To regret having lost my accent?

[pembroketable]

I grew up in Wales for the first 18 years of my life. Both parents and all family are Welsh. Grew up speaking Welsh, and was generally 'very Welsh'. I moved away for Uni and then to follow a career in the City. I completely 'lost' my accent. Sometimes people don't even believe I'm Welsh, or they think I'm a posh Welsh woman. I'm from the Rhondda!

I grew up in the East end of London, accent to match, went to a very public school type uni and dropped my accent, East London and estuary accents are associated (wrongly) with not being very bright. I don't wholly regret it, and take great pleasure into slipping back particularly when it might make someone reconsider their own biases. It definitely affects how people perceive me

I lost mine too after moving away in my teens. All my family has a very strong Yorkshire coast accent, but mine is much more mellow and a real hybrid, as I've moved around a lot and lived in different countries. People find it hard to place where I"m from, but most people seem to like/comment that they like my accent.
To be honest, I think it has helped me in my career. I've found people often look down on those with a very strong regional accent.

I moved too and lost my accent. I wouldn't do it now, but when i was young and still moving around jobs and uni etc., i just readopted my own accent! I also have a colleague who's done the same!

I definitely also agree that it has 'helped' me in professional situations.

I’m another who’s lost/softened their accent, and I was conscious of it happening- I’d moved to London the year before and kept my Manchester accent, but then I changed jobs to one where people with English as a first language were in a minority. I spent a lot of time trying to be clearer to colleagues and clients who couldn’t understand me, and was aware I was trying to speak more like the “Queen’s English” they’d heard when learning English. Within a year it stopped being something I had to think about doing and within a couple of years, just how I now spoke all the time.

I’ve been out of that industry for a long time, still living in SE and recently someone said they could tell I was from the north but would struggle to say which side of the Pennines or whereabouts in the North.

I'd totally disagree.

I think an East London accent is associated with being a wheeler dealer.

A Birmingham accent tends to be associated with not being very bright.

Sorry!

I have retained my welsh accent, despite living a variety of places. I can’t imagine ever losing it!

I don't think there's anything wrong with your accent mellowing as you move around and meet other people. It'd be a bit odd to defiantly hang on to an accent if others found it difficult to follow what you were saying easily. I bet you do still have a Welsh accent though, OP. Some people are just really rubbish at hearing and placing accents.

You might have lost your welsh accent but how about doing Duolingo and trying to learn or sharpen up (if you already speak some) Welsh? Can be a great way to feel connected to a place or your roots and the world needs more Welsh speakers

@ninemonthstime it's my experience of how I was treated when I retained my original accent and after I dropped it. I was considered to have street smarts and little else! Which is pretty fast from the truth tbh. I won't tell you what happens when I tell people I live in Essex.....

I have an East London/Essex accent too
and have always found that people think we are very street wise and they can't get one over on us (as opposed to not very bright).

NC because outing.

DH is French Native, French father. Mother is English Geordie. When he moved to the UK at 20 he moved to NCL. So when I met him he had a full on Geordie accent in English, not a touch of French accent. But his accent when speaking French is very strong Southern.

Sadly after 8 years down South with me, he's really lost of a lot of his accent. I barely ever have to say 'what?' now. 😂

I speak Welsh as good as my English :P

Ok that was poor English…

My mum moved from Ireland when she was a teenager and still talks about how her accent was pretty much bullied out of her