Help! I don't have an accent

[lockedonsie]

Or rather, a tone of voice that I stick to.

I can go from speaking like I'm quite 'posh' to speaking like I'm an Eastender.

I'm not really sure what it is. I've noticed subtle changes but now I'm realising there are big variations in between those two.

My own family have admitted it to me and donfind it odd.

I'm not really sure what it is. I've noticed that it does depend on the person I'm speaking to.

In addition to that, I seem to 'copy' accents very quickly. I'm not Irish but found myself speaking as if I were after a week of being there. Each time I had to stop and remember my true origins The Irish accent was harder to correct because it's obviously very different.

I was the same after a week or so in New York. Is there something wrong with me?!

I am the same. I'm Northern but lived in London for years and now in Australia. I can and do switch all the time. I do it for practical reasons. If I use my own, Northern accent here in Oz, no bugger understands me and I have to repeat myself sometimes up to 4 times.

So I use a plain RP to communicate here. Back home and I'm Northern again.

I spent two days in Australian and I sounded like I lived there all my life. I think it’s an empathetic skill. I can do posh posh and a Somerset accent on the click of a finger - it’s s weird skill and happens instantly

I’m the same - a bit of a chameleon. I think it’s to do with wanting (consciously or not) to “fit in” with the people you’re with. By the time I’d finished my teaching practice in Essex my accent was very... erm, Essex. I don’t even like that accent!

Apparently it is a known thing. Are you musical? I read that musicians often are more susceptible because they pick up on the musical lilt of accents and mimic them more easily.

Strangely I can’t “put on” an accent if I’m reading a story aloud, I have to be with the people!

I can go through three accents in one sentence. It depends who I talking to and where I am.

I use different words too, only 'mash' tea in the presence of my Yorkshire family.