Thursday, July 4, 2013

Assimilation

On this most American of holidays, I have a confession to make: I am no longer completely 100% Born in the USA.

Or at least my accent isn't. We have a good friend who is a voice coach and works with various actors on regional accents. She asked to record me and Himself as examples of a General American accent, and we of course said yes. So she came over with a bunch of recording equipment and a list of words and phrases for us to read. Imagine my surprise as, working my way through the list, I was asked to repeat myself on several occasions, with specific directions as to how to revert to my typical American accent! Apparently I've picked up some British pronunciations, but only when I'm talking to British people. When I start talking about America (I talked about Thanksgiving traditions for a bit), my accent goes completely back to "general American". Hunh.

The most infuriating thing, however, is that my husband had absolutely no issues with maintaining a true blue American accent, a fact I attribute to his innate stubbornness. Or something like that.

I hope you all have a wonderful 4th of July!