David Gerard wrote:
I was amazed when I moved to Walthamstow (London
E17). I heard accents
from people obviously born here that sounded like NOTHING ON EARTH I'd
ever heard before. The Australian accent is incredibly homogeneous by
comparison.
American, too. I pride myself (more or less) on speaking a very
standard American English with a very standard American accent. This
has become more important as I speak to people whose first language is
not English, because a very mainstream American accent is easy to
understand (for people who watch American movies, at least, which
means a lot of people).
Germans and Dutch and French have reported to me that I am easier to
understand than Angela, for example. (She has a beautiful accent in
my opinion, but it sounds Very British.)
Now, even so, I once took a fun little quiz/survey online (which I
can't find now) which was able to identify that I'm from the south --
it utilized vocabulary and pronounciation questions and in some cases
I had no idea that there were regional variations at all.
--Jimbo
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Most of the world can't even tell what language i'm speaking most of the
time. I'm from Newcastle, England and have the accent to suit.
I think that in Britain, the further North your accent originates from, the
harder it is for those not from your area to understand you. The London
accent is fairly easy to comprehend in comparison to a Manchurian or Geordie
accent.
- D. Hedley