So changing your "gender" is fine, but changing your accent is *weird*...

Someone on the thread’s called troll, but none of them seem to have noticed yet that MN is having a good laugh.

I have heard a story about German spies in WW2 who had learned about English culture from reading PG Wodehouse, and were discovered on landing in England because most English people didn't wear lavender spats and say "what ho!"

That may be made up, but it is true that Kaiser Wilhelm was a huge Wodehouse fan and, in exile in Holland, used to amuse himself by reading Jeeves stories to his bemused courtiers.

Once when in France I was complimented on how good my English is, by a German. We were quite perplexed as we thought the car would have explained things, but it sadly was not helpful.
MtTamednotdomesticated has worked with lots of people from all over the world who learnt their English through American culture, films etc, and who, on finding that they have also learnt American accents, were doing their best to lose it and sound English. And why America gets let off the hook for colonialism I do not know, humph.

😂😂

I was told to try and picture Iain Paisley in my minds ear as the sort of template for Protestant. Which was mercifully better than using the minds eye.

There is a folk story somewhere in the back of my head about using how a word is pronounced as a way to spot spies. I mean getting a German to say Featherstonehaugh was presumably an idea. Although I wonder if anyone here would get it right either 😆

There are some definite localisms, like pronouncing hand as haun is a very East Belfast thing.

Mostly these days I have remember to avoid certain turns of phrase that might confuse English friends. Like making tea and asking "would you like a drop in your hand?"

And, when sending a work email proposing a course of action, never say "for thon would be deadly crack"

It is possible to tell ethnic background for accents from certain parts of the Province.

And there's always the good oul ethnic shibboleth of how they pronounce 'H''.

Catholics tend to pronounce it as Haitch and Protestants tend to pronounce it as Aitch.

I might be moved to say that cheese makes him throw rings round him 😉

“'America is tied to maga and trump'
England is tied to colonialism, imperialism, coups, genocide, and above all TERFs to me. I would be more embarrassed sounding English than anything.”

Are TERFs worse than colonialism? 😂
These people are mad.

😍

The polite Norn Iron version of describing his attitude to cheese 😉

If you have a good ear, you can tell quite precisely where someone is from. To me, a Randalstown accent is very different from a Tobermore accent, and Ballymena is wile different again, though the triangle they make on a map is not big.

Town or village doesn't exactly tell you religion, but oftentimes it allows you a good guess.

the Idea that speaking in an American accent is going to be what outs chappie as non binary. I sort of thought the whole point of being non binary was to make a song and dance about it, no?

I've been asked several times - when speaking languages other than English - whether I'm Dutch.

Well, English is on the same branch. A few times watching Dutch films, some words leap out at me as being pronounced in perfect "English".

I shared a house with a (Cat'lic) guy from Norn'Iron for a year at Uni. He was adamant you could tell Protestant and Catholics apart purely by accent. Whether that's a thing or not, I've never really divined.

I will always defend Norn Iron as the most expressive form of English.

RP: My husband hates cheese.

NI: See me? See my man? See cheese? He hates it.

I don’t know you and I’m weirded out!!!

East. 😁

When I speak French in France people often ask if I am from Corsica.

Although maybe that was just my pronunciation of 'l'ecosse'.

Edit: or my habitual mangling of syntax

I've been asked several times - when speaking languages other than English - whether I'm Dutch. Which is probably not complimentary to my French/Bulgarian/German accents, but perhaps better than being obviously English?

Before hearing me speak, assumptions have included Russian, Dutch (again) and Irish. I am none of these.

Edit: can I report these people for misnationalitying me?

When I lived in Germany people asked me if I was Swiss. Which kind of makes sense to me...

Then again, anytime I meet Poles they always assume I'm Russian, and I have no idea where that comes from.

When I lived in France I used to be asked if my accent was Alsatian - from Alsace, not the breed of dog😄

Mostly infuriated by the "Radio 4 is overwhelmed by Scottish accents" comment, though that poster also said they only listen to Radio 4 "when they can bear to". I'm picturing someone wailing dramatically as they flail onto a couch after too much of the shipping forecast...

It was quite a shock to my friends when we first went to the US that Americans thought we were Australian. Which seemed to become more common the further south and west we went.

Hmm, I find strong Dublin accents much harder to understand than Kerry ones!