Gillian Anderson has 2 different accents?

[GlummyMcGlummerson]

I've been watching the Fall which has Gillian Anderson in it, I loved her in the X Files and loved her distinct voice. And I thought watching the Fall "she does an English accent so well"! So I searched on YouTube to find out what she really sounds like and it appears she has 2 different accents - sometimes American sometime English is this a thing?! Does she adapt it for her audience?

American accent

English accent

Those videos were taken a year apart BTW!

Yep, its a thing.

Most voiceover artists will have a couple of well-honed accents up their sleeve and the same goes for some actors.

Her parents are American and she lived in both Britain and America at different times growing up so she switches between the two accents depending upon who she's speaking to

She was brought up in England and then went to live in the US in her teens where she adopted the local accent to fit in with her peer group. So both accents are her own and she tends to change according to the nationality of the people she's with.

Wasn't she born in the UK? If you've lived in two places it's easy to switch between accents. I have my usual accent but if I am with someone from my home country I drop back into it really quickly.

More interesting than the accents, her persona seems quite different on these two videos! She is a pro at adapting for her audience maybe?

She was born in the US but spent a lot of her childhood in the UK.

Not an unusual thing with people who have grown up in two places or have parents from a different place to where they live. John Barrowman is the same: speaks American English when performing and Scots with family.

And then of course many actors learn different accents as part of their job. Always made me laugh, in that Poirot episode where Poirot goes back the Brussels, when David Suchet is the only one who speaks in a Belgian accent while all his old Belgian acquaintances sound as English as could be.

It’s a thing John Barrowman has a strong Ayrshire accent as he grew up in Prestwick. It’s really strong when he switches.

My children switch between English and American accents. They grew up in the US but are being raised by parents with English accents, so they just picked it up. Often they reply to me in an English accent without even noticing they're doing it.

I have two accents, they are very different. (It would potentially be outing to say what they are or how I acquired them.) I switch subconsciously between them, depending on who I'm talking to. I find it quite hard to consciously switch in to one or the other.

It's really embarrassing tbh, especially if I am in a group with people from both accents iyswim. I have never met anyone else who does this, and I always think people must think I'm putting it on or something.

It's also a bit more than just an accent. My grammar changes too. It's the weirdest thing.

DD and DS switch between mine and DH's languages and can quite expertly take the mickey out of my accent when I try to speak DH's language and DH's when he speaks english.

@AlexaShutUp you are going to think I'm stalking you having just addressed you on a different thread but having two accents is A Thing and I also do it. Like you it is involuntary and much more pronounced than just "going a bit posh" or whatever; it's two accents from two different countries. Which one I use depends on which person I'm with and if there's a mix of people I'll rapidly cycle between the two. I've done it since I was very young and both are authentic although a linguist friend spotted traces of the other accent from very slight variations she observed and asked me if I was from that country originally. No one else has ever noticed it although they do when they hear me switching!

Have you not watched house?

A good portion of actors in American films and TV are British or Australian.

The guy in the Americans was Welsh.

Tyrion in game of thrones was American.

Actors do accents. Some better than others.

Having two distinct personal accents (bidialecticism) is not the same as mimicry though. I've seen interviews with Anderson where she talks with an English accent, at length, and others where she talks with an American accent, at length. She's not putting either on. Both accents are hers. This is the same for me and others who are bidialectal.

I switch into my original accent as soon as I talk to anybody from that area, I have to concentrate to talk in my current accent. I can’t deliberately switch on my original accent though, it just comes out.

Mine switches depending on who I'm with. Born and raised in Wales, then 30 years in California. Now back in Wales, my old accent is back. Yet when with US friends or my kids (who have two accents too) I sound American, at work I sound Welsh. Friends have said when I'm tired at the end of a long work shift, the American creeps in. All unintentional, I don't try to talk with any accent.

Someone I went to school with who grew up with Scottish parents would speak to them and her brother in a very strong Scottish accent. When she was with us at school she’d use her local accent and sounded the same as we did. We used to love it when she ‘spoke Scottish’ for us.

It’s interesting - in the ‘American’ video you posted she is talking to two English people, and at one point acts her son with an English accent, and to my ears she is slipping between English and American the whole time. She says she lives in London so I guess her standard accent is English now?

She was brought up in England and then went to live in the US in her teens where she adopted the local accent to fit in with her peer group. So both accents are her own and she tends to change according to the nationality of the people she's with.

This. Isn"t John Barrowman the same? Or so he claims. Or maybe Lulu. Although I think she has cultivated her American accent for effect so just sounds fake imo.

Both accents are hers. This is the same for me and others who are bidialectal.

Bidialectal. I've learnt a new word today - thank you.

Yes as others have said, it's known as being bidialectal or bidialectally bilingual.

I was on a train once from London to Edinburgh and there was a family across the aisle from me, all talking together with strong London accents. An announcement came on that the train was going to be delayed. The woman across the aisle phoned her mum in Scotland to tell her - and immediately switched to a broad Scottish accent. Then she hung up the call and was back to being a Londoner with her husband and kids again. Later, the train was further delayed and she had to do it again, to book a taxi to pick them up on arrival, and again she became Scottish for the duration of the call and then switched back. I was sitting there open-mouthed in astonishment while neither her DH nor DC batted an eyelid!

My DS does it a little bit because I’m from the south of England but we live in the north (and his dad is also northern but doesn't especially sound it). DS tends to talk differently with me than he does with his mates, and it's not put on, he's unaware that he's doing it. When he was little, once we were reading a book together about a castle and he pronounced the word with the short 'a' sound - and then paused and helpfully 'translated' - 'That means "cahstle", mummy'.

I find this bizarre. I can't understand how you wouldn't be putting one of the accents on. My home area has a strong accent, and I have lived in other places with strong accents and , whilst I could do a passable impression of that accent and grammar/sentence structure, no one would really think I was from there. I'm not saying it doesn't exist I just can't wrap my head around how this is possible. I tone my accent down a little for different audiences, but it's still the same accent just less broad and less slang.

She did a really interesting radio programme on this several years ago.

It's more or less the same as being bilingual @Obviouspretzel. You have two different systems of sounds if you are bilingual too.
My DCs are odd, they both grew up with us (me Midlands but I've lived in the North for ages, DH firmly Northern). DS has a local accent. DD says "baaas" instead of "boos" (bus) but when you ask her "what's one of them" she says "bus". We think she has posher friends at school than DS (she's 6 so I doubt she's putting it on!)