Ha. These videos are great, man. I'm half Southern (North Carolina and Georgia) and half DEEP Midwestern (rural Wisconsin), so I live in American accent HELL. Did y'all know that the Boston accent is, according to linguists, what Y'ALL used to sound like? The English accent is one of the most rapidly evolving in the world and y'all FASCINATE me.
Driving through Lafayette, Louisiana we got lost so pulled into a gas station to get directions. Honestly could not understand a single word he said. His Cajun accent was so strong we just thanked him and left. We somehow figured out how to get where we were going even though the highways seem to go on for miles with no markings! Born and raised in the USA but we surely can sound so different.
Same here. Me and some friends from Illinois were going to Biloxi Mississippi to play golf one winter. Long before Google maps existed. We stopped in this little town and asked some guys in a diner how far it was to "Bill-Ox-ee". They looked at us, confused, until the waitress spoke up and said: "You mean Bluxa?"😂
Same! But I have also heard british people use an "f" instead of the t as well like the word think. They say fink. First time I heard it, I was like what is he saying?
See, it's not just the accents but also our mispronunciations and colorful way of stringing words together, lol. For instance... I saw Kabir down at the crick. He was drunker'n Cooter Brown and nekkid as a jaybird! Translation: I saw Kabir on the banks of the stream (creek). He was extremely drunk and had taken off all of his clothes. The language here in the south is just hilariously wonderful! Thumbs up, great reaction!
I do live in the Appalachian part of Pennsylvania. Yodeling is a MUST-SEE in rural Appalachia! There's a race car driver local to me. He yodels! He just turned 90 the day I saw him yodel in person! (Yes, he does it for fun, and this year is his 71st season of racing)
My parents both were from Louisiana. My dad was in the US Air Force and we spent four years in Georgia and then three years in England. I had a strange accent for a while!
I grew up in NY and I have a NYC accent. My best friend grew up with me in NY as well. When he was 20, his dad retired and he decided to move with his family to North Carolina. Within a few years, my friend's NY accent completely changed to one from North Carolina. I mean his NY accent was completely gone and his North Carolina accent sounded as native as it could be. My friend lost his NY accent because he still needed to go to work every day and he spent all day with North Carolinians. His NY parents never lost their accents because they never needed to go to work anymore due to their retirement. And my friend's dad spent all day talking to his NY wife. It was shocking how fast my friend lost his native NY accent. I no longer live in NY and I know that my NY accent is not as strong as it used to be, but anyone who meets me still hears my NY accent. Personally, I think my NY accent is at its strongest when I get very angry. Once I am mad it sounds completely like I am back in NYC.
Strange how that works. I know people here in Florida who moved down from New York / Boston/New Jersey 30 years ago and haven't lost a bit of their accent. I also know people who were born and raised up there and you would never guess it from the way they speak. I left Central Illinois to move to Dallas, Texas, in 1998. Within a year, I'd call my dad on the phone, and he would say something to the effect of: "I swear I just heard a y'all come through my phone line. What's wrong with you?" So when I moved to Florida, half the people thought I was a yankee, and half the people thought I was a hillbilly.. lol
In 1976 when my upstate New York family did a road trip through the south towards Disney World, we laughed so hard at the waitresses and truckers (CB radios) because their accents were so foreign to us. I miss CB radios.❤
12:31 The Great Migration is an example of this. Being African-American my parents generation are born and raised in north states while my grandparents generation were born and raised in the southern states and later migrated up north for better opportunities and less segregation. Some returned back down south in their retirement years. So my family has a variety of accents and everybody understands each other 😂. It's fun when you pick up each other's accents during school breaks 😂
The difference between Grand Ma and Maw-Maw (Grand Pa and Paw-Paw) is different sides of the marriage. My son's wife's parents were/are grandma and grandpa. My wife and I are Mimi (Maw-maw) and D-daddy (Paw-paw). Often it's like listening to a Scot.
OMG! Mate, that was amazing! There is variation here in Wales, but nothing like in that video. However, we do tend to mix Welsh in our English sentences.
Forgive me for pointing out an obvious fact. Wales is TINY [approx. 8,000 square miles] in comparison to individual Southern States. The states of Alabama [52,000 sq miles] and Mississippi [48,000 sq miles] are each SIX times the size of Wales. Georgia is more than SEVEN times as large [59,000 square miles. All of the southern states combined are approx HALF a MILLION sq miles. I realize that most Brits think that the UK is big... but it isn't. There are ELEVEN US States that are individually larger than the ENTIRE UK. It should come as very little surprise that there are far more regional differences in the Southern US alone than there are in Wales or even in the UK as a whole.
I grew up in Washington (state) and was stationed in North Carolina…and the difference is amazing. Almost every state can be differentiated. I like trying to guess. Usually can get pretty close.
There was only one time I couldn't understand a Southern accent and that was from a person from rural Georgia. mamaw, granny, grandma, nana all mean grandmother. My whole family was originally from Virginia and half of them moved to either New York or Philly. Virginia has a southern accent but it's not a heavy accent especially the larger towns and cities, you hear it more in rural areas.
It's interesting hearing that observation you made about the differences in accents within a few miles of each other coming from you Kabir, since that is also said about Britain (as you probably would have heard before). Britian is truly fascinating in that regard, being as small a place as it is relatively speaking.
See, the deep South is our Wales, culturally and linguistically. That's how I always explain it to my UK friends. Appalachia is Yorkshire. JUST accent-wise? Midwestern is our Brummy. MLE would probably be Long Island/Jersey.
Yep. Even within London itself. East end versus West end. Cockney, Estuary and Hackney. On top of that, you have Geordie, Brummie, Scouse , Mancunian...,
I find that the diversity of accents is even stronger in the UK, than in the US South. In England you can go just a relatively short distance between cities like Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds, Hull, and Sheffield, and find huge differences. And if you go a bit further afield to Somerset or Glasgow, the differences are massive, despite all of those places being closer geographically than the different parts of one US state. I was born in New York City, but grew up in Europe, where the expat community was from all over the US. People say my US accent is pretty impossible to pin down geographically.
I was born in Savannah, Georgia and spoke with the classic Southern drawl but moved out to the west coast when I was young. I lost most of my accent (to my ears) except when I go back to the South or when talking to people with an accent, then it comes back full force. My kids tell me I have an accent but I don’t notice it. My Grandma grew up in Norfolk, Virginia and had a very different accent. I’ve never heard anyone else speak the way she did. The closest I can find when trying to locate her accent is the Tidewater accent or some of those island accents off the coast of Virginia or North Carolina. My kids couldn’t understand her at all but I never had any trouble. So yeah, I guess it took 3 generations to lose that understanding. But then I grew up talking to her all the time so it was second nature for me. Fun video! 💜
Kabir, I'm on the young side of Gen X. My generation in the South had parents who were told that if their children sounded like hicks, thick Southern accents, they wouldn't be able to get jobs. So, the rich kids got elocution lessons and the rest of us were just told to "figure it out". Consequently, a lot of us can code switch, go back and forth between standard and Southern accents.
I was talking with a co-worker who is from NY recently about this. He pointed out that I don't have a southern accent and I let him know about code switching. I speak one way at work and in public spaces, and another with my family - and at this point I do it unconsciously.
Raised in NC, college in OH and a few years afterwards so adjusted my speech. Friends teased me when I would talk to my family on the phone, saying I sounded like a totally different person. Code-switching is a skill.
You should watch a 3 part video series from Wired about the accents of North America. It’s a dialect coach that talks about it and he does all the accents. It’s quite interesting, and really gives you perspective of the accent diversity in America.
My grandpa moved to Oregon from Missouri and all us kids and grandkids have what I call a watered down Missouri accent. We talk different from a lot of people in our area, but I guess people like it. I got asked multiple times when I worked in the restaurant in town where I was from and they were surprised that I was born and raised in the area. But in our small town that only has about 3,000 people you can tell what area people in live in. If they live in the north, to the south, on the outskirts of town, or even further out.
I'm from North Carolina, had a friend who was raised here, moved to New York City as a young adult, then moved back to North Carolina in middle age. The combination of southern North Carolina & northern New York City was damn near IMPOSSIBLE to follow when my friend got wound up. Thanks for your reaction.
I'm from Tennessee near the Appalachian mountain so we get a lot of the mountain sound when we talk.I can understand the majority of the folks on here.Louisiana, still the hardest.Just because of that french overtone😊
13:57 is my hometown's cajun dialect. Louisiana is one of the few places in the country with its own language. Cajun is the slang or americanized accented way of saying Acadiens, but because they struggled to say Acadiens the way it was said in louisiana with a french accent, they shorthanded the pronunciation to Cajun. But in truth, cajun is a patois of french.
3:08 they are the same thing but in the US there’s many different names we have for family members, so most of us pick a name for each grandparent so there’s no confusion on whether you’re talking about your maternal vs paternal side. For example I call my paternal grandmother Grandma and I call my maternal grandmother Nana. I’m someone who’s very blessed to a close bond with my grandparents AND great grandparents on both sides so it would be too confusing to always say grandma/pa when I have 4 sets of grandparents.
I was born in Tennessee, bounced back and forth on both ends United States, so my accent kinda blended. My mother and grandmother kept their accents, I developed a Transatlantic accent with a touch of Dixie (by choice). Friends on both sides of the Atlantic love it!
We often call our grandmothers from our mom's side and dad's side by different names to make it easy to tell them apart when speaking. Grandma might be Dad's mom and Mama might be Mom's mom
I Grew up in Charleston SC. I have ZERO accent, my mom was from Ohio. My Father sounded like 'Foghorn Leghorn' the giant chicken in Bugs Bunny cartoons. His side of the family came to SC in 1723. If you want to hear that accent, looke up Senator Ernest Hollings of SC. Whenever i want to hesr my dads voice, i look up one of Hollings videos.
One of my best friends is 92 years old and he moved here from Tennessee when he was in his early 20's he move here to Milwaukee and he still has a Tennessee accent
I love hearing and learning about different accents. Im north Jersey right by the city (NYC)...and we add a w in the weirdest places. Its funny because everywhere i go as soon as i order a coffee they know 😅...but we also say sawft(soft) or becawse(because). But half my family is born & raised in the south. So i often had a mixture 😂. I know that you have done several videos regarding accents. But i would so love to see one or more on the English accents...you know the Kings English verses say someone from Liverpool. Or those from York. Is there a difference? Personally i get a kick out you speaking so clearly and very "proper", while another guy i watch sounds like "you can catch me on Twiter (twit er)
I'm Hawaiian, and I can change my accent depending on what I hear. It's a skill I picked up as a military brat to make friends easier when I moved schools a lot. It also came in handy when working with UK Forces as a soldier. 😉 Later in life, I used it as a tool for on demand entertainment as a teacher... I would offer a few choices to the students for reading time, and they would pick the accent of the day. 😁
I remember I moved to Georgia from Virginia when I was 4. Maybe I was to young but I never realized the difference. As I got older, it started to stick out. You adapt without realizing. The states have their bid sides, but one thing I know is that the south will give their shirt off their back to help out anyone.
My dad is from the south, and my mother is from the north. I think my speech is pretty understandable. My boyfriend in college could hear a southern twang every now and then, ie: thEEeATER or oiille (oil). I left the South when I was 5 years old.
People can pick up an accent just by visiting a place for a while. I don’t have a southern accent at all normally, but I have visited places like Tennessee for a week and spoke with a pretty heavy southern accent for quite some time after returning home.
my father was from Kentucky and my mother was from Massachusetts. we moved between the states as I grew up. Down in Kentucky everyone said I sounded Like I was from the North, and in the North everyone said I sounded like a Southerner. I now live in the North and sound Northern, unless I get mad then I sound Southern.
In certain parts of the south, some people pronounce the word "lawyer" in such a way where it sounds like they are saying the word "liar". More often than not, they are correct.
❌. That old hillbilly WAS yodeling Kabir. it's a very important component of old time country western and Bluegrass music. Check out Hank Williams sometime, he's the granddaddy of all that music. 🎶 Hey, hey good lookln', watcha got cookin', hows about cookin' something up with me. 🎶. 🤠🤠🤠
A Southern drawl is when the words are elongated or drawn out. A drawl and a twang are different.😊 If you have two Grandmothers (your Father's mother and your mother's mother), one may be called your Memaw and the other Grandmother may be called your Grandmaw.🙂
12:32 I've never thought about it before, but... now that you bring it up, my family relocated from California to Pennsylvania in like the 70's or something like that... So, it now dawns on me. That perhaps my "Gay Accent" is due to my ancestors originally being "Valley Girls" before moving East? I've always been told I talk very "Proper and Eccentric" almost like an actor instead of just a normal person speaking.
I'm from North Texas, I speak with a deep voice twang, in other words a country sound. East Texans they speak with a drawl which is slow and deliberate, Southeast Texas has a Cajun sound in their speech.
When I left Michigan and moved to North Carolina, I couldn't understand half the things my landlord said to me. It took me a while to develop my ear for the accent. I now live in North Florida, almost to the Georgia border and the accents are thick around here.
My parents are from Michigan. We moved to rural Florida when I was three. They have a Midwestern accent, and I have a Southern accent. My mom and I went to London, and two British guys on the train were so confused that they just had to ask us what the deal was. 😆
We grew up in Baltimore, MD., not far from DC. We were a white family.The majority of the people we grew up with were brown Americans, who had a strong Baltimoron (as it was called) accent. We never knew we sounded different from others until we moved out of the city to a county about 30 miles away. No one could understand the way we talked. It took about a year for the Baltimore accent to fade. Strange, eh?
Kabir using two syllables in fire to tell us it's one and not two. 😉There are Southerners who have only one syllable when they say fire, but it's because they replace the diphthong that's typically used to say i with a sound that sounds more like "far" than fire to most ears. My parents were raised in Chicago, but none of us kids were. When my parents would take us to visit relatives, their accents would change back to how their family talks.
I currently live in Alabama, but I have lived in Mississippi, Arkansas, Oklahoma and about eight months in Chicago. I lived in Chicago when I was a teenager in high school and I would be talking about something and all of a sudden there would be a group of kids standing around me. They would tell me that they just liked to hear me talk. When I would go back to the south to visit while living in Chicago, everyone would tell me I was starting to talk like a yankee (lol).
My dad was born and raised in the south, but my mom in the Pacific northwest. Dad was in the Air Force, so we moved all over the US. I have also lived in Canada, and have been married to a Canadian for almost 34 years. As a kid, I lived in Alaska. So I sound like whoever I'm speaking to. It's not something I really control. If I try, I lose it, and garble the accents together.
I think Mawmaw and Grandma or whatever are the same thing, but if you have four (or more, with steps) living grandparents, you use different names for them.
My mother grew up in DC my dad grew up in California however his family is from Tennessee where I grew up and still live. Some people in my family live in Louisiana and they have a very distinct accent. I have a bit of a southern accent but not very much of one but certain words and yes that was yodeling which used to be common in country music.
@@claudias2948 Yeah It's rare that all of my family comes together but when it happens it sounds really interesting and I truly feel my southern accent come out.
Its funny but southerners can also spot northern accents and where we are from.Took a road trip with friends from buffalo ny to fort walton beach florida. We stopped for food on the way somewhere at a subway the guys making our food not only knew we were from newyork but also buffalo and we have a totally different accent then nyc.
S. African here, English is my 3rd language, grew up on American TV and movies. I'm excited at how many accents I understand, ebonics and all. 😅 Dumb flex but TV was my friend.
It's not just the accents, the thicker the accent the more dialect is usually spoken, so even if they spoke with the same accent as the listener, the words they're saying might not make sense immediately.
Let me know where I can send a video or voice recording to you southeast Missouri here you might be surprised would like to include my sister in this just to show the difference
Africans(Americans)also told stories and even communicated serious messages to one another through songs. I specify Americans because I know that African communities did recall their history through stories, but I am not sure that they all sang those stories.
Often different "sides" of a child's family (mom's side/ Dad's side) will have different terms for parents/grandparents/great-grandparents. for instance on my (German Welsh) dad's side my grandmother was "Mama )" on mom's side (Brit/Irish/Scot/Welsh) my Grandmother was Grammie and my GREAT grandmother on mom's mom's side was "Mama " My great grandmother on Mom's DAD'S side was "Grandma
I live in Savannah, Georgia, and the southern accent here sounds exactly like gone with the wind movie…. You must have someone from the south, say the word omnipotent for you.
Kabir, I live in New England. "Aunt" is pronounced like "ahhnt" not "ant." From that one word, I can tell you whose family cane from outside of New England, even if the person I'm speaking with grew up in New England. There are other tells, too, like not having three distinct pronuciations for "marry, merry, and Mary." I can tell if you're not from the place where I grew up if you pronounce the word "ferry" like "fairy," but that's a specific sub-dialect from my corner of New England (I have what's considered to be an "old" New England accent).
Im from South Louisiana, and we use words where they shouldn't be, along with swinging the vowels to allow words to roll off the tongue easier. Me: Maaaa! Need ni'thing? Bout to go make groceries! Translation: Mom, do you need anything from the store? Im going buy groceries. Me: Mawmaw told me to pick up my room else she gon' grab a switch! Translation: Grandma told me to clean my room or she will woop my ass with a stick! Me: Dey got dat der paddle on dat pireaux n it don fell'n da bayou n'ai aint gon in n get it. Translation: They had that paddle on their little boat and it fell in the bayou, and im not going in to get it. (Pireaux is a cajun word that also doesn't directly translate from French). I have my accent, but i hide it to prevent job opportunities from passing me by in other states. Also, gentle warning, if someone says "Alright na", observe the tone. Because "Alright na!!" may be followed by a fighting stance or being sized up and down, for you likely offended someone. But, "Alright na!" with a slight smile means youve impressed them. The same can be said when someone says "oh bless your heart", albeit most times, its the nicest way to get insulted in the south, for they think "your screws upstairs may be a lil loose" 😅
It's strange that you were so surprised by the different American accents. The only times that I've been to Britain was at Heathrow airport, but from what I understand, Liverpool and Essex have completely different accents, not even mentioning Scotland and Northern Ireland. And when you consider that the entirety of the UK would be like the 11th biggest state in the US, it's amazing that we can understand each other at all here. The entirety of Western Europe is about the size of the United States. Imagine having to understand every person, in every Western European country. Over there, y'all have different languages. We have different accents.
Interestingly enough, many European scholars say that the 'neutral' Midwestern US accent (like you hear in most American TV series and movies) is how the English spoke pre-1700AD. Many even say that Shakespeare's plays were written and are meant to be performed in what is now considered an American accent. Apparently, once transportation became easier, rural people would travel to cities like London, and then go back to their towns and villages and try to speak like the "posh", spreading what is now known in the US as an English accent. Obviously, you people that live there know that there are many different accents in the UK, but for we americans, the Monty Python/BBC presenter accent is what we consider British. I'll see some of these Irish or Scottish entertainers, and can't understand a damn word they say.
I loved this video watched it twice . Kabir I'm a east end women/ cockney if you go 2/3 miles north london its sounds different and again , go south london different . At least they are states apart we are a few miles apart . Funny how we don't hear our own accent only other accents . God help the poor tourists 🤣🤣
I have lived in the South (I am on the Gulf Coast) so long that I do not notice the accents any longer. My Partner has a thick accent, but I don't hear it any longer either. It's a shame, because I love accents. It's crazy how West Virginia and Kentucky are considered Southern, when they are closer to Canada than Illinois or Iowa are..when people from KY brag about being Southern it makes me laugh.
Most of these accents are very regional within a state. Country rural backwoods folk will have a different accent than someone just a few miles away from a small town. But yeah, someone from New England and from the deep south would not understand each other at first. Sounds like Kabir needs to go to New Orleans and then venture out into the smaller towns to really experience a conversation to never forget. They'll have a good time with you being from the UK
I didn't come across "chiggers" (red bugs) until I moved from Florida to Georgia. Had a college class outside on the grass of the quad in college, as you do. Did I know in advance to bring a blanket or towel? No. I sat on the grass. Spent the next week with bites all over me. They're so tiny, you hardly see them. But boy oh boy do they itch/hurt when they bite you. And they're in swarms, not one or two on you, but hundreds.
Kabir, I've lived all over the south, and did a pretty good job at guessing. The irony, is one word we use ALL over the south, but Brits, Canadians, Aussie, and even new Zealanders use is "reckon". It's so awesome, but so weird how we use a slang word so frequently together, and don't even realize it! Oh, as a chef, grew up watching Cajun chefs like Justin Wilson in the 80's, and Cajun cooking is my passion, I can't stand people giving Tatum a hard time for his Gambit accent. He was spot friggin on! I was even able to laugh so hard when he called Logan "coullion souir" (right before he threw the card to break the bottle) which basically translates to ignorant pig headed dumb-ass!😂
I can't understand southern accents to save my life. We moved from Northern California to Northern Illinois and I was made fun of constantly. Not for my accent, but for the words I used. It's like we had two different dictionaries for each state! Worst offender: Freeway vs. Tollway.😂
1st 10 years of my life were in Gary, Indiana. Then, we moved to Central Illinois. Indiana: wash. Illinois: warsh. Indiana: 8, 9, ten. Illinois: 8, 9, tin.
The people of New Orleans do not speak with a Cajun accent. Cajuns are country people. New Orleans was populated by Creoles. There isn't really a Creole accent, but you will hear what is called a "Yat" accent, derived from the common greeting, "Dawlin. Where y'at?" During the 1800s, waves of Irish immigrants made the city their home, and just like New York and Boston, the population lost the ability to pronounce the letter 'R.' 'Toilet' became 'terlet.' 'Boil it' became 'Berl it.' It's a unique accent, to say the least.
Just a note: Texas, on its own, has more than just one accent. People in South Dallas don't sound like people in North Houston... and they don't sound like people in San Antonio... and they don't sound like people in Austin... and NONE of them sound like small town Texans.
My grand fathers was from the ozarks he was like pop corn sutton. Myy cousin is runs a farn in the ozarks❤ his kind came from scotland. In the 1700s. The came to the ozarks to hide from the english.😮 two hunderd years in the ozards till 1923 granda was the first of his scottish clan to come to kansas city. He married potowatomi indain Now here im❤ watch the beverly hillbillies thats how they acted and talked.i watch it sometimea cause i miss them.❤❤but DNA proofs scottish on my grand fathers side hard to know they hid from the engliish for two hunderd years no outside clans found them after they defeated the english on kings mountain during the revoltion❤
Ha. These videos are great, man. I'm half Southern (North Carolina and Georgia) and half DEEP Midwestern (rural Wisconsin), so I live in American accent HELL. Did y'all know that the Boston accent is, according to linguists, what Y'ALL used to sound like? The English accent is one of the most rapidly evolving in the world and y'all FASCINATE me.
Driving through Lafayette, Louisiana we got lost so pulled into a gas station to get directions. Honestly could not understand a single word he said. His Cajun accent was so strong we just thanked him and left. We somehow figured out how to get where we were going even though the highways seem to go on for miles with no markings! Born and raised in the USA but we surely can sound so different.
Same here. Me and some friends from Illinois were going to Biloxi Mississippi to play golf one winter. Long before Google maps existed. We stopped in this little town and asked some guys in a diner how far it was to "Bill-Ox-ee". They looked at us, confused, until the waitress spoke up and said: "You mean Bluxa?"😂
@@davedammitt7691I'm in Biloxi riding in the snow right now. Weird times 😂
Bill-uck-sea
Oh you're right. I'm from there .....and we need floating subtitles.....I'll pridefully admit it.
@@davedammitt7691 I'm from Gulfport/Biloxi and can confirm it's not much different here than Lafayette 😂
I watch many Brits who can't seem to pronounce the T's in most words. Like the word "butter". It comes out as "buher".
Or "BUH-hahh"
I'm from Georgia and I say butter like "buDDer". I always pronounce t's like a d.
Same! But I have also heard british people use an "f" instead of the t as well like the word think. They say fink. First time I heard it, I was like what is he saying?
Yet certain Brits hit the Ts hard on certain words where American barely pronounce the T. Our American pronunciation of Ts is more of a soft D.
“Boh’oh’o’woh’ah” = Bottle of Water
See, it's not just the accents but also our mispronunciations and colorful way of stringing words together, lol.
For instance... I saw Kabir down at the crick. He was drunker'n Cooter Brown and nekkid as a jaybird!
Translation: I saw Kabir on the banks of the stream (creek). He was extremely drunk and had taken off all of his clothes.
The language here in the south is just hilariously wonderful! Thumbs up, great reaction!
I know the story about ol' cooter brown, but I go back and forth about whether it's true or not.
I married a man from the south and was introduced to the words "fixin" and " youngins".
I do live in the Appalachian part of Pennsylvania. Yodeling is a MUST-SEE in rural Appalachia!
There's a race car driver local to me. He yodels! He just turned 90 the day I saw him yodel in person! (Yes, he does it for fun, and this year is his 71st season of racing)
My parents both were from Louisiana. My dad was in the US Air Force and we spent four years in Georgia and then three years in England. I had a strange accent for a while!
That's neat, I hope you have it preserved somehow, maybe on some home videos or something like that.🙂
"It sounds like Remy from the X-Men" YES! Exactly! Gambit is Cajun!!
I grew up in NY and I have a NYC accent. My best friend grew up with me in NY as well. When he was 20, his dad retired and he decided to move with his family to North Carolina. Within a few years, my friend's NY accent completely changed to one from North Carolina. I mean his NY accent was completely gone and his North Carolina accent sounded as native as it could be. My friend lost his NY accent because he still needed to go to work every day and he spent all day with North Carolinians. His NY parents never lost their accents because they never needed to go to work anymore due to their retirement. And my friend's dad spent all day talking to his NY wife. It was shocking how fast my friend lost his native NY accent.
I no longer live in NY and I know that my NY accent is not as strong as it used to be, but anyone who meets me still hears my NY accent. Personally, I think my NY accent is at its strongest when I get very angry. Once I am mad it sounds completely like I am back in NYC.
Strange how that works. I know people here in Florida who moved down from New York / Boston/New Jersey 30 years ago and haven't lost a bit of their accent. I also know people who were born and raised up there and you would never guess it from the way they speak.
I left Central Illinois to move to Dallas, Texas, in 1998. Within a year, I'd call my dad on the phone, and he would say something to the effect of: "I swear I just heard a y'all come through my phone line. What's wrong with you?"
So when I moved to Florida, half the people thought I was a yankee, and half the people thought I was a hillbilly.. lol
"Hey" from the Tampa Bay area of Florida, USA. Hope ya doing great.
Enjoy the heck outta ya videos. Keep making them.
Have fun and be safe.
In my Appalachian family grandparents were mamaw and papaw and my great grandparents were called mommy and poppy.
Do you refer to your parents as "mom and dad" or something else?
In 1976 when my upstate New York family did a road trip through the south towards Disney World, we laughed so hard at the waitresses and truckers (CB radios) because their accents were so foreign to us. I miss CB radios.❤
12:31 The Great Migration is an example of this. Being African-American my parents generation are born and raised in north states while my grandparents generation were born and raised in the southern states and later migrated up north for better opportunities and less segregation. Some returned back down south in their retirement years. So my family has a variety of accents and everybody understands each other 😂. It's fun when you pick up each other's accents during school breaks 😂
Kabir you actually impersonate the accents very well.
The difference between Grand Ma and Maw-Maw (Grand Pa and Paw-Paw) is different sides of the marriage. My son's wife's parents were/are grandma and grandpa. My wife and I are Mimi (Maw-maw) and D-daddy (Paw-paw). Often it's like listening to a Scot.
OMG! Mate, that was amazing! There is variation here in Wales, but nothing like in that video. However, we do tend to mix Welsh in our English sentences.
Forgive me for pointing out an obvious fact. Wales is TINY [approx. 8,000 square miles] in comparison to individual Southern States. The states of Alabama [52,000 sq miles] and Mississippi [48,000 sq miles] are each SIX times the size of Wales. Georgia is more than SEVEN times as large [59,000 square miles. All of the southern states combined are approx HALF a MILLION sq miles. I realize that most Brits think that the UK is big... but it isn't. There are ELEVEN US States that are individually larger than the ENTIRE UK. It should come as very little surprise that there are far more regional differences in the Southern US alone than there are in Wales or even in the UK as a whole.
Worth watching just to see Justin Wilson on his Cajun cooking show. Shicken! I guaraunteeeea!
I grew up in Washington (state) and was stationed in North Carolina…and the difference is amazing. Almost every state can be differentiated. I like trying to guess. Usually can get pretty close.
There was only one time I couldn't understand a Southern accent and that was from a person from rural Georgia. mamaw, granny, grandma, nana all mean grandmother. My whole family was originally from Virginia and half of them moved to either New York or Philly. Virginia has a southern accent but it's not a heavy accent especially the larger towns and cities, you hear it more in rural areas.
Much like in the UK, some are called granny and others say nan.
It took me a while to understand the accent in South Mississippi. Been here since 1972 and love it. BTW, I grew up in Manchester UK😊😊😊
@@lynnegulbrand2298 I'm from Gulfport and can confirm I don't use the proper amount of syllables when I speak 😂
It's interesting hearing that observation you made about the differences in accents within a few miles of each other coming from you Kabir, since that is also said about Britain (as you probably would have heard before). Britian is truly fascinating in that regard, being as small a place as it is relatively speaking.
See, the deep South is our Wales, culturally and linguistically. That's how I always explain it to my UK friends. Appalachia is Yorkshire. JUST accent-wise? Midwestern is our Brummy. MLE would probably be Long Island/Jersey.
Great video, I wished I could like it at least ten times.😃
American here, laughing at your amazement at the number of accents in the American South, thinking about all the accents in the British Isles.
Yep. Even within London itself. East end versus West end. Cockney, Estuary and Hackney.
On top of that, you have Geordie, Brummie, Scouse , Mancunian...,
I find that the diversity of accents is even stronger in the UK, than in the US South. In England you can go just a relatively short distance between cities like Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds, Hull, and Sheffield, and find huge differences. And if you go a bit further afield to Somerset or Glasgow, the differences are massive, despite all of those places being closer geographically than the different parts of one US state.
I was born in New York City, but grew up in Europe, where the expat community was from all over the US. People say my US accent is pretty impossible to pin down geographically.
Very interesting. You should put a link to the original video in the description, I think.
I was born in Savannah, Georgia and spoke with the classic Southern drawl but moved out to the west coast when I was young. I lost most of my accent (to my ears) except when I go back to the South or when talking to people with an accent, then it comes back full force. My kids tell me I have an accent but I don’t notice it. My Grandma grew up in Norfolk, Virginia and had a very different accent. I’ve never heard anyone else speak the way she did. The closest I can find when trying to locate her accent is the Tidewater accent or some of those island accents off the coast of Virginia or North Carolina. My kids couldn’t understand her at all but I never had any trouble. So yeah, I guess it took 3 generations to lose that understanding. But then I grew up talking to her all the time so it was second nature for me. Fun video! 💜
Kabir, I'm on the young side of Gen X. My generation in the South had parents who were told that if their children sounded like hicks, thick Southern accents, they wouldn't be able to get jobs. So, the rich kids got elocution lessons and the rest of us were just told to "figure it out". Consequently, a lot of us can code switch, go back and forth between standard and Southern accents.
I was talking with a co-worker who is from NY recently about this. He pointed out that I don't have a southern accent and I let him know about code switching. I speak one way at work and in public spaces, and another with my family - and at this point I do it unconsciously.
Raised in NC, college in OH and a few years afterwards so adjusted my speech. Friends teased me when I would talk to my family on the phone, saying I sounded like a totally different person. Code-switching is a skill.
You should watch a 3 part video series from Wired about the accents of North America. It’s a dialect coach that talks about it and he does all the accents. It’s quite interesting, and really gives you perspective of the accent diversity in America.
My grandpa moved to Oregon from Missouri and all us kids and grandkids have what I call a watered down Missouri accent. We talk different from a lot of people in our area, but I guess people like it. I got asked multiple times when I worked in the restaurant in town where I was from and they were surprised that I was born and raised in the area. But in our small town that only has about 3,000 people you can tell what area people in live in. If they live in the north, to the south, on the outskirts of town, or even further out.
I'm from North Carolina, had a friend who was raised here, moved to New York City as a young adult, then moved back to North Carolina in middle age. The combination of southern North Carolina & northern New York City was damn near IMPOSSIBLE to follow when my friend got wound up. Thanks for your reaction.
I'm from Tennessee near the Appalachian mountain so we get a lot of the mountain sound when we talk.I can understand the majority of the folks on here.Louisiana, still the hardest.Just because of that french overtone😊
13:57 is my hometown's cajun dialect. Louisiana is one of the few places in the country with its own language. Cajun is the slang or americanized accented way of saying Acadiens, but because they struggled to say Acadiens the way it was said in louisiana with a french accent, they shorthanded the pronunciation to Cajun. But in truth, cajun is a patois of french.
3:08 they are the same thing but in the US there’s many different names we have for family members, so most of us pick a name for each grandparent so there’s no confusion on whether you’re talking about your maternal vs paternal side. For example I call my paternal grandmother Grandma and I call my maternal grandmother Nana. I’m someone who’s very blessed to a close bond with my grandparents AND great grandparents on both sides so it would be too confusing to always say grandma/pa when I have 4 sets of grandparents.
I was born in Tennessee, bounced back and forth on both ends United States, so my accent kinda blended. My mother and grandmother kept their accents, I developed a Transatlantic accent with a touch of Dixie (by choice). Friends on both sides of the Atlantic love it!
The comedian was from Knoxville Tennessee and sounds like everyone I grew up around.
Old Popcorn Sutton the moonshiner was from Western North Carolina
I am from New Jersey, and coffee comes out as "caw-fee"(my aunt says it like that,too).
We often call our grandmothers from our mom's side and dad's side by different names to make it easy to tell them apart when speaking. Grandma might be Dad's mom and Mama might be Mom's mom
I Grew up in Charleston SC.
I have ZERO accent, my mom was from Ohio.
My Father sounded like 'Foghorn Leghorn' the giant chicken in Bugs Bunny cartoons. His side of the family came to SC in 1723.
If you want to hear that accent, looke up Senator Ernest Hollings of SC.
Whenever i want to hesr my dads voice, i look up one of Hollings videos.
One of my best friends is 92 years old and he moved here from Tennessee when he was in his early 20's he move here to Milwaukee and he still has a Tennessee accent
I love hearing and learning about different accents. Im north Jersey right by the city (NYC)...and we add a w in the weirdest places.
Its funny because everywhere i go as soon as i order a coffee they know 😅...but we also say sawft(soft) or becawse(because). But half my family is born & raised in the south. So i often had a mixture 😂.
I know that you have done several videos regarding accents. But i would so love to see one or more on the English accents...you know the Kings English verses say someone from Liverpool. Or those from York. Is there a difference?
Personally i get a kick out you speaking so clearly and very "proper", while another guy i watch sounds like "you can catch me on Twiter (twit er)
Kabir, you MUST look up Xavier Legette. He's an NFL player for The Carolina Panthers and I live for the way he talks
I'm Hawaiian, and I can change my accent depending on what I hear. It's a skill I picked up as a military brat to make friends easier when I moved schools a lot. It also came in handy when working with UK Forces as a soldier. 😉 Later in life, I used it as a tool for on demand entertainment as a teacher... I would offer a few choices to the students for reading time, and they would pick the accent of the day. 😁
I strongly recommend you react to the three part series from Eric Singer on the various American accents.
I remember I moved to Georgia from Virginia when I was 4. Maybe I was to young but I never realized the difference. As I got older, it started to stick out. You adapt without realizing. The states have their bid sides, but one thing I know is that the south will give their shirt off their back to help out anyone.
Even people 50 miles apart can speak with vastly different accents.
My dad is from the south, and my mother is from the north. I think my speech is pretty understandable. My boyfriend in college could hear a southern twang every now and then, ie: thEEeATER or oiille (oil). I left the South when I was 5 years old.
People can pick up an accent just by visiting a place for a while. I don’t have a southern accent at all normally, but I have visited places like Tennessee for a week and spoke with a pretty heavy southern accent for quite some time after returning home.
my father was from Kentucky and my mother was from Massachusetts. we moved between the states as I grew up. Down in Kentucky everyone said I sounded Like I was from the North, and in the North everyone said I sounded like a Southerner. I now live in the North and sound Northern, unless I get mad then I sound Southern.
In certain parts of the south, some people pronounce the word "lawyer" in such a way where it sounds like they are saying the word "liar". More often than not, they are correct.
❌. That old hillbilly WAS yodeling Kabir. it's a very important component of old time country western and Bluegrass music. Check out Hank Williams sometime, he's the granddaddy of all that music. 🎶 Hey, hey good lookln', watcha got cookin', hows about cookin' something up with me. 🎶. 🤠🤠🤠
A Southern drawl is when the words are elongated or drawn out. A drawl and a twang are different.😊
If you have two Grandmothers (your Father's mother and your mother's mother), one may be called your Memaw and the other Grandmother may be called your Grandmaw.🙂
12:32 I've never thought about it before, but... now that you bring it up, my family relocated from California to Pennsylvania in like the 70's or something like that... So, it now dawns on me. That perhaps my "Gay Accent" is due to my ancestors originally being "Valley Girls" before moving East? I've always been told I talk very "Proper and Eccentric" almost like an actor instead of just a normal person speaking.
I'm from North Texas, I speak with a deep voice twang, in other words a country sound. East Texans they speak with a drawl which is slow and deliberate, Southeast Texas has a Cajun sound in their speech.
When I left Michigan and moved to North Carolina, I couldn't understand half the things my landlord said to me. It took me a while to develop my ear for the accent. I now live in North Florida, almost to the Georgia border and the accents are thick around here.
My parents are from Michigan. We moved to rural Florida when I was three. They have a Midwestern accent, and I have a Southern accent. My mom and I went to London, and two British guys on the train were so confused that they just had to ask us what the deal was. 😆
We grew up in Baltimore, MD., not far from DC. We were a white family.The majority of the people we grew up with were brown Americans, who had a strong Baltimoron (as it was called) accent. We never knew we sounded different from others until we moved out of the city to a county about 30 miles away. No one could understand the way we talked. It took about a year for the Baltimore accent to fade. Strange, eh?
There IS only one syllable in "fire". Not fa-yah.
Kabir using two syllables in fire to tell us it's one and not two. 😉There are Southerners who have only one syllable when they say fire, but it's because they replace the diphthong that's typically used to say i with a sound that sounds more like "far" than fire to most ears.
My parents were raised in Chicago, but none of us kids were. When my parents would take us to visit relatives, their accents would change back to how their family talks.
I currently live in Alabama, but I have lived in Mississippi, Arkansas, Oklahoma and about eight months in Chicago. I lived in Chicago when I was a teenager in high school and I would be talking about something and all of a sudden there would be a group of kids standing around me. They would tell me that they just liked to hear me talk. When I would go back to the south to visit while living in Chicago, everyone would tell me I was starting to talk like a yankee (lol).
My dad was born and raised in the south, but my mom in the Pacific northwest. Dad was in the Air Force, so we moved all over the US. I have also lived in Canada, and have been married to a Canadian for almost 34 years. As a kid, I lived in Alaska.
So I sound like whoever I'm speaking to. It's not something I really control. If I try, I lose it, and garble the accents together.
I think Mawmaw and Grandma or whatever are the same thing, but if you have four (or more, with steps) living grandparents, you use different names for them.
My mother grew up in DC my dad grew up in California however his family is from Tennessee where I grew up and still live. Some people in my family live in Louisiana and they have a very distinct accent. I have a bit of a southern accent but not very much of one but certain words and yes that was yodeling which used to be common in country music.
I bet family get together sound fun 👍
@@claudias2948 Yeah It's rare that all of my family comes together but when it happens it sounds really interesting and I truly feel my southern accent come out.
I had to train myself to speak so ppl could understand me when I moved just one state over 😂
Its funny but southerners can also spot northern accents and where we are from.Took a road trip with friends from buffalo ny to fort walton beach florida. We stopped for food on the way somewhere at a subway the guys making our food not only knew we were from newyork but also buffalo and we have a totally different accent then nyc.
S. African here, English is my 3rd language, grew up on American TV and movies. I'm excited at how many accents I understand, ebonics and all. 😅 Dumb flex but TV was my friend.
It's not just the accents, the thicker the accent the more dialect is usually spoken, so even if they spoke with the same accent as the listener, the words they're saying might not make sense immediately.
Let me know where I can send a video or voice recording to you southeast Missouri here you might be surprised would like to include my sister in this just to show the difference
Africans(Americans)also told stories and even communicated serious messages to one another through songs. I specify Americans because I know that African communities did recall their history through stories, but I am not sure that they all sang those stories.
Often different "sides" of a child's family (mom's side/ Dad's side) will have different terms for parents/grandparents/great-grandparents. for instance on my (German Welsh) dad's side my grandmother was "Mama )" on mom's side (Brit/Irish/Scot/Welsh) my Grandmother was Grammie and my GREAT grandmother on mom's mom's side was "Mama " My great grandmother on Mom's DAD'S side was "Grandma
I live in Savannah, Georgia, and the southern accent here sounds exactly like gone with the wind movie…. You must have someone from the south, say the word omnipotent for you.
Kabir, I live in New England. "Aunt" is pronounced like "ahhnt" not "ant." From that one word, I can tell you whose family cane from outside of New England, even if the person I'm speaking with grew up in New England.
There are other tells, too, like not having three distinct pronuciations for "marry, merry, and Mary." I can tell if you're not from the place where I grew up if you pronounce the word "ferry" like "fairy," but that's a specific sub-dialect from my corner of New England (I have what's considered to be an "old" New England accent).
Im from South Louisiana, and we use words where they shouldn't be, along with swinging the vowels to allow words to roll off the tongue easier.
Me: Maaaa! Need ni'thing? Bout to go make groceries!
Translation: Mom, do you need anything from the store? Im going buy groceries.
Me: Mawmaw told me to pick up my room else she gon' grab a switch!
Translation: Grandma told me to clean my room or she will woop my ass with a stick!
Me: Dey got dat der paddle on dat pireaux n it don fell'n da bayou n'ai aint gon in n get it.
Translation: They had that paddle on their little boat and it fell in the bayou, and im not going in to get it. (Pireaux is a cajun word that also doesn't directly translate from French).
I have my accent, but i hide it to prevent job opportunities from passing me by in other states.
Also, gentle warning, if someone says "Alright na", observe the tone. Because "Alright na!!" may be followed by a fighting stance or being sized up and down, for you likely offended someone. But, "Alright na!" with a slight smile means youve impressed them. The same can be said when someone says "oh bless your heart", albeit most times, its the nicest way to get insulted in the south, for they think "your screws upstairs may be a lil loose" 😅
i sound very different from my mom she has a thick georgia accent but im from new mexico
The British say butter 3 ways:
BUH-ta
BUH-da
BUH-ah
It's strange that you were so surprised by the different American accents.
The only times that I've been to Britain was at Heathrow airport, but from what I understand, Liverpool and Essex have completely different accents, not even mentioning Scotland and Northern Ireland. And when you consider that the entirety of the UK would be like the 11th biggest state in the US, it's amazing that we can understand each other at all here. The entirety of Western Europe is about the size of the United States. Imagine having to understand every person, in every Western European country. Over there, y'all have different languages. We have different accents.
Interestingly enough, many European scholars say that the 'neutral' Midwestern US accent (like you hear in most American TV series and movies) is how the English spoke pre-1700AD.
Many even say that Shakespeare's plays were written and are meant to be performed in what is now considered an American accent. Apparently, once transportation became easier, rural people would travel to cities like London, and then go back to their towns and villages and try to speak like the "posh", spreading what is now known in the US as an English accent. Obviously, you people that live there know that there are many different accents in the UK, but for we americans, the Monty Python/BBC presenter accent is what we consider British. I'll see some of these Irish or Scottish entertainers, and can't understand a damn word they say.
I loved this video watched it twice . Kabir I'm a east end women/ cockney if you go 2/3 miles north london its sounds different and again , go south london different . At least they are states apart we are a few miles apart . Funny how we don't hear our own accent only other accents . God help the poor tourists 🤣🤣
NORTH CAROLINA in the house-or as my elders would say --"NAUF KAYALINUH IN DUH HAUCE"!!!!!! NC
I have learned in my years to appreciate those I am with by keeping my mouth shut until I know what I have to say? That always seems to work.
as a New Englander I've met people from Oklahoma that I find really hard to understand. They probably think the same about me!
I have lived in the South (I am on the Gulf Coast) so long that I do not notice the accents any longer. My Partner has a thick accent, but I don't hear it any longer either. It's a shame, because I love accents. It's crazy how West Virginia and Kentucky are considered Southern, when they are closer to Canada than Illinois or Iowa are..when people from KY brag about being Southern it makes me laugh.
Doesn't the UK have a wide variety of accents too? I've heard some of them, they are really cool.
"You can't pronounce your R's and G's, when your speaking Southernese.", Jimmy Buffet
Most of these accents are very regional within a state. Country rural backwoods folk will have a different accent than someone just a few miles away from a small town. But yeah, someone from New England and from the deep south would not understand each other at first. Sounds like Kabir needs to go to New Orleans and then venture out into the smaller towns to really experience a conversation to never forget. They'll have a good time with you being from the UK
I didn't come across "chiggers" (red bugs) until I moved from Florida to Georgia. Had a college class outside on the grass of the quad in college, as you do. Did I know in advance to bring a blanket or towel? No. I sat on the grass. Spent the next week with bites all over me. They're so tiny, you hardly see them. But boy oh boy do they itch/hurt when they bite you. And they're in swarms, not one or two on you, but hundreds.
I grew up in Central illinois, and we had chiggers everywhere in the summer
Kabir, I've lived all over the south, and did a pretty good job at guessing. The irony, is one word we use ALL over the south, but Brits, Canadians, Aussie, and even new Zealanders use is "reckon". It's so awesome, but so weird how we use a slang word so frequently together, and don't even realize it! Oh, as a chef, grew up watching Cajun chefs like Justin Wilson in the 80's, and Cajun cooking is my passion, I can't stand people giving Tatum a hard time for his Gambit accent. He was spot friggin on! I was even able to laugh so hard when he called Logan "coullion souir" (right before he threw the card to break the bottle) which basically translates to ignorant pig headed dumb-ass!😂
I can't understand southern accents to save my life. We moved from Northern California to Northern Illinois and I was made fun of constantly. Not for my accent, but for the words I used. It's like we had two different dictionaries for each state! Worst offender: Freeway vs. Tollway.😂
I knew a Korean guy raised in Tennessee....
He sounded like Elvis.
1st 10 years of my life were in Gary, Indiana. Then, we moved to Central Illinois. Indiana: wash. Illinois: warsh. Indiana: 8, 9, ten. Illinois: 8, 9, tin.
i'm amazed how many accents are in England never mind all of the U.K.
Shirley MacLaine is originally from Virginia.
Kabir's posh London accent sounds nothing like a blue collar Nottingham accent.
The people of New Orleans do not speak with a Cajun accent. Cajuns are country people. New Orleans was populated by Creoles. There isn't really a Creole accent, but you will hear what is called a "Yat" accent, derived from the common greeting, "Dawlin. Where y'at?" During the 1800s, waves of Irish immigrants made the city their home, and just like New York and Boston, the population lost the ability to pronounce the letter 'R.' 'Toilet' became 'terlet.' 'Boil it' became 'Berl it.' It's a unique accent, to say the least.
Also don’t confuse Southern with Appalachian
Please react to different British accents 😊
Just a note:
Texas, on its own, has more than just one accent.
People in South Dallas don't sound like people in North Houston... and they don't sound like people in San Antonio... and they don't sound like people in Austin... and NONE of them sound like small town Texans.
He didn’t cover Arkansas and Texas. And Missouri.
My grand fathers was from the ozarks he was like pop corn sutton. Myy cousin is runs a farn in the ozarks❤ his kind came from scotland. In the 1700s. The came to the ozarks to hide from the english.😮 two hunderd years in the ozards till 1923 granda was the first of his scottish clan to come to kansas city. He married potowatomi indain Now here im❤ watch the beverly hillbillies thats how they acted and talked.i watch it sometimea cause i miss them.❤❤but DNA proofs scottish on my grand fathers side hard to know they hid from the engliish for two hunderd years no outside clans found them after they defeated the english on kings mountain during the revoltion❤
Never fight a mountain. Man you will lose lost in them there Hills
Them Hills they are on the mountains of the Ozarks❤
This made my cry thinking of my kin grand dad would be 123 years old