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English vs English


deanb
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Woops, blame the wikipedia article I was reading to check I was using the word preserve correctly for mentioning it. I'll amend the original post to appease your wrath.

 

PS. Are you not yourself English, WTF? I always thought you were but the way that post is worded sounds to me more like you're not of English descent at least.

Edited by Mr W Phallus
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Woops, blame the wikipedia article I was reading to check I was using the word preserve correctly for mentioning it. I'll amend the original post to appease your wrath.

 

PS. Are you not yourself English, WTF? I always thought you were but the way that post is worded sounds to me more like you're not of English decent at least.

Lol Sorry.

 

 

Well I am English technically. My roots not so much. My mother is Spanish, Middle Eastern, Indian and English and my father is mostly English and a bunch of other stuff. My grandparents on one side dropped most of their British Heritage for some reason and wanted to live in the 'colonial nations'.

 

Not to mention I was raised in 7 nations so my accent and language is all over the place. And to think I spoke RP and went to a public school when I was a kid, still I did only have private education for most of my life so I'm going to sound funny. I sound 'British' to Americans and I sound 'American' or 'Canadian' to most Londoners today (though I didn't some 20 years ago). Truth be told, due to my education and roots, I enunciate a fair bit and pronounce words in British English, however, due to my travels I've picked up on 'TV language' since outside the UK a lot of international schools tend to be more Americanised mostly to do with the fact they have kids whose parents work for oil companies or are from the various US military bases... as a result my language and accent for lack of a better word is quite 'international' which sucks because I have no sense of national identity or even identity for that matter. I hate and love everyone equally XD.

 

I don't tend to get into details about my background because uh I still like to remain slightly anonymous on the internet :)

 

That post was worded specifically because of my 4 years spent in India and coming to terms with a culture where I felt extremely alien (they're extremely friendly people, but my first year of living there I struggled in learning the language and had to start from a basic level because while they all spoke English I wanted to know if anyone said anything behind my back - call it paranoia).

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Well that explains it then. I wasn't meaning to pry (well only a little XD), I was just curious.

 

You've certainly had a colourful life so far, makes me wish I had more experience of other cultures. I've travelled quite a bit to some interesting places (China, Russia, Peru), but mostly on school trips (one of the benefits of going to a private school) and it's just not the same as actually living and integrating into a different culture.

 

What was the thread topic again? :scratch: Quick, someone get us back on track.

Edited by Mr W Phallus
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  • 2 weeks later...

Does anyone here have a 'mutable' accent? As in someone who can switch between multiple accents regional or national depending on who they're talking to?

 

It's been brought to my attention that depending on my company my accent varies. I speak in semi RP when I speak to my English friends (that's most closest to my natural accent) and when I speak to my American friends it just slips to something that's close to So Cal (it's all due to constant exposure to some of my good friends from there consistently for a few years in my life). Apart from that I can pick up on European (Franco-Belgian), Asian (Indian- Subcontinental) and Middle Eastern ones. It's just weird to realise this. It's almost like I'm subconsciously adapting to everyone I meet and talking in a way that's comprehensible to them (It isn't an instant thing, it takes a few conversations and then these people are like wtf I didn't get you 2 days ago and now you speak in an accent that I can understand perfectly...)

 

Does anyone else have this weird issue?

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I think the closest I get to that is I sometimes sound a bit more northern when I'm drunk. XD

 

It sounds like a more advanced version of how people tend to adapt their vocabulary, using some different slang words, phrases etc when they hang out with different friend groups (or at least I do that anyway).

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Does anyone here have a 'mutable' accent? As in someone who can switch between multiple accents regional or national depending on who they're talking to?

 

It's been brought to my attention that depending on my company my accent varies. I speak in semi RP when I speak to my English friends (that's most closest to my natural accent) and when I speak to my American friends it just slips to something that's close to So Cal (it's all due to constant exposure to some of my good friends from there consistently for a few years in my life). Apart from that I can pick up on European (Franco-Belgian), Asian (Indian- Subcontinental) and Middle Eastern ones. It's just weird to realise this. It's almost like I'm subconsciously adapting to everyone I meet and talking in a way that's comprehensible to them (It isn't an instant thing, it takes a few conversations and then these people are like wtf I didn't get you 2 days ago and now you speak in an accent that I can understand perfectly...)

 

Does anyone else have this weird issue?

 

I tend to pick up accents, unfortunately, a lot of people think I'm taking the piss as normally I'm "well spoken" so when I start to slip into another accent it can come across as mildly offensive.

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I tend to pick up accents, unfortunately, a lot of people think I'm taking the piss as normally I'm "well spoken" so when I start to slip into another accent it can come across as mildly offensive.

 

Well in my case, not many can place where I'm from based on my looks which helps (in several ways if i might add). So no one's going to take offense. My skintone ranges in colour depending on season. You know 'well spoken' is quite difficult to place. Do you mean people consider you well educated, posh or just you talk like you're from a good background? Honestly though well spoken is an asset, most of the speaker's opposite sex like it that way.

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I tend to pick up accents, unfortunately, a lot of people think I'm taking the piss as normally I'm "well spoken" so when I start to slip into another accent it can come across as mildly offensive.

 

Well in my case, not many can place where I'm from based on my looks which helps (in several ways if i might add). So no one's going to take offense. My skintone ranges in colour depending on season. You know 'well spoken' is quite difficult to place. Do you mean people consider you well educated, posh or just you talk like you're from a good background? Honestly though well spoken is an asset, most of the speaker's opposite sex like it that way.

 

I'm a bit of a Mediterranean mongrel myself. I mean well educated/posh though it depends on who you ask. I'm sure I'd sound like a total pleb to an actual posh person but, generally speaking, I'm one of the more well educated/posh people in any given room.

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I'm a bit of a Mediterranean mongrel myself. I mean well educated/posh though it depends on who you ask. I'm sure I'd sound like a total pleb to an actual posh person but, generally speaking, I'm one of the more well educated/posh people in any given room.

 

There you go. Absolutely no problem then.

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Getting back to the topic like what are all the oddities you notice in specific regional dialects. Things like Fink, aks, exasctly, fought (thought actually) and so on. Btw these aren't all used in the same place or by the same people.

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I think England has more words for a bread roll than any other country ever. I've heard them called everything from rolls, to baps, to buns, barm cakes, butties, cobs and stotties, all used to describe a bread roll, sometimes dusted with flour.

 

We (in Ireland, it appears to be the same) generally reserve "roll" for the foot long baguette whereas the rest are their own unique types of roll.

 

Have a Blaa!

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It's kind of how anything on your feet are shoes and all soda is coke.

 

Don't know if this has been brought up, and I'm not about to sort through 24 pages to find out, but here every soft drink is known as Coke. Sometimes, soda is an acceptable term as well. My father is from Michigan and calls it pop.

 

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You know I've a lot of business associates I constantly have to communicate with and despite being able to switch accents the pronounciation always stays the same.

 

I mean there's no way I'll start saying ferdil instead of fertile as an example (also it irks me for some reason, irked me when Nolan North as the prince did it in the Prince of Persia game).

 

As for bread there are differences ask any kid who ended up working at Sainsburys in the bread aisle. My kid brother's friend worked in one and I know a few myself.

So without further ado the various types of buns

 

Bap --> It's bigger, about 6 inches. The dough has butter or something similar to make the dough soft. The shape can vary depending on region and in Scotland they aren't sweet and in Ireland they can contain currants.

 

Butty ---> Now you don't call bread or buns butty without chips. It's a chip buttie or nothing. I've not come across anyone calling a bun a butty without chips.

 

Bread Roll --> Everything here is generally a bread roll. It's the quadrilateral amongst bread. Baps,buns, cobs, stotties, manchets, etc are all various bread rolls.

 

Cob --> Round bread roll. It's crusty in some parts.

 

Stottie --> thick fat round loaf. Leavened and tastes more like dough.

 

Barm cakes have hops and it's also barm-leavened.

 

Cakes generally contain more sugar but it need not be sweet (when we refer to the bread roll cake i.e.)

 

Sometimes in some parts bread rolls are called muffins though we do have a different muffin as well.

 

TN you made the error in say they're all the same bread roll when in fact they are different types of bread rolls. You really need to run int some breadies or head to a proper bakers XD.

There's a lot more. Also Blaa is also a type of bread roll. I think you guys generalised the various types of bread rolls. It's like say it tastes like fish when each fish has a different flavour, here it's different ways to prepare it. Bread isn't all the same really.

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Don't know if this has been brought up, and I'm not about to sort through 24 pages to find out, but here every soft drink is known as Coke. Sometimes, soda is an acceptable term as well. My father is from Michigan and calls it pop.

 

Here in Ireland, we tend to call them fizzy drinks but we'll be more specific when it comes to for example asking someone if they wanted a coke or a fanta, even if there's only one option available.

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Butty ---> Now you don't call bread or buns butty without chips. It's a chip buttie or nothing. I've not come across anyone calling a bun a butty without chips.

Bacon butty, definitely. I'd also use it for a fish finger butty. I probably wouldn't use it for much else but I'm pretty sure I've heard people refer to all sorts of sandwich as a butty. Could be a Northern thing.

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