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Original poster

Do your dc have your accent?

125 replies

Whatsthepoint1234 · 22/08/2023 13:57

I was having this conversation with a colleague earlier about our regional accents and it made me think about whether children take more of their parents accent or their peers accent. My area has a fairly distinctive accent, lots of the people from where we live have never lived anywhere else! Pretty much all the local older generation I meet at work have quite a ‘broad’ version of this accent however both my sons sets of friends have standard southern accents. My husband is from the same region and grew up about 1.5 hours away and both his parents are Asian but he grew up in a very mc white area and mainly socialised with white British people, he sounds RP to me with a slight Asian tint. I grew up abroad have the accent of my native country (came for university). Both my dc get asked where they are from as they pronounce some words ‘funny’ but sound mostly British. What accent do your dc have, is it more regional or more like yours?

OP posts:
mindutopia · 22/08/2023 14:03

They have the accent of the area where they have grown up, thankfully. I have an accent from my home country and they have only picked up some ways of saying things from watching tv shows from there. So it's much more thanks to YouTube than me (as even I don't pronounce things like that anymore). I think that's quite typical. It's quite hard to pass on an accent unless that is the majority of what they are hearing spoken around them.

DuploTrain · 22/08/2023 14:05

When I was in Year 1, I remember noticing that I pronounced “bath” the southern way like my parents even though I’d always lived in the north.
I got more northern as I got older though.

Owjrbvr · 22/08/2023 14:05

Mine have an accent that is more me than the area we live in; that may change as they move through school though

tarheelbaby · 22/08/2023 14:06

I grew up elsewhere but we live in southern England and my children have a basic MC southern British accent - not as posh as some but not dead common - similar to their friends and DH.

The DCs sometimes mimic an accent from my home country but it's the one they've learned off telly, not my accent.

When I go to my home country, people think I'm British but no Brit would ever think that.

mindutopia · 22/08/2023 14:07

I do, however, think that it is about acculturation and performance too. If you live in an area that has a regional accent that is not as desirable as a more 'general' accent, then it's not uncommon that people do try to put on the more desirable accent (and eventually that just becomes second nature).

For example, I grew up in a (non-UK) area that has an accent that can be seen as not as 'cultured' sounding. Definitely as soon as I moved away from home, I made an effort to speak more 'properly'. With the internet and TikTok, etc. today, which I didn't have as a teen, then I expect that would have been more pronounced among some of my peers too.

easterfloral · 22/08/2023 14:07

Yes, they have my accent rather than the regional accent. Called 'posh' by strangers on account of the accent.

I've had it (comments from strangers) all my life too, and wish people wouldn't comment on it as I'd never think about it otherwise.

ifonly4 · 22/08/2023 14:08

My DD has a customer facing role locally, literally every week someone asks her where her accent is from. DH born in town, I moved here at less than a month old. In her case, she was in next county for sixth form, has had one year abroad and three years in Scotland as part of her uni course. Personally, I can't pick up an accent from any of these areas, but if I'm being honest she sounds quite well spoken and doesn't roll her 'r's as some locals, including myself do.

Lovepeaceunderstanding · 22/08/2023 14:09

My husband and I have distinctly London accents, our sons were privately educated and are both very well spoken. They don’t sound like they belong to us at all! 😂

FunnysInLaJardin · 22/08/2023 14:11

DH and I are from the north and midlands and the DC were brought up down south.

They generally have a southern accent, but seem to interchangeably flatten and un flatten their vowels.

So a mix of our accents and their peers.

SnapdragonToadflax · 22/08/2023 14:13

My son has a twang of the not-particularly-desirable accent of where we live, same as DP. I notice it gets broader sometimes, I think based on which key workers are in his room at nursery - some of them have very broad accents.

My accent is generic MC southern - sometimes get called posh.

cocksstrideintheevening · 22/08/2023 14:13

Currently some kind of weird americanised tik tok accent with a bit of vocal fry or just running allthrwordstogetherinonegosoitsimpossibletoactuallyunderstand.

Drives me FUCKING mental. I have threatened them both with elocution lessons if they don't sort it out im turning into my mother

PerspiringElizabeth · 22/08/2023 14:15

My kids have a southern mother and a northern father and live in the south. Weirdly they say a few things, eg ‘one’, like their dad.

Thefamilywaster · 22/08/2023 14:18

My niece has an American accent despite living in deepest Lanarkshire - she picked it up from watching television and it didn’t disappear at nursery or school. It’s quite odd. Goes down well at Glasgow Uni tho who all have a weird nasal American twang for 4 years.

TeamTea · 22/08/2023 14:18

I’m not from the UK and my husband is southern, we are in the midlands. Eldest is only in nursery but she sounds exactly like her friends

AMessageToYouRuby · 22/08/2023 14:18

I have a definite East London accent, probably what some people would call cockney but is not true cockney to those in the know! DH similar but a bit softer. DC similar but I think more well spoken

This year we learnt from our DC's rather posh teacher, that we all have and speak Multicultural London English. Had never heard of this, read the wikipedia page about it and we tick all the boxes: Hackney, working class, mixed ethnic background, a Caribbean parent.

Missmoppetspoppet · 22/08/2023 14:20

DH and I sound very middle class English. We moved to Wales when DS was 9mo. He is developing a middle class accent with Welsh vowels. I love it!

LetMeGoogleThat · 22/08/2023 14:21

Nope, I'm originally from the Midlands but DS 1 was born in London, DS2 in Bedfordshire and then we moved back to the Welsh Borders when they were still relatively small. So, we all sound different....but sort of the same due to certain sayings and twangs 🤣

TheClitterati · 22/08/2023 14:22

no.

I have a foreign accent. My DC were born in England. They don't have a "local" accent as such, but of course have an English accent - its non specific though rather than regional. Growing up in London everyone around them had a different accent so they have never lived in an area with one accent.

Biscuitandacuppa · 22/08/2023 14:23

Dd was born in North Wales and lived here all her life. I’m English with a northern non regional accent that is sometimes described as posh by other people. Dd sounds like me. Her friend at school sounds American and it’s really odd!

elp30 · 22/08/2023 14:26

I've always wondered why my husband has such a different accent to his parents and those in his hometown. He and his parents are from an area near Wigan but his mother was a catering manager at a school in Cheshire, five miles away. He went to the school for only three years, ages four to seven. However, his accent is substantially milder than his parents and neighbors. The man is 54 and he still always gets remarks that he can't be from that town. Go figure!

AllProperTeaIsTheft · 22/08/2023 14:28

I have a South East England (London/Home Counties) accent, RP-ish but not super-posh. Dh's similar but s bit less posh than me! Our dc's accent is like ours, even though we've now lived in NW England since they were 6 and 9 - they never picked up a local accent at all.

EveSix · 22/08/2023 14:33

ND DC1 code-switches fluidly between RP (which is how I have learnt to speak as an immigrant from northern Europe), DP's very broad regional dialect and our equally broad local dialect.
NT DC2, despite growing up in the south of England, rhymes bath and path with math, grass with has and laugh and staff with naff, despite having no northern relatives and no telly. I think I can trace it back to her brilliant scouse Y1 teacher.

Greigewalls · 22/08/2023 14:33

I have a slight northern accent, I’ve lived in the Home Counties for the majority of my adult life. My DC have different accents DC 1 went to state school in suburban area, they’ve got an RP accent. DC 2 went to state school in south London they’ve got a sarfe landan accent. Which is gradually being lost

soundsys · 22/08/2023 14:34

My eldest two have my accent and my youngest has the accent of where we live now 🤷🏻‍♀️

twotonecloud · 22/08/2023 14:40

I'm from the north from a city with a strong accent but for a reason I don't know, mine is mild to non existent compared to my parents and sister (no difference in upbringing, schools etc). My son was born in a nearby area with a different accent and his father spoke English as a second language. So my son has ended up what I think is a generic northern accent. Flat vowels but nothing of either of the regional accents he's been exposed to.