Can an accent ever be Lost ?

[cavvytri]

I am a born and bred Northumbrian and speak "Pitmatic" a type of speech found around the coal mining areas here.. a mix of Geordie/Northumbrian and an accent all of its own. My maternal grandparents were also from this area, but they spoke with a Northumbrian rolling R, similar to german accent, and you don't hear that very often now.
My Dad was born and brought up in Edinburgh, but living here for the last 50 odd years, he speaks like we do until he speaks to his brother in Scotland on the phone and then he is instantly speaking in the Edinburgh "twang"....as for my poor South Australian husband..he is slowly getting to understand us all! He pronounces many words like someone from the South of England (barth/bath, carstle/castle, loyt/light etc..so much so that one of his workmates asked him "which part of the South are you from?" and he replied "Australia mate!"....."Wow! That IS a long way south!" was the reply.....

[LizzieW]

Does anyone wonder, like me, what accents their ancestors had, especially the ones who moved from, for instance, Cumbria (as it is today), to Hull.  Others from Suffolk/Norfolk to Hull, Hull to Manchester etc.

For some reason, I imagine them having very strong accents, like you hear sometimes on old recordings on TV and radio.

Lizzie

[meles]

My great aunt moved from London to Norfolk in the 1920's when she married a Norfolk man in her 20's. I recall in the 60's that her accent was pure Norfolk.

OH fled South Africa in the 70's when it was not good to have an accent from the apartheid country, and deliberately learned Southern English, and now speaks better than I do!

meles

[elaineinUSA]

I moved from Scotland to the States 30 years ago, but I still have my Scottish accent.  I don't consciously try to keep it, it is just still there. More so when I get of plane in Edinburgh.
On the other hand my sister moved to Australia and she is Aussie to the core, my brother moved to England and he has a English accent.
My children have moved around the world with us they don't have a Scottish accent but they understand the lingo. 

[*sparkle*]

I remember quizzing my Dad about this. We all have broad Scots accents (living south of the border hasn't affected mine except for slowing down slightly and pronouncing things clearly so I can be understood)

Anyway as part of my research I was quizzing my Dad and he was trying to tell me his Grandad was English. But he wasn't as I already had his birth details and had found him in the census listed as being local. Turns out his Mum was Irish and Dad was English (Worcestershire). So it explains why he had an unusual accent and was singled out for not sounding 'local' even though he was!

However I don't think any of the Irishness or Worcestersherishness has filtered down as far as me. However I somehow knew that as part of my research (before quizzing my Dad ) that we werent completely from the borders of Scotland despite the remaining 7/8 of me being pure Scottish border stock....

[acceber]

I think it varies, my grt aunt and uncle emigrated to Australia in 1969 from Gloucestershire with their 2 small children. They came over last summer and my aunt and uncle have an extremly strong west country accent, in which you couldnt tell they had lived abroad. My cousin (their son) who is 40, sounded completley Australian, with not a hint of Gloucestershire in his accent.

My mum left Wiltshire, where she grew up in 1985 and has lived in the South East since and is still told from time to time that shes 'not from round here' when she meets new people! Although she doesnt retain as much of her accent, she still has words and phrases which she uses e.g Daps for Plimsolls/Gym Shoes which I myself and others have no idea what she's talking about. (This ties in with the regional words thread a few posts below)

As already stated, I think if you make a conscious effort to keep your accent and dialect, and integrate with others who speak the same, you will. But if you adopt your new local accent and dialect you can lose it easily.

acceber - (bread in the south east but slips quite easily into a west country accent when in the company of her broad Bristolian relatives!)

[mariahswind]

My cousin (their son) who is 40, sounded completley Australian, with not a hint of Gloucestershire in his accent.

this is quite common here. The accent is lost with children of migrants from the UK. I think it's more n' likely because the accents here are really made up of the variety of UK accents.

This makes me wonder about my daughter who is 2 1/2, as to what her accent will be. We have always assumed she would get an Aussie accent because she lives here. Right now though she sounds like me sometimes with certain words and sometimes she says things that are more Aussie. We plan on home schooling her so her accent should be a melding of the two of us (and since DH's accent is very mellow I think she will have a nice accent)

Now here's something I completely forgot to mention in my earlier post... this is ironic... I've lived in Oz for over 10 yrs now and have only changed my accent a little, I go back to visit my parents who live in southern missouri (I was raised in Iowa) and I immediately start talking with a major twang! I can't help myself... I try not to do it but I do! And sometimes I catch myself mimicking various accents without trying... but I can't for the life of me do a real Aussie accent!

I am starting to pick up on the various accents from Britain since I have friends from London (who sound different from one another so I assume this means they are from different parts of the city) and I have a friend from Manchester, and some from Plymouth. But I hear of all these other places and would love to know what the accents are. I have ancestors from all over both Scotland and Britain, it would be great to know what they sounded like!

[indiapaleale]

I have been in the US for a little over 40 years. When I first came, I worked in a factory in Chicago and I was TOLD by one of my American co-workers - Oh, you're Irish! I said "No, I'm not."
She said,"YES, YOU ARE! You talk just like my neighbor and she's from Ireland."

I was born and raised in Birmingham! I'm a Brummie! LOL

My children were little tiddlers when we came - 6 - 4 - and 3 months. All of them speak with an American accent. When I go home to England, my family think I speak like a Yank - but people here can still tell that I'm a furrerner! LOL I don't mind.

So - accents don't even last one generation - the children pick them up from their peers, school, friends and carry them along. But - I think that once you have gone past about 25 years old, it's difficult to erase the dialect. AND, when I get round a bunch of Brummies - I am in 7th heaven! Ow Yow doin? Aright ar kid?

IPA

[BevL]

What gets me is that I am a born and bred Australian, but the first time we holidayed in the UK everyone we spoke to asked how long since I had left England - but the part the got me was that my husband came to Australia when he was 10 and the usual joke when he spoke 'was do you want a Fosters'.
Bev