Is it too late for my American-sounding toddler?

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Martha N.

Posted: Thu Apr 10, 2008 8:38 am

Guest

I'm American but live in England with my English husband. Our
three-year-old must've picked up his speech from me, because he
pronounces some things the American way, especially the d for t
in words like "wadder" and "nawdy" (water and naughty).

We plan to stay here and I don't want him to be picked on in
school for the way he talks.

Can we retrain him not to sound American? How?

Is it too late? Or will he automatically pick up the local
pronunciations when he spends more time with local people?

Thanks for any advice.

Mike Lyle

Posted: Thu Apr 10, 2008 11:29 am

Guest

On Apr 10, 7:38ï¿½pm, "Martha N." <mar...@NOSPAM.invalid> wrote:

Quote:

As the others have said, don't worry about it: he'll fit in naturally.
You may find your own accent a greater concern as it changes gradually
to Mid-Atlantic.

--
Mike.

Peter T. Daniels

Posted: Thu Apr 10, 2008 12:10 pm

Guest

On Apr 10, 2:38 pm, "Martha N." <mar...@NOSPAM.invalid> wrote:

Quote:

People tend to settle (unconsciously) on the regional and social
dialect they'll have for the rest of their life (see other responses
in this thread) during their middle teens, when they first become
acutely aware of social pressure and peer groups. So you have about a
decade not to worry about your son's accent, and by the time he's 13
or 14, his accent will be the least of his traits that will be
bothering you.

Adrian Bailey

Posted: Thu Apr 10, 2008 1:50 pm

Guest

"Martha N." <martha@NOSPAM.invalid> wrote in message
news:397647bfad1e563170035461113c6633@pseudo.borked.net...

Quote:

1. We're concerned that our 3-year-old sounds _too much_ like the local
people! I think you should be happy that yours sounds more like you.

2. Do you really think that 4-year-olds are picked on for the way they talk?
By whom? The other kids? The teachers? If he _is_ picked on, or if he feels
uncomfortably different, you'll discover that at his age he'll learn to
conform in no time. Whatever transpires, there's no need for any
"retraining".

Adrian

the Omrud

Posted: Thu Apr 10, 2008 2:33 pm

Guest

Martha N. wrote:

Quote:

I'm sure he will pick up the local pronunciation at school. I'd be more
worried about what the local accent is. I mean, he might end up
sounding like a Brummie (we don't usually do smilies here in AUE but I
see you're not from around these parts, so Smile

)

--
David

Richard Chambers

Posted: Thu Apr 10, 2008 3:25 pm

Guest

Martha N wrote

Quote:

Don't worry about it.

In 1972, I came from the Midlands (of England) to live in Yorkshire. I have
absolutely nothing against the Leeds accent, it's lovely, but as things
turned out I have picked up very little of it -- except that I now say "ont'
table", or even "ont'able", etc, instead of "on the table" etc . My wife,
who I married a couple of years after I came here, has even less of a Leeds
accent than I have -- she does not even stoop to "ont' table". Our two
children, before school age, spoke with the same accent as we have. Within a
year of starting school, they were talking with a slight Leeds accent. That
was enough for them to be able to bluff their way through the Leeds
schooling system without being picked on.

The true Leeds accent, like cockney, is an endangered species. Labour is so
mobile nowadays that people like me move into Leeds and inadvertently dilute
the local accent, while other people born and bred in Leeds move to
different parts of the country, again diluting the local accent. A city like
Leeds therefore has a complete mixture of accent, from Caribbean
[Spelling? - it's a miracle if I got that one correct] to Indian
sub-continent, to Polish, to Midlands, London and Eastbourne. We normally
aim to understand all these accents, and have plenty of practice doing it.

Another point to mention is that (because of television) the American
accent[1] is so well known in Britain that we hardly notice anybody who
happens to speak with that accent.

[1] or accents.

Richard Chambers Leeds UK.

James Silverton

Posted: Thu Apr 10, 2008 5:29 pm

Guest

Peter wrote on Thu, 10 Apr 2008 15:10:30 -0700 (PDT):

PTD> On Apr 10, 2:38 pm, "Martha N." <mar...@NOSPAM.invalid>
wrote:
??>> I'm American but live in England with my English husband.
??>> Our three-year-old must've picked up his speech from me,
??>> because he pronounces some things the American way,
??>> especially the d for t in words like "wadder" and "nawdy"
??>> (water and naughty).
??>>
??>> We plan to stay here and I don't want him to be picked on
??>> in school for the way he talks.
??>>
??>> Can we retrain him not to sound American? How?
??>>
??>> Is it too late? Or will he automatically pick up the local
??>> pronunciations when he spends more time with local people?
??>>
??>> Thanks for any advice.

It's surprising how adaptable are kids. I started out Geordie,
switched to West Highland Scottish, went back to Geordie, then
West Yorkshire, back to the Highlands, college in Glasgow then
to the US. I think my accent stopped changing much at that
point, tho' when I bought a jacket in Oxford, the salesman said
"Shall I send it to your college?"

James Silverton
Potomac, Maryland

E-mail, with obvious alterations:
not.jim.silverton.at.verizon.not

Peter T. Daniels

Posted: Thu Apr 10, 2008 5:45 pm

Guest

On Apr 10, 6:51 pm, "John Dean" <john-d...@fraglineone.net> wrote:

Quote:

Martha N. wrote:
I'm American but live in England with my English husband. Our
three-year-old must've picked up his speech from me, because he
pronounces some things the American way, especially the d for t
in words like "wadder" and "nawdy" (water and naughty).

We plan to stay here and I don't want him to be picked on in
school for the way he talks.

Can we retrain him not to sound American? How?

Is it too late?

Uh huh.
But not too late to teach him to lie and claim he's Canadian.
Or you could change the way *you* speak and let him pick *that* up.

Well, no, she can't really, since she's presumably more than 16 years
old or so.

At best she's picked up some local traits so when she comes home to
the US, folks notice that she has a "British accent."

Quote:

But the more time he spends socialising with Brit kids, the more likely it
is he'll look to synchronise with them rather than you.

John Dean

Posted: Thu Apr 10, 2008 5:51 pm

Guest

Martha N. wrote:

Quote:

Uh huh.
But not too late to teach him to lie and claim he's Canadian.
Or you could change the way *you* speak and let him pick *that* up.
But the more time he spends socialising with Brit kids, the more likely it
is he'll look to synchronise with them rather than you.
--
John Dean
Oxford

Marc

Posted: Thu Apr 10, 2008 6:07 pm

Guest

On Apr 10, 1:38 pm, "Martha N." <mar...@NOSPAM.invalid> wrote:

Quote:

Or will he automatically pick up the local
pronunciations when he spends more time with local people?

You have nothing to worry about.

I went to London at nine years old and went from an American accent to
the local accent in about six months. I personally have no memory of
this, but all my relatives tell me it's so, so it must be true. It
took me about the same amount of time to regain my American accent at
the age of eleven when I moved back to the States. (Again, no memory
of ever being even aware of my accent.)

Marc

R H Draney

Posted: Thu Apr 10, 2008 6:22 pm

Guest

John Dean filted:

Quote:

Or that he's a great admirer of Alistair Cooke....r

--
What good is being an executive if you never get to execute anyone?

Robert Bannister

Posted: Thu Apr 10, 2008 8:16 pm

Guest

Martha N. wrote:

Quote:

Children always conform to peer groups (although rarely to parents). He
will quickly pick up the local accent whether you want him to or not.

--
Rob Bannister

Guest

Posted: Thu Apr 10, 2008 11:28 pm

On Apr 11, 1:10 am, "Peter T. Daniels" <gramma...@verizon.net> wrote:

Quote:

On Apr 10, 2:38 pm, "Martha N." <mar...@NOSPAM.invalid> wrote:

I'm American but live in England with my English husband. Our
three-year-old must've picked up his speech from me, because he
pronounces some things the American way, especially the d for t
in words like "wadder" and "nawdy" (water and naughty).

We plan to stay here and I don't want him to be picked on in
school for the way he talks.

Can we retrain him not to sound American? How?

Is it too late? Or will he automatically pick up the local
pronunciations when he spends more time with local people?

Thanks for any advice.

People tend to settle (unconsciously) on the regional and social
dialect they'll have for the rest of their life (see other responses
in this thread) during their middle teens, when they first become
acutely aware of social pressure and peer groups.

This is as may be, but the accent people have is very much about who
they identify with. I was bullied from my first schoolday, and
although I had spoken the local dialect of Finnish with my friends
until I started at school, I soon lost it entirely, because I didnt
identify with them bastards I was going to school with. Instead, I
spoke to everybody in my grandparents' literary Finnish - they were
primary school teachers whose job it was to inculcate standard
language. Now that I have been living in Southwestern Finland for half
my lifetime, I have adopted both the local accent and many local
dialectal traits. Few people believe I am from Eastern Finland at all
when they hear me speaking. The fact is that I rather like it here and
identify with the place, and have even started taking an interest in
local history. The industrial casualty where I grew up I never liked,
or identified with. It always was a place to get away from.

Martin Rich

Posted: Fri Apr 11, 2008 1:52 am

Guest

On Thu, 10 Apr 2008 12:38:33 -0600 (MDT), "Martha N."
<martha@NOSPAM.invalid> wrote:

Quote:

My grandmother was born in America, but came to England at the age of
around 7 and lived in Manchester until around her mid-teens. As an
adult she spoke pure Mancunian English.

From memory, there's a woman called Judith Rich Harris (no relation of
mine) who studied the children of Hungarian immigrants into America,
and particularly why they picked up American voices from their peers,
and not Hungarian accents from their parents. I think she used this
to make some controversial inferences about parental influence, but
the fundamental point stands, that children acquire the accent of
where they grow up.

It's fairly certain that your son will start speaking British English
once he's at school. I appreciate your anxiety that he might get
picked on when he starts school, but probably better to deal with that
if and when it happens (the school should be supportive if he is being
bullied), than try to train him to speak differently now.

Interestingly, my son was friendly with a little boy both of whose
parents were American, but who lived and attended nursery/pre-school
in England. At 3 years old this boy's accent was genuinely
mid-Atlantic.

Martin

Marc

Posted: Fri Apr 11, 2008 3:07 am

Guest

On Apr 11, 6:23 am, Matthew Huntbach <m...@dcs.qmul.ac.uk> wrote:

Quote:

We need to remember, when communicating with Americans, that they
pronounce their 'r's. So what you write as "ar", they will think of
as symbolising "arrr". You could write it as "ah" to convey the

And then there are those Americans who say warsh instead of wash
(appropriately making Washington Warshington).

Marc

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