If you have a different accent to your children

[doadeer]

My son is a toddler so just starting to build words. I'm from NE but live in an area of London with a "neutral accent" - DH has more of a London accent (not neutral)

I say BOOK rather than BUCK, GRASS rather than GRARSE etc.

His nursery when he goes back has lots of different accents including nationalities and regional accents.

Just curious how your children's accents developed if you live somewhere different to where you grew up.

I have a very middle class home counties accent. My DH is Scottish and we live in the north of Scotland. My children all sound Scottish compared to me but extremely English next to their peers/teachers who all have thick accents. I had expected when they started nursery for their accents to change but my eldest is 8 and he still only has a mild accent after 5 years of full-time nursery/school. They all say "barth" and "grarss" much to the annoyance of DH. It'll be interesting to see how their accents change as they get older.

I have a severe South Wales valleys accent. ExH much more 'neutral/englishy', inherited from his parents who moved around and have plummy eng accents. I can't hear that my boys have any accent at all which tells me they must be as Welsh as it comes (I can't perceive my accent at all except for when I hear myself recorded and I'm shocked at how full on it is!). But my daughter has the most remarkable accent! It's so posh, English, and she is SO well spoken. I listen to her sometimes and think where the fuck did you come from?! She outstrips her dad's accent for 'poshness' by a million miles. I think it's a combination of her dad/grandparents accents, a couple of her close friends are English or have posh almost rp accents, and watching crap on tiktok and YouTube and films. I suspect she's high functioning autistic too and I've been told that 'absorbing' accents can be a factor of that. It does make me laugh though. 'Mother, my eeeer is sooaar', 'Errr, do you mean you'er YEAR 'URTS' 😁

It’s interesting, DS is 4 with a speech delay and recently diagnosed ASD. He’s definitely getting a little bit of a local twang though. Which is interesting as neither DH nor I is from the local area! I grew up in a totally different region and have moved around a bit so my accent is a bit jumbled. And DH is from the neighbouring county, but without an especially strong local accent (apart from a couple of phrases which he uses talking to his dad, which are massively local IYSWIM). Yet despite this DS is turning into a tiny local lad. Its very sweet. Although I was hoping for a bit of backup from him on the glass/glarse issue... looks like I’ll be carrying that one on alone again 😏

So fascinated by the various "siblings, grew up together but the accents are different" stories.

Would it be very unethical to have a couple more kids just to run an experiment even though I've always said one was enough.

no worries, not serious, just locked down and bored

I’m from the east end of London, my kids were born on Scotland and have strong Scottish accents, thought they can do a great London accent especially at the top of there voices(shouting)

My mum is Aussie and has a very strong accent, but I was raised in the Home Counties so have quite a plummy posh accent although do use Aussie slang which must sound a bit odd

@ActuallyItsEugine, I never try to (would be so terrible and insult everyone if I did), but it just happens sometimes.
Think my son will sound more like his dad though. I pronounce TH as F and ING as K, my son doesn't he says them the same as my husband. There's one word he says in a very strong scouse accent, it's errm. I love it when he says it as well.

Everyone.
What age do children start to develop an accent? My son still mostly has the sort of generic voice that all children seem to have to start with.

My mum was from Wales, and my Dad from London, and we grew up in another place again. We've ended up with quite different accents as adults. Mine is very malleable and I acquired a hideous mid atlantic accent when i lived in the states, thankfully since lost. Very few people can place where I'm from on accent alone (dialect words are a different matter).

My sister has lived abroad in another English speaking country for fifteen years and sounds just as English as the day she left. Her children also sound remarkably English.

My husband also has a British regional accent despite being from a different country entirely, and despite only living there for 3 years. We've been where we are now for plus 10

And wherever I've lived in the world, if people hear me speak they say 'you're not from round here are you'

We're in the NE both kids developed fairly distinct local accents at nursery - strong Geordie when we were in Newcastle, now in Darlington and the darlo accent is strong however the eldest lost it fairly quickly once he started school and I suspect the youngest will too it's already less pronounced in the past few weeks.
Both DH & I have fairly neutral accents as we've been up her 20+ yrs that only occasionally have a regional twang (Yorkshire & Somerset/ Bristolian) when very drunk and even then only really with other family or friends with similar accents
My original accent was never very strong my mum is from SA and has a strong accent especially with other family.

This evening DH has been playing me a Lenny video on YouTube where he is saying train and explaining that he is not saying tren. DH is claiming that he can’t hear any difference between the two. None at all.

I’ve been giving him perplexed looks that he can’t hear the difference given how often he hears Glaswegians.

Mine have the accent of where we live / they we're born. However, they say things like lunch and dinner rather than dinner and tea, where the latter is used here! Sometimes they use long vowels too, but mostly not.

My DH is from Sheffield, I’m a brummie. We live in the west mids, the kids sound brummie but occasionally come out a bit northern.

If babies learn all/most of their language from their parents, how on earth do they end up with the neighbours’ accents?

They are exposed to the local accent at least as much. Say (in normal times) there is a SAH parent who takes their child to a couple of groups a week then the baby/todddler is exposed to the language in the groups and when the parent interacts with other adults, buying things in the corner shop, bus tickets, talking to neighbours etc.

My family has a multitude of accents. We origionate in Yorkshire, I kept my accent all through school but then worked for the NHS and older people couldn't understand me so my accent became more and more Lancashire.

Meanwhile my brother moved with his Yorkshire accent to Cornwall, which he still has 30+ years later.

I moved about quite a lot and have ended up iun the Midlands with an accent that crosses boarders everytime I open my mouth, unless I vivit Lancashire.

I drove a friend up to Lancs once and he thought it was hysterical that`my accent changed on the motorway.

Most of cousins straartedn Yorkshire, 2 are now broad Lancashire and the others live in London and Manchester with their origional but slightly toned down accents so it will be interesting to see/hear their offspring.

My parents speak English with an Italian accent.

I speak English with a southern accent/RP - picked up from my teachers and 'how to learm English' video tapes.

DS1 speaks with my accent (DS2 is still at the goo gooing stage)

DH alternates between Southern (at work) and Laandon (when he speaks to his mates)

I love this video of a little boy saying moo in welsh and english with a belfast accent

I asked my colleague this because we’re in Scotland, his wife is Scottish and he has a southern English accent. He says his 8yo DD has a Scottish accent.

When I was growing up I had a friend whose younger brother had an American accent because his speech therapist was American

@IllegalFred I love that video!