Do you find the Boston and New England American accents are similar at all to some British accents ?

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the old boy in blue jacket sounds somewhat RP english, so not nessesarily an english accent, but he has a pretty clean pronouciation of things in a typical posh or RP english kind of way (its hard because the quality is low)

but the other guy sounds true and true american, not a single word he says sounds english in any accent.

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EruditeTarington@reddit (OP)

None needed. I get the distinctions.

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Coca_lite@reddit

Not in the slightest. No American accent sounds remotely English

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AllRedLine@reddit

Not strictly true. There are still a few 'mid-atlantic' accents that can have some striking similarities with English accents.

There's also a few hyper-regional accents on the US seaboard that are literally holdover accents from British rule that have actually persisted in some more isolated communities. The 'Okrakoke' or 'Hoi Toider' accents in the Carolinas sound almost identical to a strong west-country accent.

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thecityofgold88@reddit

No American accents sound at all British.

The British are accustomed to a huge number of regional British accents and can determine a non British accent easily.

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AllRedLine@reddit

The OP I responded to:

"No American accent sounds REMOTELY British"

My response:

"That's not STRICTLY true."

Which it isn't. There are literally accents in the US which are noted by linguists for their similarities (not identical, but similar) to some British accents.

The people downvoting are literally just ignorant of the fact that some American accents that share some similarities with some British ones, or for some reason it pisses them off...

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herefromthere@reddit

There are similarities, but we are very accustomed to hearing accents from the UK and to a lesser extent the rest of the Anglophone world.

Even if you're not familiar with an accent, you can often place it by the ones that sound like they are from near by. For example, you might not know a Skelmersdale accent if you were not from round there, but you'd guess somewhere Liverpool/Lancashire and be more or less right, Skelmersdale had a lot of Liverpudlians move there donkeys years ago and there are similarities but to someone who is familiar with it they sound totally different. You wouldn't hear a Skelmersdale accent and think they were from North Wales though there are similarities in some sounds, just as you wouldn't hear a Cockney and think they were from Brisbane.

In the linked video, most of the speakers sound far more American than West Country, despite some similarities.

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C2H5OHNightSwimming@reddit

I think people gotta downvoting you just for lols at this point :") You're being so reasonable, gotta get downvoted

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thecityofgold88@reddit

OK, if you want, and I'm reluctant to sink into the Trumpian use of capitals but here we go Truth Social, no American accent sounds REMOTELY English. At all. To any British person.

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AllRedLine@reddit

I'm just highlighting the words to show which have meaning in the context.

You're wrong. If you watch the BBC clip I linked, you will see an example of one such accent that has similarities to a west-country accent. Linguists have noted the similarities and have been able to trace the lineage of some accents, precisely because they've been preserved from the Colonial era by their respective communities' isolation. These are very small populations and hyper-regional with very few native speakers. Nevertheless, to say none sound 'remotely' like any English accent (i.e. to imply there is literally zero similarities at all) is simply objectively untrue.

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denbolula@reddit

Have you ever left your home town?

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AllRedLine@reddit

I must have been to at least one or two other towns in my life, yes.

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thecityofgold88@reddit

They sound nothing like British accents today.

Obviously they have historical similarities, the United States wasn't born out of a vacuum, but nowadays there are no American accents that sound like British accents to a British person.

I'm not going to respond again. Look at the like/dislike for who is right&wrong.

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AllRedLine@reddit

Again, the link I provided shows you to be wrong, with distinct similarities to existing west-country accents.

Obviously they have historical similarities, the United States wasn't born out of a vacuum, but nowadays there are no American accents that sound like British accents to a British person.

You're quite just moving the goalposts here. OP says there are literally zero similarities at all, I disagree, you downvote me and agree with OP... but now you're saying there are similarities, but they just dont sound like a native English accent... which I never alledged... i just said there are similarities... which there provably are.

Look at the like/dislike for who is right&wrong.

Ahh yes... the most accurate measure of reality... Reddit votes.

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booroms@reddit

Cheating a bit here but if we open that up to north American and British Isles the Newfoundland accent can be very similar to Irish https://youtube.com/shorts/_DKmHGTOGbY?si=ToefGdSHMm_vz3yo

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herefromthere@reddit

The first chap in the blue tshirt with the hat sounds a bit West Country, but like an actor who his trying to imitate it and not doing very well. The rest all sound American.

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ICantSpayk@reddit

Jesus Christ those downvotes. I'm English and can definitely hear some massive west country accent influence in that.

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andyrocks@reddit

I guess you're American - to British ears they do not, at all.

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Bhfuil_I_Am@reddit

You can definitely hear Irish and British influences on the Eastern coast of the US and Canada.

In terms of Irish, a Newfoundland accent is very close to some dialects heard in Wexford or Tipperary

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andyrocks@reddit

Oh sure, but they are distinctly different and recognisable as such.

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AllRedLine@reddit

Btw... i literally never said they weren't distinctively different. In fact, I explicitly said they were just similar. You are agreeing with the point i made...

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AllRedLine@reddit

Nope. British.

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Tuscan5@reddit

What part of Britain? Where were you born?

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AllRedLine@reddit

Boston, Lincolnshire. Pilgrim Hospital to he precise.

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Royal_Philosophy7767@reddit

False, Boston is obviously in America

Checkmate American 😎

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AllRedLine@reddit

Damn, you outed me. If only i'd been more discreet!

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Commercial_Web2365@reddit

What adjective would you use to describe nandos

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pm_me_d_cups@reddit

Getting downvoted for this when it's clearly true is so funny

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Safe_Grass3366@reddit

Not sure why you're being downvoted man, I thought of the same BBC clip as soon as I saw the thread title.

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AllRedLine@reddit

My fellow Brits here on Reddit seem to have a very cringeworthy hatred of any sort of association with the USA. In this case, even if it's settled knowledge in linguistics lol. Just makes 'em angry.

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Neferknitti@reddit

Also, Kent Island, Maryland.

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Straight_Cicada5757@reddit

Have you ever heard the Ocracoke Broge' accent out of North Carolina? Because of its remoteness on the smaller islands its retained a lot of its Britishness still although its a dying accent unfortunatly! Its very similar to what we would call a south west / 'generic farmer' accent here in the UK!

Fascinating stuff - worth a look on Youtube!

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HMSWarspite03@reddit

What about Dick Van Dyke in Mary Poppins, the guy was a natural

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Doogerie@reddit

have you ever been to England nobody sounds like that I mean the accent he used works in the movie but that is nor an English accent.

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HMSWarspite03@reddit

I was joking, it is quite famously the worst English accent in recorded history.

Also, I've lived in England for all of my 59 years.

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Doogerie@reddit

Oh good I was worried there that you believed that all English people ( apart from the posh ones) sounded like that In,ram can you imagine if we all spoke like that. Just imagine a doctors office.

Doctor: So what ca I do for you today.

Patient: Cor Blimey is my ticker it is.

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HMSWarspite03@reddit

You should get out and about in England and become acquainted with some regional accents, Cornwall and the West country are quite obvious, but Ipswich/ Suffolk/Norfolk might surprise you, Ipswich is locally known as Ipsidge, Also head off up to Newcastle or even in to Scotland, the English accent is a many varied and wonderful thing, no just newsreader speech.

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Doogerie@reddit

I know it's a patchwork of wonderful regional accents and dialects I was just sayinh nobody in the uUK talks like Dick Van Dyke

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Icantspellforship@reddit

🤣 cowr Bloymey Merry Pawpins.

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WaldenFont@reddit

ELLO GUVNAH!!!

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HandOne4272@reddit

Ugh!

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DazzlingClassic185@reddit

lol

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PastorParcel@reddit

Incorrect: https://youtu.be/lFvzPWiTCS4?si=iqTL_S_qsHobF1PT

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neveramerican@reddit

Well, they once did, in the 17th and 18th centuries.

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MMH1111@reddit

'English'? Briddish if you please.

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andyrocks@reddit

Americans pronounce Ts as Ds. We do not.

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larusodren@reddit

If you ask me it’s the behaviour of a dosser. A dosser and a dwad.

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andyrocks@reddit

I think it's "dwod"

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Neferknitti@reddit

Not all do. That is part of some regional accents.

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andyrocks@reddit

Interesting - which American accent has the hard T?

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Neferknitti@reddit

Many of them do. Fun fact, in parts of the U. S. people don’t pronounce the T in the middle of a word at all. In Connecticut, there is a city called “New Britain”. A news anchor out of Hartford would pronounce the city as “New Bri’un”.

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andyrocks@reddit

Well which ones then?

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OneDropOfOcean@reddit

I can hear it a bit in some of the southern US accents.

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ZealousidealAd6382@reddit

No you only would if you had no ears

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ljofa@reddit

I’m surprised nobody commented on Loyd Grossman’s accent. His is certainly closer to a British accent but he has lived here for almost fifty years.

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Straight_Cicada5757@reddit

WHoooooo lives in a houuuse like thisssssss, David its ooooover to youuuuuuu

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Hamsternoir@reddit

Is this a bot or troll?

Do you find the California and Geordie accents similar after 12 pints of Fosters?

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Secret-Ice260@reddit

I am an American obsessed with Taskmaster. I adored Chris Ramsay’s Geordie accent, and my husband and I mimic his “No way!” all the time.

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Bose82@reddit

I feel like I need to hear that. An American doing a geordie accent would be interesting 😂

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Straight_Cicada5757@reddit

I'd love to hear that as well - the Geordie accent is one of the most difficult British accents to get spot on apparently!

Although that just reminded me of the bit off the Graham Norton show with Jimmy Carr trying to teach Antonio Banderas and Selma Hayek how to speak 'Geordie' with the words

Pooper Scooper

Roller coaster

Kawasaki

Oompah Loompah

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Secret-Ice260@reddit

Not just American, but southern. I can attempt his “No way!” easily enough, but it would be so embarrassing to attempt anything more. I’m sure it would sound hilarious to British ears.

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NeedleworkerBig3980@reddit

He was wrong about "Cook Book" being the most fun thing to say with a Georgia accent though. The answer is actually "Walkie Talkie". I used to have a Geordie colleague, and we occasionally his his handset so he would have to ask us if we'd seen his "Wakeee Takeee" (we always returned it immediately when asked, and we didn't do it too often).

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EruditeTarington@reddit (OP)

No bot, guy was older and probably his accent dying with him. He sounded like these guys crossed with a Kennedy https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=bXjU60a8dmI

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Straight_Cicada5757@reddit

To me, the chaps in that video sound more British than a typical American accent, although you can still tell the are American.

Love that line though - 'Dickens is MESSY George!' had me chuckling!

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No_Earth_5912@reddit

Just watched the context provided and I see what you mean. There’s elements that root it in American still for me though. I’d never mistake those blokes for British if you catch my drift. Would maybe take a 30 second conversation to be confident.

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EruditeTarington@reddit (OP)

I’m with you. My question is that is it close enough that my British colleague thought this old Boston McWasp taking the piss

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No_Earth_5912@reddit

I work in student accommodation, and we often have international students we think are taking the piss. Turns out they’ve genuinely been training themselves to speak like that, but they’re never good enough at it to pass as British. That’s how this sounds to me. Consciously talking one way for so long that it becomes second nature, but still influenced by those around regardless. Whenever he says “all”, it’s obvious to me.

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I_will_never_reply@reddit

Yes absolutely, sometimes there'll be a character in a movie and I'll think "why is he British when the character obviously isn't?" and it's because they're a character from that area

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EruditeTarington@reddit (OP)

I sense you’re taking the Michael

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I_will_never_reply@reddit

Not at all

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Doogerie@reddit

I mean some do a little Charls from MASH and Fraser from Fraser but that’s all oh and before you say Patrick Stewart he is English.

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HouseOfWyrd@reddit

They sound nothing like any British accent. You're completely incorrect.

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EruditeTarington@reddit (OP)

If you read my post you’d see I agree with you

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Murky_Gear_4623@reddit

Brit living in New England here...not at all similar other than occasional words like 'aunt'. Old-money New Englanders, esp older examples, can sometimes sound quite 'received', however.

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Arsey56@reddit

No, mainly because they aren’t similar

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NochMessLonster@reddit

I have no idea what a New England American accent is. I know a Boston accent from movies.

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EruditeTarington@reddit (OP)

This guy sounded like a cross between these old Bostonians and JF K boston brahmin

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Four-Assed-Monkey@reddit

One of these guys sounds like Anthony Hopkins doing Hannibal Lector. It's quite bizarre, and some elements could perhaps be mistaken for some kind of upper class English accent.

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Cyberhaggis@reddit

That's what I was thinking, you could mistake some of the drawl as a super posh English accent, but other than that they don't sound British at all.

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Four-Assed-Monkey@reddit

Exactly. Most of the overlap is to do with the upper class speech pattern, as opposed to some sort of American / "British" overlap (noting here that many people on this thread seem to be assuming "British" = Southern English).

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PM-me-your-cuppa-tea@reddit

That video sounds a little bit British, but I don't think it's a fair comparison. The average Bostonian doesn't sound like a descendent of John Adams & John Quincy Adams, vaguely related to Churchill and Diana, born before the Titanic sank and who's accent is described as "A rare and declining upper-class American accent"

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Antique-Brief1260@reddit

Peter Griffin

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Neferknitti@reddit

Peter Griffin is Rhode Island. There are many accents within New England.

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Antique-Brief1260@reddit

Sure, but Rhode Island is in New England, and to us they all sound similar

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Wild-Routine879@reddit

no.

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HandOne4272@reddit

In that clip of the two older guys, the one in the grey-blue suit could get away with being English. The other one? Nah!

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PinkLibraryStamp@reddit

I always think of Winchester from MASH reruns I watched in the 90s with my parents. For a while I couldn’t understand why a posh southern English Doctor was forced to go into the American Army. I can remember how he used to say Boston.

I’m northern British and our accents are very different north/south!

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Soggy_Amoeba9334@reddit

Aye, I thought he was English when I was a young child in the 70s.

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Free-Ambassador-516@reddit

Boston people came from Ireland, lol. (And don’t tell someone from Ireland that, it annoys them)

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HandOne4272@reddit

Kennedy didn’t sound remotely British!

The worst American/English accent was Dick Van Dyke in the original Mary Poppins 😖😱🤯🥴

And, there was an American child actress I saw in a couple of films (within the last 20 years) who did a cringy ‘cockney’ accent similar to Dick Van Dyke’s that was so twangy that it set my teeth on edge….

HOWEVER! Rene Zellweger’s British accent in The Bridget Jones ‘Movies’ was so stunningly authentic I didn’t realise she was American u til later I saw her talking American!

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DirectCaterpillar916@reddit

Not in the least. Mind you when I was working in Boston several locals thought my (Manc) accent was Aussie.

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BigDsLittleD@reddit

My brother used to work in New Jersey.

One or two of the locals in the bar down the street from his apartment, on finding out our parents are from Edinburgh exclaimed "I knew you were Scottish, I could tell from your accent"

My brother never lived in Edinburgh. He never lived in Scotland. My Brother sounds like Danny Dyer.

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EruditeTarington@reddit (OP)

One could or should never confuse those two

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Ok-Opportunity-979@reddit

Not General American and RP but certainly regional American Accents on the East Coast have a few connections back to ‘the old country’.

The ‘ah’ sound in Boston Brahmin is somewhat similar to long ah in East Anglian accents and there were migrations from East Anglia to New England Pre Revolution which probably explains this connection. I think the historical accents of Norfolk and Suffolk IMO sound like a mix between mostly South West England, Essex and to a lesser extent New England.

I heard some Islands off the coast of the Carolinas maintained a likening to rural South England and South West accents.

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TheRemanence@reddit

I don't think they do at all. Were there any particular words they thought were similar in particular?

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EruditeTarington@reddit (OP)

The way this guy said words with tle suffix

Like little was “lit-uhl “

The British colleague thought this guy Sean was making fun of him, not that he sounded like him and made me think maybe he did a little . This guy sounded more like these dudes https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=bXjU60a8dmI. Than mark wahlberg

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TheRemanence@reddit

Based on a few snippets of that youtube clip i can definitely hear similarities with aspects of RP british accent. Issue is, there are so many british accents that there can actually be greater variability within the country than there is between a specific british accent and a specific american one.

We are also all more sensitive to differences and similarities to our own accents. My mother is from new jersey but has lived in the uk for almost 50 yrs. Americans think she sounds british and brits think she sounds american. Same with my husband who is british but spent the first 10yrs of his life in the US.

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Purple_Bureau@reddit

If Boston is the one that's in every Matt Damon / Ben Affleck film, then not in the slightest

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EruditeTarington@reddit (OP)

It was this type https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=bXjU60a8dmI

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Purple_Bureau@reddit

The guy on the right has a bit of a Transatlantic quality to him, a bit like Frasier Crane, but he still sounds overall very American.

There's the odd word in there that sounds a tiny bit like received pronunciation (how the Queen spoke).

But basically I think it's just the sound of money coming though.

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teedyay@reddit

I can see what you mean about the chap on the right. I would find that accent hard to place, out of context, and probably wouldn’t guess American first.

The man on the left sounds 100% American to me though.

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MolassesInevitable53@reddit

That's old, 'posh' American. Not English.

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Neferknitti@reddit

The Matt Damon/Ben Affleck accent is from the south side of Boston, so a “Southie” accent. The posh Boston accent is Brahmin. The Kennedy accent is unique to that family.

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SaxonChemist@reddit

Some of the New England accents have more similarities with our accents than other US accents, but I don't think you'd get them confused

I tend to find those accents sound like they're in serious need of decongestant medication, or septum repair

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Frosty_Term9911@reddit

Not in any way shape or form.

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HalfExcellent9930@reddit

There are some similarities - they're both non-rhotic and both often have the intrusive R (as in law-rand order)

A native speaker will notice many differences obviously but there are also some definite similarities

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EruditeTarington@reddit (OP)

So like native English speakers will deny any similarities but a non English speaker will say you guys sound the same

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HalfExcellent9930@reddit

Possibly, but I couldn't really speak for a non English speaker

Probably just easier to say there are similarities

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DizzyDinosaurs@reddit

Yeah I was going to say this, the non-rhotic pronunciation of "car" sounds pretty similar to some Northern English accents for example.

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TimboJimbo81@reddit

😂 did you think McNulty’s accent in ‘The Wire’ was similar to wherever the fuck in America it was supposed to from?

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Own_Art_2465@reddit

Americans often say Baltimore (where the wire was) accent sounds English as well

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TimboJimbo81@reddit

Until they say route or roof

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CharmingMeringue@reddit

A bit of an odd accent and speech pattern, but no way does it sound British to me

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Mikon_Youji@reddit

No, American accents do not sound remotely British.

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BobbieMcFee@reddit

Boston sounds very British, as it's in Lincolnshire. The namesake (reboot?) however, doesn't. I understand it has some similarities, like many US accents to older UK ones. I understand the Eastern seaboard and Cornish have some links.

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hime-633@reddit

The Boston accent is incredibly distinctive and unlike any current British accent IMO. The vowels are wild. I love it. (Ancesats source: am British).

All that rhotic shit apparently traces back to ye olde southern England. Y'all be talking like we all (w'all?) used to talk :)

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pm_me_your_amphibian@reddit

Not even close

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SherlockOhmsUK@reddit

Nope - partner is Bostonian (New England not Lincolnshire) and she sounds in no way like any British accent I’m aware offhand

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J2JC@reddit

As a Brit who’s lived in the US for a long time: nope. (To go further, for me, are actually some well-spoken southern US accents where you can hear a very slight resemblance to certain English accents, and the non-rhotic nature of the New York City accent has some slight similarity too (it’s probably worth remarking that New York City was the loyalist place in the US War of Independence), but generally, speaking, US accents are really a long way away from (the myriad of) British accents.

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EruditeTarington@reddit (OP)

Indeed, they abstained from Independence vote

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Cheese-n-Opinion@reddit

They're non-rhotic - which means they only pronounce /r/ as a consonant if it is immediately followed by a vowel sound. This is quite a distinctive feature shared with most English and Welsh accents, that separates them from most other US accents. This is probably the source of the issue.

They don't sound British, but they could sound like an American trying to take the mickey out of British non-rhoticity.

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Shannoonuns@reddit

I swear i can hear bits of cockney in east coast American accents but I don't think i would ever mistake it for an American try to make fun of us :')

Like there's similarities, like dropping "h" at the start of words and glottal stops but I feel like i can also hear other accents in there too and its not like dropping "h"'s and glottal stopping is uniquely cockney or new england.

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EpsonRifle@reddit

Not even close

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Mango_Honey9789@reddit

The only accent from north America that sounds british is that weird Canada island in newfoundland or labrador or something where they sound Cornish

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NeedleworkerBig3980@reddit

I once came across a tiny former silver mining settlement in the Colorado Rockies. It had been much bigger once. The older residents sounded almost Cornish and when I looked at the local phone book (this was about 1990) a lot of them had Cornish surnames like Trebellan, Godolphin and Mevagissey.

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AlrightLove75@reddit

No. HTH.

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Caveman1214@reddit

No idea what New England sounds like, Boston accents (judging by online ones) are like no British accents I’ve ever heard