International Intense Dictionary

[Parts]

And with what I said earlier, I wouldn't expect QV, cbc, PPK, MLA or any other American here to change their accent if they move to Australia. I think everyone should be able to speak the language or dialect they were brought up with, and people should be able to understand it.

But then again, this mainly applies to forms of English.

I would not change it consciously but I have a tendency to pick up the accent of whoever I am speaking to.  Some people get very offended thinking I am making fun of them but I don't even know I am doing it most of the time unless told

[P7PSP]

What gives me the shits is when an Aussie goes accross to the states, say Greg Norman, and then after a year or so he speaks with a fluent American accent. What makes it so hard for people to understand the native dialect and why should people have to change just to be understood?

Same thing with Hugh Laurie - who played George in Blackadder Goes Forth, and is now more commonly known as House. I could understand using the accent for the show, but to continually use it at other times?

I had Californians tell me that I had picked up a slight Memphis accent in the 7 months that I was stationed there. OTOH I found Virginians to be stuck up fuck heads so none of their bastardized/hybridized Northeast/Southern accent stuck on me. When I speak Spanish I have to make an effort not to say things like an Andalusian would, i.e. "giro al izquierda" rather than the "giro al ithquierda" as spoken in Andalusia.

I do think that you are right though about the likely hood of me picking up more than the vestiges of an Aussie accent. I would more likely just pick up the local idioms like using take away instead of to go. Most of the Limey/Kiwi/Aussie expressions intuitively make sense after a couple of listens.

['andersom']

What gives me the shits is when an Aussie goes accross to the states, say Greg Norman, and then after a year or so he speaks with a fluent American accent. What makes it so hard for people to understand the native dialect and why should people have to change just to be understood?

Same thing with Hugh Laurie - who played George in Blackadder Goes Forth, and is now more commonly known as House. I could understand using the accent for the show, but to continually use it at other times?

I had Californians tell me that I had picked up a slight Memphis accent in the 7 months that I was stationed there. OTOH I found Virginians to be stuck up fuck heads so none of their bastardized/hybridized Northeast/Southern accent stuck on me. When I speak Spanish I have to make an effort not to say things like an Andalusian would, i.e. "giro al izquierda" rather than the "giro al ithquierda" as spoken in Andalusia.

I do think that you are right though about the likely hood of me picking up more than the vestiges of an Aussie accent. I would more likely just pick up the local idioms like using take away instead of to go. Most of the Limey/Kiwi/Aussie expressions intuitively make sense after a couple of listens.

Myth has it that that Andalusian th is because of a king with a speech-impediment, somewhere in the 18th century. 

[P7PSP]

I never heard that one. OTOH I never heard of Catalans until I went there either.

[ZEGH8578]

"ersters" sound almost exactly like we'd pronounce it in norwegian

[renaeden]

As I understand it, the Aussie accent is the easiest to lose but the hardest to gain. Anyone that comes over here from another country never loses their accent, even if they are here for 20+ years. But if an Australian goes over to the UK or US for a year or so they lose their Aussie accent.

I've heard the opposite said about Scottish accents.

I have lived outside my native Scotland for more than half my life, but I still have a Scottish accent. You could drop me in the Amazonian rainforest to live with the local indigenous people, with no contact with native English speakers for the next 50 years, and I would still emerge sounding the way I do now.

Of course, I’d probably leave behind a tribe of Amazonians who speak English with a Scottish accent, say “wee” when describing something small or young, use the shortened version of vowels (the words “cot” and “caught” sound the same), and drop the G from words ending in “ing”.

I believe that. All Scottish people I have known (a fair few) have strongly kept their accents, even those who have been here for many years.