Learning Kiwi accent

[cappuccino]

IMHO if you are speaking any language and you are using in this language a word of another language you should try pronouncing this word in the way that other language does it.

That reminds me of Telstra Clear's voice activated service whereby when I gave the answer 'Yes' to a question, it said that it did not understand my response. However, when I said 'Yisssss', it did understand me!

[JandM]

Should've guissed!

[James 1077]

IMHO if you are speaking any language and you are using in this language a word of another language you should try pronouncing this word in the way that other language does it.

I'm sorry but that is just too confusing! There are so many words that we use in everday usage that are borrowed from different languages - should we be using the original pronunciation for these? And what about where that language has, in turn, borrowed it from elsewhere?

What about place names and country names? And what if that country has more than one official language - can we pick and choose?

And which pronunciation should we use in situations where you have the same language but different accents? Should the inhabitants of Bath in England force everyone to say Barth as that is the way that they pronounce it (and does this apply to people speaking the same language but who would normally pronounce it as Bath which a short "a")?

[Tia Maria]

I haven't read the last 8 pages, so apologies if this has been mentioned....

My son is doing speech therapy, so it's quite interesting as she is teaching him to say words, vowels etc in a Kiwi way, although he is then confronted by us saying them in an English way. Probably the most important difference is how we say his name and how she does, and whether one way in particular should be chosen.

The best one was when he had a different Scottish speech therapist, in NZ, teaching him to say his vowels in what appeared to be an English/Kiwi way but removing as much Scottish as possible!

I probably don't help matter by being from London and dropping letters left, right and centre.

Ultimately accents don't matter, it's the ability to make yourself understood.

Cheers

Tia

[KelvinAng]

That reminds me of Telstra Clear's voice activated service whereby when I gave the answer 'Yes' to a question, it said that it did not understand my response. However, when I said 'Yisssss', it did understand me!

I've got a similar experience with that voice recognition system and found it mildly entertaining