What accent will my child have?

[ThisGreenFinch]

Hi everyone. We're originally from Essex and moved up to Scotland last year. DS is now 5 and has autism. He is just starting to speak, yay! We were talking last night about what accent he will have? Essex, like DH and I, or Scottish, like the other children and his teachers? He has just started P1 (reception) in a mainstream school. Not bothered either way obviously as so happy to hear him talk, but fun to know the experience of others!

Even us adults tend to pick up a slight dialect if we live in a place for a while. I'd imagine he will have a Glaswegian dialect, but possibly slightly softer to begin with due to hearing you speak.

Just wait until he goes full Rab C Nesbitt. 'Haw Mary Doll, you comin' oot for a swally?' 😅

A family in my road growing up had Scottish parents. The kids spoke with English accents as they went to school in England.

Dh and I are from the home counties and we have lived in the West country for 20 years. Ds1 and Ds2 have home counties accents, ds3 and ds5 speak broad Somerset and ds4 has a lisp so you can't really tell. Ds3 wants to be an actor and regularly tried out different accents. He is very good at the Scottish one which he swears is purely because I went to Scotland for the weekend when I was 6 weeks pregnant with him!

I had my parents' Irish accent as a small child. I was born in another country and once I went to school at 5 my Irish accent faded away. I don't have a hybrid accent. I have the local accent where I was raised.

Scottish, although it might be a tiny bit different to those around her. Some people will pick it up and ask her if her parents are from elsewhere, and others won't. She will probably sound more like you when she's around you.

Somewhere in between I think. They will be influenced by both.

We are both Irish and live in London -
4 year old speaks with a London accent with a bit of an Irish twang and says a lot of Irish phrases / words

i always wonder this.

Ds was born in a European country which doesn’t speak English. So he learnt local language from Kindergarten
But he speaks English at home. And dh and I have Southern English accents.
Will he just speak English with an English accent as he doesn’t hear English in a different accent? Or will he still have an accent as he speaks two languages and the second one will influence English?

My husband and I immigrated from the states to Scotland before having kids. My daughter sounded like us to start but that all changed when she started school. Now at 12 she has two accents depending on who she is with. My son is 100% Scottish accent.

We live in Edinburgh though so lots of different accents around them all the time. I'd imagine if you lived up north it would be different.

I know of a family where the Mum is English, Dad is Scottish and both son and daughter speak with strong English accents.

They lived in Scotland from being born.

My wife has an aunt and uncle who lives in Aberdeen. Aunt is English, from Bucks and very posh, her uncle is originally from Edinburgh and broad scots. All 3 of their kids (2 also with autism) also all have southern English accents despite living in Scotland their whole lives.

I have moved around between Yorkshire and Norfolk. My parents are from London and Stoke on Trent originally. I was born in Sheffield, moved to Norwich when I was 5, went to university in Leeds, back to a Norfolk again for a year after. And then back up to West Yorkshire where I've lived now since 2012. Most people, including my wife say my accent is mainly southern sounding, with a slight Norfolk twang and the odd Yorkshire word after 15 years up north! Apparently I had a northern accent after the first move, but lost it when I started school within weeks. I am quite good at accents but despite half my family being broad stokies, I cant do that accent for the life of me!

Children with autism often develop an American accent rather than from their locality or parents particularly if they use echolalia as they get it from the American TV shows and are emulated the accent as well as the words and phrases.

Otherwise, the accent of their location with some parents accent thrown in on certain phrases.

Most likely the local accent where they are raised. We’ve lived in Sweden for 17 months, so not long, but our youngest was almost two when we moved, so not a huge amount of speech. She has a distinct local accent when speaking both Swedish and English, where as our son was eight, so his accent hasn’t changed as much.

Scottish. I'm English, DH has a soft Scottish accent but we live just outside of Glasgow and my daughter has a Glaswegian accent. I thought that with my accent and lots of peppa pig, she'd have a hybrid or mild Scottish accent but no, very strong. DS doesn't have a distinctive regional accent yet.

My DH is in his sixties. He was born in London to Irish parents. He had an Irish accent until he went to school and then developed a South London accent which he still has - unless he is speaking to certain Irish relations when he reverts to his original accent(Donegal because that how his Mum spoke).
Weirdly, he also sings in that accent but his responses in Mass are in his Dad's Carlow accent!

He will have no choice but to speak Scottish as the kids bully English kids even the teachers. We did 5 years before we came back to England! Country is too racist.