Accents

Accents are fascinating -- listening to the difference between how I sound now and my family in Minnesota (I haven't lived in MN for seventeen years or so) is always a treat. Occassionally, I still sound like a midwesterner, notably when pronouncing words like 'hose' and 'lose', but the rest of the time I'm twanging with the rest of the Colorodoans. Except when I say 'bag'. The Adorable Husband laughs every time I try.

I also am fascinated by the varieties of accents and regional dialects of English around the world and discovered sounds files on the web that illustrate them. Personally, I could talk to a person with an Irish accent for hours. Just let them read the phone book, I don't care -- I can only hope that we sound as charming and lilting to the Irish ear as they do to us.

At any rate -- for a really interesting set of example of English around the world can be found at the International Dialect of English Archives . Sound files and interviews about English in the United States (by state) are also on the IDEA site.

I found a place to send in your own voice stuff, as well, to be part of the process. Cool, eh?