One of the favorite stories is about the first time I took my wife to England. She majored in British literature in college and is the type of person who reads Shakespeare for fun, and can even read and speaks middle English. I worked and traveled to England a few times a year and had lived there in my early 20s, before we met.
For our fifth anniversary I took her to England. It was her first time ever leaving the US. In fact the first time she left the southern US.
We’re standing at the curb at Gatwick waiting for a cab and there are two guys behind us talking. My wife leans over and whispers, “what language are they speaking?”
I just started laughing, and explained they were speaking English, they are just Scottish. All that book learning and studying of the language couldn’t prepare her for the Scottish accent.
Does she have a southern US accent? Middle English in a southern drawl sounds fun.
That would be awesome, but her accent is not that strong. She grew up in the suburb.
Awesome, how was meeting Tom Hanks in The 'Burbs?
He seemed nice until he blew up my basement
Haven’t heard that euphemism for reproductive organs yet, and yes Mr Hanks is known for doing that!
Interestingly, linguists believe that the way people spoke in Shakespeare’s time was similar to how people speak on some islands off the cost of the Carolinas in the US South.
I mean the English language didn’t stay static in England and only changed in other parts of the world. Accents changed in England just as they changed elsewhere. And depending on where in the South someone is from it may actually be more accurate to be speaking older forms of English in those accents rather than in any of the modern English accent.
As odd as it may seem to hear someone read Shakespeare in s US Southern accent, it’s likely a closer approximation to how it sounded in Shakespeare’s time than someone saying it with a posh English accent.
TL;DR, You’ve not experienced Shakespeare until you have heard it in the original Southern drawl.
linguists believe that the way people spoke in Shakespeare’s time was similar to how people speak on some islands off the cost of the Carolinas in the US South.
This is one of those things you hear on the internet all the time that has no real truth behind it. This story was based on 1 paper written by a guy with no expertise is shakesperian English and has been supersceded by much better researched ideas on what Shakespeare sounded like.
Ben Crystal is probably the best source as to what Shakespeare actually sounded like and its far more west country than American
You know, now that you say that I recall hearing something to that effect previously! Now I extra have to hear it! Haha
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I’m curious about that. I know I shared this story before on Lemmy, but don’t remember saying it on Reddit.
It could very well just be the case that you and your wife’s experience is a common experience.
Up the ante - walk into a Scotsman with a thick Glaswegian accent.
Oh good, an excuse to share one of my favorite videos:
Thought it was gonna be this skit from limmys show haha. That one broke my brain until I binged the show and acquired a passive understanding of glaswegian
I’ve watched Limmy’s show so much, I can even understand the old guy in a pub skits
Now we’re talking, but it’s still a video game set on average difficulty. It can be hecks worse, trust me. ^^
I stll categorise this as “fairly easy”, maybe “average” difficulty. What breaks my head is some Aussie slang. ^^
Did ye aye
I believe this is where the belter dialect in The Expanse comes from…
I call the Glasgow Scot and raise one West Country Gerald
I burst out laughing watching this. Reminded me of how my British wife “warned” me about folks’ accent back when I first met her family in rural England.
Honey, I understand them perfectly fine. Won’t you be worrying, love?
:D
Lol, that’s really sweet. But imagine that specific MP to be the first boss in a very lengthy and challenging video game. ^^
Tory MP’s kinda are but the game is Life
I’d put subtitles on for sure!
I could understand the first guy, but had to look up “antipodean”.
I could hear what he was saying but he was talking quite fast which makes it harder to understand.
Glaswegian is medium difficulty, try Dundee
Then they meet an Irishman speaking at full speed
Or a Newfie
Hi!
Or someone from Cape Breton
O fuck that was a rough episode of letterkenny when they had some Newfies on it.
Well to be fair
Scots is a language technically distinct from English.
They mean English spoken with a Scottish accent
Ay, I know… But it’s frequent that folk are ignorant about the language spoken here. It’s not strictly English.
If you’d checked out the link you’d see that it sounds like English a lot of the time, but is its own distinct branch, not just including the pronunciation but the words too.
I’m not talking about Gaelic here, but the the sort of English where you can call someone a fud whilst smiling at them because they don’t know what it means.
What I meant is that you replied directly to the meme but the meme is specifically about someone speaking English with a Scottish accent so saying “Scots is a different language” doesn’t make much sense in this context.
If you had said “Some people don’t realize it but there’s a language specific to Scotland that isn’t English with a Scottish accent” then that would have made more sense.
Honestly though, the difference between an accent/dialect and a language is both vague and artifical. Norwegian dialects has 12 different variations for the word I (E/Eg/Ej/Æ/Æg/I/Jei/Je, and appearently 3 more), yet it’s still the same language
Too much troll shagging has fucked them up.
Closely enough related though, it’s as intelligible to english speakers as danish/swedish/norwegian is to each other
it’s just another case of “a language is a dialect with an army”
Is Auld Lang Syne an example of this?
But most people are talking about Scottish English
If I can clearly understand Limmy from Limmy’s Show would I be able to get by traveling in Scotland?
Aye until you got to Doric land and Aberdeen
“Benendndneebawjdbdya ejdjfjhsbe zmxjsuwhhd”
“I’m sorry I don’t speak Welsh”
“I’m speaking English you dick”
All the accents from the UK and southern Ireland are made up. Australia and New Zealand are also faking it.
How do I know this? Tom Holland has done so many characters without that speech impairment that he lost it.
So now the “accent” he speaks with in interviews is fake now.
Side question: how old is Tom Holland going to have to be, before I can look at him and see something other than a fetus?
He just looks too young to be anything. He comes on screen, talking about adult problems that his character is having, and I just can’t make myself take it seriously. My brain just goes “THIS IS A CHILD. THIS IS A CHILD. THIS IS A CHILD. THIS IS A CHILD,” and I can’t pay attention to anything that’s going on in the movie.
Everyone else goes on about what a great actor he is, but I wasn’t able to concentrate on any of that. I was just unable to notice anything apart from how he looks like a child.
Is it just something about his face? Is he going to look like that, all his life? Am I alone in this situation?
For what it’s worth, Timothée Chalamet has the exact same problem, in my brain. In fact, I’m sure I would get a bunch of their roles confused between the two of them, if I went to write them down without googling anything.
Two of my best friends growing up were Scottish and their parents spoke with super thick Scottish accents. Made understanding Trainspotting and reading Irvine Welsh so much easier.
Some of my fondest memories were in my early 20s, their dad would make me a drink and after a few my Irish/English ass would start talking with a Scottish accent. They’d all get a huge kick out of it. To this day even though I grew up with a dad with a heavy Irish accent I still can’t do a proper accent unless I’ve had a few, then I can’t stop it. 😅
Why is Luke a ghost? Luke died? Spoilers!
Its fine, it’s a fan-fiction film.
