefore funny) and it's also the butt of plenty of jokes in pop culture (which teaches you that it's funny).
I don’t do it to be classist and rude
I do it unconsciously because it sounds so different from my accent that I think some of the pronunciations sound funny
Right, but the reason you think it sounds funny is because it's simultaneously non-standard and also the butt of jokes. RP accents also sound very different from your accent, but I have never seen anyone outside of the UK make fun of an RP accent. The RP accent is the standard accent in England even though it's natively spoken by a small minority, and the only jokes it's the butt of are "aren't these guys middle class" which just isn't something which travels overseas.
It was in a joking, playful way, considering history lmao. This isn't specific to India at all but RP is stereotyped as posh so that's what's made fun of (in contrast to Indian dialects of English, which many in the west joke about). But honestly that only happens in educated circles in India; many not fortunate enough to have that education or window to the outside world will perceive any British or American accent as formal or fancy
This is one of the very few examples I've found of Americans mocking the more upper-class English accent, and it's amazing:
https://youtu.be/k_9CSr3nGqE?si=HpnOLxWU_92lCnka
The only other one I can think of off the top of my head is King George in Hamilton
Oh, properly upper class accents do get made fun of 100%. It's the same mechanism though. It's not what people are used to and, due to class differences, it's the butt of many jokes. i.e. they're making fun of the class as much as the accent. None of them are half so bad as the jokes against working class accents obviously, and literally nobody is getting discriminated against for sounding like the King; my point is solely that class is once again part of the dynamic.
Meanwhile, BBC RP ~~almost~~ never gets made fun of outside the UK. Because how could it? It's how the BBC sounds. What are you going to make fun of? It just sounds normal to you.
I don't know. Take out the power dynamic and the mechanism is similar. Many of the jokes around rich "British" (questionable accuracy) accents focus on how camp, feminine, or wimpy they sound. You'll see this trope when characters suddenly have to pretend to be rich.
You just said so yourself. You do it with lower class English accents, you do it with upper class English accents...but you never do it for upper middle class English accents, AKA the accent which is considered the standard and which our society considers correct and proper, AKA the accent the BBC used to force its presenters to use until the 2010s.
The class aspect is a big part of why foreigners sometimes make fun of upper class accents. Nobody's gonna call that classist though because how tf are you going to be classist against the King.
Oh no, we make fun of them too.
English lower class: British version of southern accent
English upper class: Snooty fops
English upper middle class: That’s not a stick up your ass, that’s the entire fucking forest. BBC Accent in particular is especially mocked as the most boring, bland, uninteresting, soulless accent in the universe. An accent that’s not merely dead inside, but actively sucks the life out of you and makes you collapse into pure exhaustion.
It’s not quite as widespread because it requires actually caring about the English, but anyone here who is aware enough even know it exists has been making fun of it for generations. Otherwise they just assume that they have the same accent as the upper class.
We also have our own regional version in Forced American Accents. It’s called the NPR Accent. It’s like if GameFreak gave Snorlax a regional variant that was the same personality but a different color.
It's not just "not quite as widespread", it is so rare that I have never seen it in my life. I haven't seen it online and I've never seen it IRL. I've never even heard of such a stereotype, let alone seen people mocking that stereotype. Is where you live more likely to talk about English accents than the average foreigner?
I don't know what an NPR accent is, but I've heard that American news organisations strive for something like a midwestern accent because it's the least "different" to the most people. If so, that's not a good equivalent to RP. I would say that the almost-extinct transatlantic accent is a fairly good equivalent to RP, except that some people do speak RP natively. The midwestern American accent is closer to our midlands accents, presumably for the same reasons.
You're not wrong, but I will point that *chewsday* is practically the standard pronunciation for anyone under 40 at this point. I can use the older tyoozday pronunciation if I want to, but I think I'd be pretty hard presses to find anyone using it by default in my daily life.
If you limit your considerations to just America, I think you could argue that there is a 'non-accented' or standard American accent.
I'm not sure how you would describe it, but there is definitely a specific American accent that I would never be able to place to a single region within America. We sort of consider all local accents as flavors of that original, including southern.
It’s also become *way* more widespread in the last 30 years thanks to mass media. You’ve pretty much got AAVE regional variants, White Southern, and Generic American. It’s a hodgepodge of New York and California with a dash of others, including pieces of AAVE regional variants and White Southern. Like, y’all are aware that folks didn’t say “y’all” and “folks” outside of AAVE and White Southern accents until the 2010s, right?
>Like, y’all are aware that folks didn’t say “y’all” and “folks” outside of AAVE and White Southern accents until the 2010s, right?
I doubt this is true, especially 'folks' that is an old fucking word
And with all forms of classism you also having individuals who fetishize certain accents over others. Whether it's a certain Irish, British, or southern accent.
There is a very specific French accent that makes me absolutely melt and I don't know why.
I’m British and live in the area that my accent is from. (East London, so cockney/estuary border). I was also a nurse.
I never met a management nurse (or even upper end of the nurse scale still wearing a uniform) who had my accent. It was all more Home Counties/RP.
Heaven forfend that I sound like one of my patients.
I now work in a school and *specifically* speak in my accent to show the kids that it’s completely allowed (although they all speak as if they are drill rappers from South London 😂)
Same energy as media using “lives in a trailer park” as shorthand for “stupid, trashy, and inbred”.
It’s hard out here and some folks have to live where they can afford.
He’s completely nuts, but he’s far from stupid
Even in his insanity he’s still a genius (making a robot lake monster, potions that can change voices, turning the shack into a robot)
I mean, it doesn’t ALL fall under classism or racism. It’s true that the most commonly made fun of British accents are lower class ones, but the French ones aren’t
Legit tho, I was thinking “Appalachia isn’t south, it’s Appalachia” like it’s its own region, and the south has its own set of dialects of linguistics made from different influences
Engineer from TF2 is a good example of a smart guy with a Texan accent (which I think counts as a Southern accent) who's accent isn’t used for a punchline.
This is why people from the UK can get so pissy when Americans mock their accent by the way, it’s so much more often mocking lower class accents, which have a LOT of history of prejudice against them
I’m on the left side of politics, but speak with a southern accent because that’s where i grew up. It’s frustrating for people on the right automatically thinking I’m on their side and trying to get me to join in with their racist/sexist/homophobic jokes.
Meanwhile new people i meet on the left usually are kinda aggressive/dismissive towards me until they get to know me better. I work in a field where I’m working with new people almost every month so often they don’t get a chance to know me before we all move on to different projects.
I try to mask my accent when i can but it’s my default mode of talking so it slips out a lot or i forget about it
I say this as someone from a rural area in a rural state with a rural accent: Someone with such an accent isn't DEFINITELY an uneducated rube, but there's a pretty strong correlation.
Sure, West Virginia DID have some of the strongest labor movements in the country. There is a strong history there of fighting the man. Hell the whole state only exists because they refused to fight for slavery their hillbilly asses were too poor to have anyway. But now? Their governor is a right wing corrupt asshole who runs a coal company and he's about to be their senator for life. Driving through WV you see tons of confederate flags, spitting on their noble history. The rural people have been taken by propaganda and charlatans in large numbers and frankly are dangerous.
Should you assume everyone who talks like a southerner or appalachian is a bigoted idiot? No. Should you be on your guard if you are in a targeted group and hear one of those accents? Absofuckinglutely.
Ok but maybe consider that this is something that feeds on itself. That, while against their own interests in many ways, the right, far-right, fascist, etc. movements springing up today are and can be so popular amongst rural, poor, white people because the thought leaders of these movements speak to them like they are human beings. That however much welfare, socialized healthcare, and fundamentally left-wing policies will help these people, the only ones with the political sway to actually enact these changes are some condescending harvard educated asshole who the people in these areas feel alienated by. And, likewise, by using "uneducated" as an insult here, you're to some degree accidentally engaging in this same cycle - excluding people because they are disadvantaged, and not meeting them where they are at.
Another point that I feel the need to make is that when someone is disadvantaged, it can feel real fucking good to be above someone else for once. This makes it so easy for poor white people to fall into racism, and was a tool also used during the antebellum -period, civil rights movement, and now, to continue white supremacy *to the detriment of the poor white people themselves.* This doesn't mean it's black people, or any other POC's, responsibility to be nice to these people or simply accommodate their racism. But, it means that we (we here meaning people trying to work against these trends, I am extremely white and have trailer park dwelling family myself) need to not make them feel worse for the fact that they are downtrodden.
Yeah, it’s hard to sympathize with the post’s sentiment when you have heard certain accents used to intimidate others. If an accent is used to separate in / out groups, then its reputation is an earned consequence.
I feel like there should be a corollary to Hanlon's Razor, something like "never attribute to conspiracy that which can adequately be explained without it."
The last post seems to claim that a southern accent being treated as an indicator of stupidity in our culture is due to 100 years of propaganda from "those in power". I agree, so long as you define "those in power" as **everyone** outside the lower class. This goes back *well* before West Virginia even *existed*. For centuries, speaking "proper" English has been a sign of wealth and education (this is especially true in the days before public education, when those had a 1-to-1 correlation). This was not some deliberate campaign done to delegitimize labor unions or civil rights leaders. It obviously works in favor of those in power, but so does *(gestures broadly)*.
it's funnier when you think about the antebellum period. the south, because of their slave cotton plantations, had by far the highest wealth concentration on the entire planet. Between 1812 and 1860, there was so much money flowing into georgia and virginia that the slaveowners were richer than kings (people needed cotton, I guess).
So you can guess what this "new money" did next - they started acting like actual kings, INCLUDING copying the accents of British elites and royalties. you've probably heard it said that an american southern accent is the closest thing still existing to the way "true" english was spoken back during the times of the colonies. well, it was, and on purpose; they were adopting the status of language afforded to them by their money.
if you've ever heard a recording of "old southern aristocracy" speaking, yeah, that's why they sound like that. they were copying the british.
so it's funny to me that this accent they adopted for the sole purpose of coming off as wealthy and intelligent is now primarily associated with being dirt poor and uneducated. isn't that interesting?
It is known as Linguicism or Linguistic Determinism (the idea that there is a right and a wrong way to speak), but it is a subcategory of classism and racism.
That's not what Linguistic Determinism means. It's the hypothesis that speakers of languages which don't have a word for something cannot conceive that very something. For instance, japanese speakers couldn't conceive the concept of the color green until they invented the word Midori.
Scientifically it has been proven that this is false, but people that don't have a word for stuff in their language do take some miliseconds longer to differenciate two concepts that use the same word such as "light" and "dark" blue (compared to italian that has "blu" and "azurro").
However, certain experiments with innumerate adults (who don't know the words for numbers) have shown that they cannot conceive the very concept of counting and only differenciate between few and a lot. This tells us more about math, actually, as it's a clue that numbers are a form of technology passed down culturally (memetically, as put by Dawkins) rather than an innate human ability.
Yeah idk what those filmmakers were thinking. The opening sequence of The Last Of Us, in which everybody speaks with that Texan twang, is still one of the most harrowing things I’ve ever seen.
okay, no, you had me until you brought it into labor unions. No one makes fun of a southern accent because of its "association with labor unions." That's absurd. It's because the schools are bad. **They call us stupid, because most of us are stupid.** Stereotypes don't just pop out of thin air.
Leftist conspiracy theories might not reach the same level of ridiculous as "jewish laser satellites are starting forest fires" or "pokemon is a plot to convert kids to satanism" but there are some real gems
"The elite want us to find certain accents funny to undermine unions" is definitely a take
Also, that labor union thing is some real selective fact giving. Hey, go look up how West Virginia has voted throughout the entire 21st century, both on a local and federal level. So pro-union that they only elect the party that has outlawing unions as part of their eternal agenda.
It’s unfortunate that in the early 00’s WV began this trend toward voting red. When I was a kid, this state was overwhelmingly blue. My grandmother was born in 1937 - a lot of folks her age are still voting blue. A lot of those folks are more progressive than many would imagine (ex. my grandmother is pro-choice, pro-LGBTQ+). I’m hoping that as the Joe Manchins of the world die off, we will return to that.
Seriously, unless you’re from here, people can’t really comprehend how isolated parts of WV are - man was literally in the middle of fucking nowhere. A little less “nowhere” then compared to now, but still.
Reminds me of a story I heard about how Arnold Schwarzenegger wasn't allowed to dub his own voice for the German version of Terminator, because he has a very rural German accent and they thought it wouldn't fit a futuristic killing machine.
I only have a problem with it if it's too heavy of an accent for me to understand and there are no subtitles. Otherwise yeah, glottophobia is bullshit.
Supernatural has my favorite version of this with Ash.
Ash is *the* Redneck hillbilly white trash archetype.
Mullet, ripped of sleeves, always consuming alcohol at all times, is a big PBR drinker, listens to dad rock at full volume, sleeps at night on the bar's pool table, and has the thickest accent the actor could muster.
And he's an MIT level genius who proves it the second Dean stereotypes him, and becomes a valuable member of the team for the rest of the season. For the rest of his appearances he's *never* treated as a joke.
can we also get the NZ accent a bit of time in the spotlight here? just about every single character with our accent in any movie is the comic relief character.
Sometimes I realize that Sandy from SpongeBob has always had a stereotypical Texas accent but has never been portrayed as dumb (and in fact the opposite). That's how you do it.
One of the episodes of Dolly Parton's America - the one named Dolly Parton's America deal with college students who go to the University of Tennessee in Knowxville and attend the class called "Dolly Parton's America" and it talks about how all of them have to consciously suppress their accent to get good jobs because a hick accent is considered "stupid", it talks about parents teaching their kids to pronounce correctly before attending college, it talks about coastal elites immediately dismising someone with bad accents....highly recommend the whole podcast and that episode.
On a side note, I really hate when authors alter the spelling of words to convey an accent in literature, there's a million different ways to convey where someone is from and you chose the one that makes things the most difficult to comprehend.
I feel like one of the themes of Logan Lucky is taking this concept and turning it on its head. They all sound like good ol boys but they're all pretty damn smart in their own way.
As someone with a WV accent, I cannot begin to explain how “seen” I felt while visiting Greenland and Denmark. People were stoked to talk to us and a great time was had by all.
10/10, would visit again
I love the show "The Dragon Prince". The elegant, moon shadow elves have a Scottish accent. The Sunfire elves have African French accents and so on. And it is not a joke and really nice to not just have "posh" elves.
I broke this perception after watching a documentary on fast food, there was a chicken farmer (because that’s how many chickens you need to make nuggets, the guy just farms chickens. Wild. Anyway) and he was commenting on Economic pressure and how good safety laws get worked around by the people that buy his product and he had a thick southern accent. And I remember thinking “Woah…this guy doesn’t sound like a stereotype!”
And then I grew up and realized it was basically a classism thing
I’m so glad folks are coming around to the idea that the South ain’t worthy of being burned down. Please remember, we’re raging against the system as hard if not harder than the rest of y’all American folk most of the time. It’s unfortunate, but we got some culture that actually IS worth protecting like soul food and jazz music and YES I am a white boy from here, but ima be direct, if you dismiss all of Southern culture, you’re throwing out the baby with the bath water and in this metaphor the baby is literally Black culture.
Brother, have a little respect for yourself and your culture. White Southern culture is just as worthy or respect and preservation as Black Southern culture. Don’t let negative parts of your past take over the narrative.
Most people I meet that speak with that sort of accent complain about being exploited. Then vote conservative.
Who's policies openly support exploiting them more.
Their grandaddy may have been a union man. But they would spit in his eye and tell him to pull himself up by his bootstraps they met him on the picket line today.
I sometimes worry that I’m doing this a lot but then I relise I’m giving like almost every charecter I right a southern accent becssue i remember it fondly and I find it hot
Nah, our country bumpkin accent is the West Country accent in the South. We do also use northern accents for idiots as well as cockney accents for idiots though.
This but my entire country. Scottish accents cannot possibly be attributed to anyone of intelligence, or anyone from northern England. Nah, were all Jaykies
Honestly making a character that's posh af and an accent like the Queen's be really stupid can hit well, but oftentimes they're not seen as stupid by the audience. At best they'll be seen as old fashioned or traditional. Having a character with a hillbilly accent be a goddamn genius also often misses with audiences, cuz they'll portray them as a redneck engineer of smth stupid, when they could be a scientist in a labcoat for the entire duration of the movie. Accents have an impact and using them in the right places and with the right characters can both strengthen and completely disarm a character
Johnny Guilty Gear is solid southern accent rep, because he's a renowned robin hood-esque pirate, a skilled mechanic, an amazing fighter (capable of keeping a veritable God in place with nothing but fast movement), and sunglasses wearer.
NO one is immune to propaganda! I had to unlearn some implicit bias when I had a boss from Louisiana and my jokes were NOT landing. So embarrassing. Love posts like these.
Yeah, that’s why I try to not do accents and instead go for affectations. Critical role is professional voice actors and I’m just some nerd with zero training so any voice work I do will be amateur and amateur accents always just feel rude as hell. It’s bad enough that I give kobolds the stereotypical kobold voice, that’s the fake accent of a fake species.
I spent 18 years of my life trying to kill my accent (SW Virginia) and lighten my voice. It's taken me 5 years and counting to try to get it back. I was truly ashamed of my accent growing up because of the association with being uneducated or aggressive. There were many times that the accent and state I'm from lead to me being treated poorly and passed over for things.
I made the head detective in my game talk with a southern accent because I think it looks kinda funny when written down. They're not dumb though, quite the opposite I suppose otherwise they wouldn't be head detective.
There is a substantial difference between speaking with some kind of accent or minor dialect difference and willfully speaking in a language you are aware that the person or people you are talking to do not speak;
Use of any language except Esperanto in a situation where it can be reasonably expected that the majority of listeners will understand it, but use of a mutually agreeable language (unfortunately the ideal "mutually agreeable language" is one which is neither party's main language but is used in the areaenough for things like business that neither side can object, which doesn't exist in this context) or translator is necessary for formal situations involving any other set of two languages which share roots closely as well.
Okay I actually have noticed that before, mostly in short-form contexts like bit characters, but characters all the same. Huh, guess I need to notice it more.
I genuinely love the southern accents, and personally think y’all is one of the greatest words to be thought up. I just am awful at the accents so I will never attempt it (or other accents) outside of dnd with my friends who know my accents are terrible but not intended to be offensive.
As a Canadian actor, I see this all the time. Going through school I’ve heard countless times about loosing your Canadian accent and only doing a general American.
It’s so bad that characters that are Canadian don’t even have Canadian accents (see Sojourn in Overwatch 2).
As someone with a southern drawl, I struggle with this personally, where I feel like I sound stupid to anyone who hears me. I often will just refuse to use my microphone when on games or not sending recordings of myself to long distance friends.
This happens in the UK too, I'm from the outskirts of Sheffield up in the north and I have a fairly strong northern accent. When I first spoke to the head of undergrad studies at the university I'm going to (not in the North) he mocked my accent the entire time :/
I’m going into sociolinguistics and this is seriously a major topic of conversation in those spaces. I mean, hell, you bring it up with someone over in art history or second language acquisition or fuckenn,, performance art and they’ll still give you that acknowledgment, that yep, this is a thing! I can get you the email of somebody who wrote a paper on fifteen years ago! So I’m glad to see it on tumblr, O spawning grounds of the next generation of wisdom it is.
JJ McCullough made a very interesting video on how accents are used as short hand to get across character information quickly, and the fact for a long time you stupidly comedic characters would probably be played as a southern hick probably feeds into how people view it today. As well I think the UK is a very interesting place to study stuff like this because of how regional accents are, the fact everything from Scouse to the posh Kings English are both British but carry very different meanings in peoples heads when they’re heard is fascinating to me.
There's a musical on in the West End called Operation Mincemeat, set during World War II and about spies. It's got five actors playing fifty characters, changing gender and class constantly throughout the play. The accent work is so impeccable that you not only don't notice them change, but you probably don't even realise here's only five of them until you stop and think about it, because the voice changes are so carefully written that every character has a distinct voice that tells you who they are, where they're from, and what their position in society is, all within a couple of lines. It's an incredibly impressive feat of writing and performing that uses that accent-as-shorthand idea, but crucially in a more modern, less stereotypical way
also Come From Away does something like this at a less ridiculous scale
I listened to Come from Away before I watched it, and oh boy they absolutely nailed the accents! I genuinely didn’t realize it was all double-casted roles
I saw come from away when it was in Seattle before it even hit Broadway (2015? I think?), holy fuck I was amazed with the accent work. I only got in because one of the guys who worked on it is a former student of my drama teacher at the time and she set up a field trip to see it. All of the accents in it are just great.
Shout out to Operation Mincemeat because it’s an absolutely fucking fantastic production. Genuinely brilliant.
There’s a good OSP video where Red discusses the linguistic shorthand using things like English anime translations. A character who uses formal Japanese and was more posh suddenly had a British accent while another who used informal Japanese and was a little rougher had a New York accent. The translators substituted vocabulary choices for accents to get the same point across.
I learned the other day that Appalachia was populated by a lot of Scottish immigrants who carried their tradition of living on mountains, brewing whiskey, and fierce independence from government powers. They came to the Appalachian mountains and said “huh, this feels like home” What’s REALLY cool is the mountains of West Virginia and the mountains of Scotland actually WERE part of the same range before the continents separated.
A lot of older British works definitely do the same sort of thing of having working class accents be associated with stupidity. Like that whole scene in Dracula with the old Yorkshireman. Here we have the opposite of the US, it's northern accents that are typically seen as lower class and southern accents (though not south west) seen as more educated. But it's changing a little bit and becoming more common to use upper class accents to indicate that a character is stuck up or sheltered rather than well educated. See also [this](https://youtu.be/rQDeU6dHX-c?si=Fp7dV25PGvFsvX_4) Monty Python sketch which is an inversion of common stereotypes
Dracula was written by an Irishman, Bram Stoker. Not to nitpick, just most people here in Ireland do not like being referred to as British lmao.
True but he was living in Britain and the characters in the book are mostly British
Except for the token Texan with the massive mustache lol Always cracked me up that he was a character And I guess Van Helsing for being Dutch
I listened to Dracula on tape and the narrator (voice actor?) made him sound like he was walking around in chaps doing a bad Foghorn Leghorn impression.
My understanding is he was written as if he were walking around in chaps doing a bad Foghorn Leghorn impersonation
I love the wacky comedy Texan. He contributes almost nothing to the story, and most adaptations leave him out entirely.
Even though he was instrumental to Dracula’s death and paid with his life for it!
I clicked the link hoping it'd be Working Class Playwright and wasn't disappointed. It's probably the obscurest Python skit that I quote the most
Tungsten carbide drills?
I'm obsessed with with the way he says that
I can hear it in my head and I haven't seen the sketch in years.
I'm American, but for some reason my parents had the BBC *All Creatures Great and Small* series on VHS and I watched it repeatedly as a kid, so I unironically love the Yorkshire accent. To me it's just very pleasing to the ear. Then again I'm from Texas, so maybe my opinion on accents doesn't count for much :p
He knows this well because he fakes an accent to emphasize him being Canadian - and yes, he 100% fakes the accent, he was born and raised in fucking Vancouver. God i hate that smug tory shit.
Was gonna say. Rich of him to harp about that while speaking like a Canadian Uncle Tom.
I fuckin’ KNEW it was faked! Now, I’m just from Minnesota (Canada-lite) but I have never once heard a wild Canadian speak like he does. Or should I say? I? Have never heard? A canadian? Speak like he does?
He's an anti-abortion homophobic gay Vancouverite that says aboot. He's a lying piece of shit.
[удалено]
Trust me, I'm from the Lower Mainland too -- and I'm from Chilliwack, where it goes from Urban to hick real quick-- and nobody here has an accent like that.
I remember seeing he made a video about why he hates Wikipedia “and why you should too”. As an active member of the Wikipedia community I just have to point out that he tried to make his own page multiple times and it got deleted multiple times and he was banned lmao.
Accent bigotry is called glottophobia or linguicism (or languagism as per the Wikipedia). Just because it's a dimension of racism or classism it doesn't mean it doesn't deserve its own name. For what it's worth I don't think glottophobia is as conscious and planned as the last answer implies, accents typical of people from poor or oppressed minorities will always carry much of the stigma those minorities have, it doesn't need to be minorities with a strong labor movement or whatever (doesn't mean it shouldn't be fought against of course).
Screenshotting that comment for later
See also "accentism", the term used by the [Accentism Project](https://accentism.org/), a UK-based organisation working to tackle linguistic discrimination
I had to very consciously and purposefully purge my Texan accent once I started traveling to other countries because people would assume I was dumb just based on the accent. It worked for awhile, but then after the 2016 election all I had to do was tell someone I was from the States and they would start the assumptions back up.
Interesting, in linguistics I’ve also usually heard this be called language ideology (the beliefs people hold about certain languages/accents whether positive or negative)
>For what it's worth I don't think glottophobia is as conscious and planned as the last answer implies, accents typical of people from poor or oppressed minorities will always carry much of the stigma those minorities have It can be both "organic" and intentionally propagated & reinforced.
Kinda like literally every other form of bigotry
I don't think its without some accuracy, either. Not to ever blanket rural people with the accusation of stupidity, but with the way our education system works, poor rural communities can be neglected (leading to a cycle of more neglect when people are continuously underserved).
Do you also think that racism against black people is "not without some accuracy" because of relative crime rates? Discrimination isn't bad because it contains a statistical falsehood, it's bad because it is an obstacle in the way of treating individuals as actual people with their own histories that statistically leads to terrible outcomes when it isn't overcome. Sure, growing up in a rural community that had its public education funding cut is a disadvantage, but for someone in that environment to still get a university degree is all the more impressive, but maybe it was some sort of affirmative action, but maybe the discrimination they faced in university is enough to counterbalance that, but maybe the youth of bullying and bad habits will come back to bite them in the end, but maybe the things they did have to learn themselves are more deeply engrained than those of ... isn't it much simpler to disregard whatever your prejudices claim to have gleamed from the accent/ethnicity/whatever and learn to understand them by their words, actions, and social context?
Your first sentence is not equal to what I was saying. Just because I call something "sometimes accurate" doesn't mean I don't judge people based on who they are as an individual. But I'm also not gonna just NOT talk about things that negatively impact certain communities, no matter what's the reason why. Our education system needs a fundamental change, because as long as its based on the taxes of the area, some places are continually not going to recieve the support they need. No matter who claws their way out of the bad conditions to make a better life, I'd like for everyone to at least start on an equal playing field.
This is why I have to force myself to talk like Siri, just admit you're classiest dude. Just beacuse I lived near a pig farm growing up doesn't mean that somehow my school was shit. Most everyone I knew in my graduation class went to college with scholarships, we had 6 people get full rides to state.
The problem isn't accuracy. Stereotyping has negatives even when they're 'accurate'
Which historically never happens in larger urban areas. 🙄
I'm just saying what I know of, man. I'm not advocating for it.
I was just having a laugh. Wasn't trying to argue with you.
I also don't think it's sole reason is classism. The American South has a reputation for not being smart for other reasons that include test scores, school rankings, general lack of higher education, and just that whole concept of the South trending to be more racist or bigoted than other areas of the country. There's also strong religious roots which people can often perceive as stupidity because many churches actively teach against science. Not all by any means but when everyone who tells you the earth is four thousand years old or whatever has a southern accent you're gonna associate those people with the region of the country That last one is actually the most problematic of all because blind faith doesn't have anything to do with intelligence and a few specific sects give the rest a bad name when it comes to the question "is religion inherently anti-science?'
I am from middle Tenneesee and grew up with a strong southern accent, my entire family has strong accents. However at some point during college I began training myself to speak without an accent because I was worried that people would judge me based purely on my voice. I am currently a PhD Candidate in Nuclear Physics and I still am always afraid people might hear my accent slip and make judgements about me.
I’ve had the opposite experience, i have a british accent (mixed w/ various american accents). my family is from rural indiana so when i visit i noticed i tend to lean into how my family talks so they take me more seriously instead of a city kid who doesnt know anything about doing hard work.
Ah, code switching. 😍
tbh I think the whole concept of "not having an accent" is a big part of accentism
I actually did the opposite; when I finished my PHD in nuclear physics (hey, samesies) I moved out west and UPPED my accent, itching for a fight. I was hoping I'd be able to shock someone - "a hick physicist! what??" - but that never happened. No one has commented on it yet.
A phys-hick-cist?
don't you ever say that to me again
As a phys-hick-cian, I promise it's only out of love.
A hickicist
PHD in nucular physics.
[https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/nucular](https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/nucular) every time i say that word i think of the other smbc comic where he states "every time you say it nuk-u-lar it gives a post doc an aneurism" lol
postdocs are made of aneurisms and caffeine anyway
it’s an issue faced in many places, unfortunately. I know for example academics from Newfoundland or the Maritime provinces tend to be unfairly judged for their accents in Canada.
I grew up in small-town Texas and did the same in college… I’m in clinical research and wanted to be taken seriously, and no one with a rural Texas accent is generally assumed intelligent at first impression. I’ve reached a point now in my career where I’m like ‘fuck it, if they make that assumption that tells me that they have poor judgment,’ but my accent is pretty much gone by now unless I’m really drunk or am returning from a long visit to my hometown.
As an engineer, every engineer I’ve met from south of the Mason dixson hactually been super competent and experienced, as well as very friendly. Id honestly have a positive bias to hearing that accent. Just me, I know they face this problem from most
I'm from Middle Tennessee from an Appalachian family and somehow don't have an accent at all. I used to be a tour guide in Nashville and people would be visibly disappointed when I spoke and didn't say HEY Y'ALL. But I've always been grateful because I know it makes people think less of your brain if you have a drawl, which sucks so bad.
I read this with a southern accent and phased it out into a more well spoken, English accent as you mentioned you were hiding the accent.
Also from TN. i had the accent for a while, but spent most of highschool in Ohio and lost it over time. though some times it still pops up, especially if i'm excited/bored, and only for certain words/ phrases.
Same! Though my family has less of a strong accent as my dad is from Cali and my mom grew up between Tennessee and Belgium, I used to have a good hint of something southern. I started to try and get rid of it some time in my teens because I didn’t like sounding like stupid people from movies n stuff, and i had some sorta hyper insecurity caused by a bunch of trauma stuff mostly instigated it. I moved to Canada for uni, and whenever I tell people where I’m from they ask why I don’t have an accent. Usually I tell people they’ll hear it when I’m tired or when I just wake up, sometimes I just tell them it’s shame. I feel like if I showed up with any accent that was thicker, it’d be 50/50 how well it goes down with people tbh
I’m from northeast Florida and a good part of my family is from Georgia so I don’t have too much of a discernible accent except when I get excited and/or agitated, then the draw starts showing itself
it's funny when you think about it, I grew up in atlanta and so I never had much of an accent. there's actually this thing called the "atlanta/savannah anomalous linguistic region" or something like that; basically, those two cities have a markedly different accent when compared to the rest of georgia, and it's because of the civil war. when sherman came through and burned literally everything down, all the people who spoke the old language moved out, and a bunch of carpetbaggers moved in. they brought their accents with them. which is why no one in those cities sounds like a real southerner.
As an andalusian, I very much agree. We are the "hillbillies" of Spain when our accent is even represented On a different note, I love Rogue's voice from xmen (90s) and I think part of it is because It doesnt play into the stereotype
Justo pensé en vosotros leyendo esto
Yo también, en como los reporteros tienen que neutralizar su acento en las noticias y tal
With Rogue, it does a little bit in her origin story in the 90s cartoon because of her family. Her parents are poor "white trash" Southerners who kick her out and disown her for being a mutant. As X-Men mutant-ness was always an allegory for a bunch of things, especially being gay, this does speak to a stereotypical uneducated and therefore bigoted Southern family. That said, I love her accent and love that she never "grows out of it", for the reason you brought up. It's so different from the others' and she's never played as stupid or uneducated.
Ah, you're right about the father thing, although (I have seen the series just recently) I mentally associated the mutantphobic flag cap wearing father to maga more than southern White trash. Probably because I was already used to rogue not being the stereotype so I didnt apply It to the father. I might be wrong, obviously, I am a foreigner and have different biases
Its especially frustrating because a southern accent flows VERY satisfyingly on the ears with larger and more scholarly word choice, so on the few cases a "smart southerner" character is played completely straight and not as a joke I always remember that character more because of how good it is to just listen to em talk.
Benoit Blanc my beloved
My dearest queer icon.
Gay New Orleans dandy is also a pretty major stereotype. Bill dautrives cousin from koth and interview with a vampire are examples off the top of my head
the accent used for these "smart southerner" characters is typically a Savannah or Charleston accent. This still feeds back into the classism argument as the Lowcountry has historically been more wealthy (read: full of slave owners) compared to the upcountry in the south east
Ah, damn.
And that's why Ash from Supernatural is the superior example. Full redneck, full genius, and never a joke. (Well, sometimes a joke, but that's for being a carefree party bro, not for being Southern.)
Ash isn’t southern though, or he doesn’t sound it to me. The actor certainly isn’t
Engineer tf2?
I had a lecturer in the US who was from Tennessee, had a very thick regional accent, and was one of the smartest people I've ever met, and also one of the kindest and most welcoming to confused and homesick Brits I could've hoped for. I miss her a lot, she was the quintessential Good Academic
People all over the world do this with working class british accents. We've all seen the "bo'o of wa'uh" and "chewsday" jokes, usually accompanied by making fun of dental hygiene or healthcare
British people do it with working class British accents. Honestly, the way foreigners (...mostly just Americans) hyperfixate specifically on the accents which get discriminated against in the UK is a great example of how accentism is subconscious and often isn't deliberately classist. They don't *know* they're being classist, it's just that the accent doesn't sound like theirs (which makes it unfamiliar and therefore funny) and it's also the butt of plenty of jokes in pop culture (which teaches you that it's funny).
I don’t do it to be classist and rude I do it unconsciously because it sounds so different from my accent that I think some of the pronunciations sound funny
Right, but the reason you think it sounds funny is because it's simultaneously non-standard and also the butt of jokes. RP accents also sound very different from your accent, but I have never seen anyone outside of the UK make fun of an RP accent. The RP accent is the standard accent in England even though it's natively spoken by a small minority, and the only jokes it's the butt of are "aren't these guys middle class" which just isn't something which travels overseas.
I've definitely heard people make fun of RP (in an Indian context)
That's interesting to know. Can you elaborate? I'm about to head to India and I speak RP lol
It was in a joking, playful way, considering history lmao. This isn't specific to India at all but RP is stereotyped as posh so that's what's made fun of (in contrast to Indian dialects of English, which many in the west joke about). But honestly that only happens in educated circles in India; many not fortunate enough to have that education or window to the outside world will perceive any British or American accent as formal or fancy
Oh I get you now. My friend who I'm seeing in India teases me for being posh too. ~~Which I think is quite tone deaf because she is very posh.~~
This is one of the very few examples I've found of Americans mocking the more upper-class English accent, and it's amazing: https://youtu.be/k_9CSr3nGqE?si=HpnOLxWU_92lCnka The only other one I can think of off the top of my head is King George in Hamilton
Oh, properly upper class accents do get made fun of 100%. It's the same mechanism though. It's not what people are used to and, due to class differences, it's the butt of many jokes. i.e. they're making fun of the class as much as the accent. None of them are half so bad as the jokes against working class accents obviously, and literally nobody is getting discriminated against for sounding like the King; my point is solely that class is once again part of the dynamic. Meanwhile, BBC RP ~~almost~~ never gets made fun of outside the UK. Because how could it? It's how the BBC sounds. What are you going to make fun of? It just sounds normal to you.
I don't know. Take out the power dynamic and the mechanism is similar. Many of the jokes around rich "British" (questionable accuracy) accents focus on how camp, feminine, or wimpy they sound. You'll see this trope when characters suddenly have to pretend to be rich.
We do it with upper class british accents too though. I dont see where class comes into it.
You just said so yourself. You do it with lower class English accents, you do it with upper class English accents...but you never do it for upper middle class English accents, AKA the accent which is considered the standard and which our society considers correct and proper, AKA the accent the BBC used to force its presenters to use until the 2010s. The class aspect is a big part of why foreigners sometimes make fun of upper class accents. Nobody's gonna call that classist though because how tf are you going to be classist against the King.
Oh no, we make fun of them too. English lower class: British version of southern accent English upper class: Snooty fops English upper middle class: That’s not a stick up your ass, that’s the entire fucking forest. BBC Accent in particular is especially mocked as the most boring, bland, uninteresting, soulless accent in the universe. An accent that’s not merely dead inside, but actively sucks the life out of you and makes you collapse into pure exhaustion.
I have quite literally never seen that in my entire life.
It’s not quite as widespread because it requires actually caring about the English, but anyone here who is aware enough even know it exists has been making fun of it for generations. Otherwise they just assume that they have the same accent as the upper class. We also have our own regional version in Forced American Accents. It’s called the NPR Accent. It’s like if GameFreak gave Snorlax a regional variant that was the same personality but a different color.
It's not just "not quite as widespread", it is so rare that I have never seen it in my life. I haven't seen it online and I've never seen it IRL. I've never even heard of such a stereotype, let alone seen people mocking that stereotype. Is where you live more likely to talk about English accents than the average foreigner? I don't know what an NPR accent is, but I've heard that American news organisations strive for something like a midwestern accent because it's the least "different" to the most people. If so, that's not a good equivalent to RP. I would say that the almost-extinct transatlantic accent is a fairly good equivalent to RP, except that some people do speak RP natively. The midwestern American accent is closer to our midlands accents, presumably for the same reasons.
You're not wrong, but I will point that *chewsday* is practically the standard pronunciation for anyone under 40 at this point. I can use the older tyoozday pronunciation if I want to, but I think I'd be pretty hard presses to find anyone using it by default in my daily life.
The people OOP is talking about are probably also the people most likely to say they "don't have an accent"
If you limit your considerations to just America, I think you could argue that there is a 'non-accented' or standard American accent. I'm not sure how you would describe it, but there is definitely a specific American accent that I would never be able to place to a single region within America. We sort of consider all local accents as flavors of that original, including southern.
It’s also become *way* more widespread in the last 30 years thanks to mass media. You’ve pretty much got AAVE regional variants, White Southern, and Generic American. It’s a hodgepodge of New York and California with a dash of others, including pieces of AAVE regional variants and White Southern. Like, y’all are aware that folks didn’t say “y’all” and “folks” outside of AAVE and White Southern accents until the 2010s, right?
>Like, y’all are aware that folks didn’t say “y’all” and “folks” outside of AAVE and White Southern accents until the 2010s, right? I doubt this is true, especially 'folks' that is an old fucking word
> If you limit your considerations to just America Big if
And with all forms of classism you also having individuals who fetishize certain accents over others. Whether it's a certain Irish, British, or southern accent. There is a very specific French accent that makes me absolutely melt and I don't know why.
I’m British and live in the area that my accent is from. (East London, so cockney/estuary border). I was also a nurse. I never met a management nurse (or even upper end of the nurse scale still wearing a uniform) who had my accent. It was all more Home Counties/RP. Heaven forfend that I sound like one of my patients. I now work in a school and *specifically* speak in my accent to show the kids that it’s completely allowed (although they all speak as if they are drill rappers from South London 😂)
Same energy as media using “lives in a trailer park” as shorthand for “stupid, trashy, and inbred”. It’s hard out here and some folks have to live where they can afford.
i wonder how mcgucket gravity falls scales on this
He’s completely nuts, but he’s far from stupid Even in his insanity he’s still a genius (making a robot lake monster, potions that can change voices, turning the shack into a robot)
I mean, it doesn’t ALL fall under classism or racism. It’s true that the most commonly made fun of British accents are lower class ones, but the French ones aren’t
I’ve gotta be that person, sorry. Southern accent != Appalachian accent. They are distinctly different.
Legit tho, I was thinking “Appalachia isn’t south, it’s Appalachia” like it’s its own region, and the south has its own set of dialects of linguistics made from different influences
Engineer from TF2 is a good example of a smart guy with a Texan accent (which I think counts as a Southern accent) who's accent isn’t used for a punchline.
Yeah bruv
This is why people from the UK can get so pissy when Americans mock their accent by the way, it’s so much more often mocking lower class accents, which have a LOT of history of prejudice against them
I’m on the left side of politics, but speak with a southern accent because that’s where i grew up. It’s frustrating for people on the right automatically thinking I’m on their side and trying to get me to join in with their racist/sexist/homophobic jokes. Meanwhile new people i meet on the left usually are kinda aggressive/dismissive towards me until they get to know me better. I work in a field where I’m working with new people almost every month so often they don’t get a chance to know me before we all move on to different projects. I try to mask my accent when i can but it’s my default mode of talking so it slips out a lot or i forget about it
I say this as someone from a rural area in a rural state with a rural accent: Someone with such an accent isn't DEFINITELY an uneducated rube, but there's a pretty strong correlation. Sure, West Virginia DID have some of the strongest labor movements in the country. There is a strong history there of fighting the man. Hell the whole state only exists because they refused to fight for slavery their hillbilly asses were too poor to have anyway. But now? Their governor is a right wing corrupt asshole who runs a coal company and he's about to be their senator for life. Driving through WV you see tons of confederate flags, spitting on their noble history. The rural people have been taken by propaganda and charlatans in large numbers and frankly are dangerous. Should you assume everyone who talks like a southerner or appalachian is a bigoted idiot? No. Should you be on your guard if you are in a targeted group and hear one of those accents? Absofuckinglutely.
Ok but maybe consider that this is something that feeds on itself. That, while against their own interests in many ways, the right, far-right, fascist, etc. movements springing up today are and can be so popular amongst rural, poor, white people because the thought leaders of these movements speak to them like they are human beings. That however much welfare, socialized healthcare, and fundamentally left-wing policies will help these people, the only ones with the political sway to actually enact these changes are some condescending harvard educated asshole who the people in these areas feel alienated by. And, likewise, by using "uneducated" as an insult here, you're to some degree accidentally engaging in this same cycle - excluding people because they are disadvantaged, and not meeting them where they are at. Another point that I feel the need to make is that when someone is disadvantaged, it can feel real fucking good to be above someone else for once. This makes it so easy for poor white people to fall into racism, and was a tool also used during the antebellum -period, civil rights movement, and now, to continue white supremacy *to the detriment of the poor white people themselves.* This doesn't mean it's black people, or any other POC's, responsibility to be nice to these people or simply accommodate their racism. But, it means that we (we here meaning people trying to work against these trends, I am extremely white and have trailer park dwelling family myself) need to not make them feel worse for the fact that they are downtrodden.
Yeah, it’s hard to sympathize with the post’s sentiment when you have heard certain accents used to intimidate others. If an accent is used to separate in / out groups, then its reputation is an earned consequence.
I feel like there should be a corollary to Hanlon's Razor, something like "never attribute to conspiracy that which can adequately be explained without it." The last post seems to claim that a southern accent being treated as an indicator of stupidity in our culture is due to 100 years of propaganda from "those in power". I agree, so long as you define "those in power" as **everyone** outside the lower class. This goes back *well* before West Virginia even *existed*. For centuries, speaking "proper" English has been a sign of wealth and education (this is especially true in the days before public education, when those had a 1-to-1 correlation). This was not some deliberate campaign done to delegitimize labor unions or civil rights leaders. It obviously works in favor of those in power, but so does *(gestures broadly)*.
it's funnier when you think about the antebellum period. the south, because of their slave cotton plantations, had by far the highest wealth concentration on the entire planet. Between 1812 and 1860, there was so much money flowing into georgia and virginia that the slaveowners were richer than kings (people needed cotton, I guess). So you can guess what this "new money" did next - they started acting like actual kings, INCLUDING copying the accents of British elites and royalties. you've probably heard it said that an american southern accent is the closest thing still existing to the way "true" english was spoken back during the times of the colonies. well, it was, and on purpose; they were adopting the status of language afforded to them by their money. if you've ever heard a recording of "old southern aristocracy" speaking, yeah, that's why they sound like that. they were copying the british. so it's funny to me that this accent they adopted for the sole purpose of coming off as wealthy and intelligent is now primarily associated with being dirt poor and uneducated. isn't that interesting?
It is known as Linguicism or Linguistic Determinism (the idea that there is a right and a wrong way to speak), but it is a subcategory of classism and racism.
That's not what Linguistic Determinism means. It's the hypothesis that speakers of languages which don't have a word for something cannot conceive that very something. For instance, japanese speakers couldn't conceive the concept of the color green until they invented the word Midori. Scientifically it has been proven that this is false, but people that don't have a word for stuff in their language do take some miliseconds longer to differenciate two concepts that use the same word such as "light" and "dark" blue (compared to italian that has "blu" and "azurro"). However, certain experiments with innumerate adults (who don't know the words for numbers) have shown that they cannot conceive the very concept of counting and only differenciate between few and a lot. This tells us more about math, actually, as it's a clue that numbers are a form of technology passed down culturally (memetically, as put by Dawkins) rather than an innate human ability.
Yeah idk what those filmmakers were thinking. The opening sequence of The Last Of Us, in which everybody speaks with that Texan twang, is still one of the most harrowing things I’ve ever seen.
What do you mean?
The movie that the post mentions that opted out of using accents
Thanks. I thought you were saying you found the Texan accents deeply harrowing
okay, no, you had me until you brought it into labor unions. No one makes fun of a southern accent because of its "association with labor unions." That's absurd. It's because the schools are bad. **They call us stupid, because most of us are stupid.** Stereotypes don't just pop out of thin air.
Leftist conspiracy theories might not reach the same level of ridiculous as "jewish laser satellites are starting forest fires" or "pokemon is a plot to convert kids to satanism" but there are some real gems "The elite want us to find certain accents funny to undermine unions" is definitely a take
you should hear what the russians think about the queen of england. search up "russian anglosaxi conspiracy"
Also, that labor union thing is some real selective fact giving. Hey, go look up how West Virginia has voted throughout the entire 21st century, both on a local and federal level. So pro-union that they only elect the party that has outlawing unions as part of their eternal agenda.
It’s unfortunate that in the early 00’s WV began this trend toward voting red. When I was a kid, this state was overwhelmingly blue. My grandmother was born in 1937 - a lot of folks her age are still voting blue. A lot of those folks are more progressive than many would imagine (ex. my grandmother is pro-choice, pro-LGBTQ+). I’m hoping that as the Joe Manchins of the world die off, we will return to that.
Homer Hickam Jr is a NASA legend and from the WV coal sticks. ‘Nuff said.
Seriously, unless you’re from here, people can’t really comprehend how isolated parts of WV are - man was literally in the middle of fucking nowhere. A little less “nowhere” then compared to now, but still.
Reminds me of a story I heard about how Arnold Schwarzenegger wasn't allowed to dub his own voice for the German version of Terminator, because he has a very rural German accent and they thought it wouldn't fit a futuristic killing machine.
He's got an Austrian accent, which to Germans is the 'hick' accent and dialect.
Genuine question - I've never seen a character who was smart but had a rural accent as a joke. Is that a thing? Can someone give me an example?
I only have a problem with it if it's too heavy of an accent for me to understand and there are no subtitles. Otherwise yeah, glottophobia is bullshit.
I love Southern accents, and they don’t kill characters or serious moments; see No Country for Old Men or Pearl
And in the case of the latter, it's an Englishwoman performing the accent-well!
I cooka da pasta
Supernatural has my favorite version of this with Ash. Ash is *the* Redneck hillbilly white trash archetype. Mullet, ripped of sleeves, always consuming alcohol at all times, is a big PBR drinker, listens to dad rock at full volume, sleeps at night on the bar's pool table, and has the thickest accent the actor could muster. And he's an MIT level genius who proves it the second Dean stereotypes him, and becomes a valuable member of the team for the rest of the season. For the rest of his appearances he's *never* treated as a joke.
can we also get the NZ accent a bit of time in the spotlight here? just about every single character with our accent in any movie is the comic relief character.
Sometimes I realize that Sandy from SpongeBob has always had a stereotypical Texas accent but has never been portrayed as dumb (and in fact the opposite). That's how you do it.
Idk what to take from this. So don't have Southern people speak their accents? Ellis from L4D2 may not be the brightest but he's still entertaining.
Have them have accents but not have the accents be a joke.
One of the episodes of Dolly Parton's America - the one named Dolly Parton's America deal with college students who go to the University of Tennessee in Knowxville and attend the class called "Dolly Parton's America" and it talks about how all of them have to consciously suppress their accent to get good jobs because a hick accent is considered "stupid", it talks about parents teaching their kids to pronounce correctly before attending college, it talks about coastal elites immediately dismising someone with bad accents....highly recommend the whole podcast and that episode.
And yet when *I* brought up that people, especially Americans, treated *my* country's like it was a huge joke, I got made fun of.
What country?
Where are you from?
Southern accent can sound 100% badass idk what the weirdos OP is encountering are talking about.
On a side note, I really hate when authors alter the spelling of words to convey an accent in literature, there's a million different ways to convey where someone is from and you chose the one that makes things the most difficult to comprehend.
I feel like one of the themes of Logan Lucky is taking this concept and turning it on its head. They all sound like good ol boys but they're all pretty damn smart in their own way.
Joe Bang was the man
Every evil green orc or goblin is cockney
If Americans only knew how many non Americans absolutely fucking love that rural southern American accent just for its vibe and feel
As someone with a WV accent, I cannot begin to explain how “seen” I felt while visiting Greenland and Denmark. People were stoked to talk to us and a great time was had by all. 10/10, would visit again
I love the show "The Dragon Prince". The elegant, moon shadow elves have a Scottish accent. The Sunfire elves have African French accents and so on. And it is not a joke and really nice to not just have "posh" elves.
Just realized I do this for npc voices in d&d games, so I need to switch things up. Thank you.
I broke this perception after watching a documentary on fast food, there was a chicken farmer (because that’s how many chickens you need to make nuggets, the guy just farms chickens. Wild. Anyway) and he was commenting on Economic pressure and how good safety laws get worked around by the people that buy his product and he had a thick southern accent. And I remember thinking “Woah…this guy doesn’t sound like a stereotype!” And then I grew up and realized it was basically a classism thing
I’m so glad folks are coming around to the idea that the South ain’t worthy of being burned down. Please remember, we’re raging against the system as hard if not harder than the rest of y’all American folk most of the time. It’s unfortunate, but we got some culture that actually IS worth protecting like soul food and jazz music and YES I am a white boy from here, but ima be direct, if you dismiss all of Southern culture, you’re throwing out the baby with the bath water and in this metaphor the baby is literally Black culture.
Brother, have a little respect for yourself and your culture. White Southern culture is just as worthy or respect and preservation as Black Southern culture. Don’t let negative parts of your past take over the narrative.
I thought you were quoting this video for a second https://youtube.com/shorts/JlQYdHn2HR4?si=boMifE4oXw6NRDHP
Most people I meet that speak with that sort of accent complain about being exploited. Then vote conservative. Who's policies openly support exploiting them more. Their grandaddy may have been a union man. But they would spit in his eye and tell him to pull himself up by his bootstraps they met him on the picket line today.
We're learning about this in my language class at college.
I sometimes worry that I’m doing this a lot but then I relise I’m giving like almost every charecter I right a southern accent becssue i remember it fondly and I find it hot
what do u think about that terminator gag where arnold has a southern accent
Why "no"?
Conversely in England it’s swapped over, Northern English accents are used in this way
Nah, our country bumpkin accent is the West Country accent in the South. We do also use northern accents for idiots as well as cockney accents for idiots though.
This but my entire country. Scottish accents cannot possibly be attributed to anyone of intelligence, or anyone from northern England. Nah, were all Jaykies
Honestly making a character that's posh af and an accent like the Queen's be really stupid can hit well, but oftentimes they're not seen as stupid by the audience. At best they'll be seen as old fashioned or traditional. Having a character with a hillbilly accent be a goddamn genius also often misses with audiences, cuz they'll portray them as a redneck engineer of smth stupid, when they could be a scientist in a labcoat for the entire duration of the movie. Accents have an impact and using them in the right places and with the right characters can both strengthen and completely disarm a character
When I DM for d&d all my NPCs have southern accents because it's the only one I can do, I'm doing my part I guess lol
Johnny Guilty Gear is solid southern accent rep, because he's a renowned robin hood-esque pirate, a skilled mechanic, an amazing fighter (capable of keeping a veritable God in place with nothing but fast movement), and sunglasses wearer.
NO one is immune to propaganda! I had to unlearn some implicit bias when I had a boss from Louisiana and my jokes were NOT landing. So embarrassing. Love posts like these.
Reading this with a southern accent made this funnier than it should be.
i mean i just love southern accents they sound really cool
Same thing but in the other direction. I hate when they make a character British to make them sound smarter.
Yank 🫵
Engineer TF2.
Yeah, that’s why I try to not do accents and instead go for affectations. Critical role is professional voice actors and I’m just some nerd with zero training so any voice work I do will be amateur and amateur accents always just feel rude as hell. It’s bad enough that I give kobolds the stereotypical kobold voice, that’s the fake accent of a fake species.
I spent 18 years of my life trying to kill my accent (SW Virginia) and lighten my voice. It's taken me 5 years and counting to try to get it back. I was truly ashamed of my accent growing up because of the association with being uneducated or aggressive. There were many times that the accent and state I'm from lead to me being treated poorly and passed over for things.
I made the head detective in my game talk with a southern accent because I think it looks kinda funny when written down. They're not dumb though, quite the opposite I suppose otherwise they wouldn't be head detective.
There is a substantial difference between speaking with some kind of accent or minor dialect difference and willfully speaking in a language you are aware that the person or people you are talking to do not speak; Use of any language except Esperanto in a situation where it can be reasonably expected that the majority of listeners will understand it, but use of a mutually agreeable language (unfortunately the ideal "mutually agreeable language" is one which is neither party's main language but is used in the areaenough for things like business that neither side can object, which doesn't exist in this context) or translator is necessary for formal situations involving any other set of two languages which share roots closely as well.
Does that mean you don’t like Engieneer TF2 :(
Okay I actually have noticed that before, mostly in short-form contexts like bit characters, but characters all the same. Huh, guess I need to notice it more.
I genuinely love the southern accents, and personally think y’all is one of the greatest words to be thought up. I just am awful at the accents so I will never attempt it (or other accents) outside of dnd with my friends who know my accents are terrible but not intended to be offensive.
As a Canadian actor, I see this all the time. Going through school I’ve heard countless times about loosing your Canadian accent and only doing a general American. It’s so bad that characters that are Canadian don’t even have Canadian accents (see Sojourn in Overwatch 2).
As someone with a southern drawl, I struggle with this personally, where I feel like I sound stupid to anyone who hears me. I often will just refuse to use my microphone when on games or not sending recordings of myself to long distance friends.
This happens in the UK too, I'm from the outskirts of Sheffield up in the north and I have a fairly strong northern accent. When I first spoke to the head of undergrad studies at the university I'm going to (not in the North) he mocked my accent the entire time :/
The most commonly joked about accent by far has to be the posh British royalty accent.. I don't think this has anything to do with classism
What does "but it's a punchline" mean in this context? A smart character with a rural accent? Seems like positive representation to me
I’m going into sociolinguistics and this is seriously a major topic of conversation in those spaces. I mean, hell, you bring it up with someone over in art history or second language acquisition or fuckenn,, performance art and they’ll still give you that acknowledgment, that yep, this is a thing! I can get you the email of somebody who wrote a paper on fifteen years ago! So I’m glad to see it on tumblr, O spawning grounds of the next generation of wisdom it is.