Why am I doing this?

• Trying a non-technical talk
• Increased interest in my heritage
• Increased comments about my own accent
• This topic is way more interesting than I thought.

What is an accent?

Dialect vs Accent

• Dialect
  • Grammatical features of the way someone talks
  • Usually specific to region or social groups
  • Examples: words like "Y'all" or British English.
• Accents
  • Variations on the way a language is pronounced.
  • Emphasis on different syllables words or notes

Anatomy of an Accent

• Quality of Voice
• Pronunciation and distinction of vowels and consonants
• Stress
• Prosody
  • Pitch
  • Length
  • Loudness
  • Timbre

aschmann.net

Accent Map

What about mine?

• Appalachian Eastern Tennessee English
• Wiki's definition
  • Vowel shift
  • 'oil' pronounced 'uhll' - 'spoil'
  • Law and tense vowels  netural before L - 'feel'
  • Short i and short e before n and m - pin / pen
  • o in middle of words are drawn out. - home

Reactive Accent

• Ability to switch accents based on some condition
• Uncommon condition
  • Actors
  • Immigrants
• My conditions
  • Tired
  • Drunk
  • Talking to my grandparents

The facts...

• Monster.com states accents DO determine a successful interview, and not in the good way
• Survey from Monster shows accents give wrong first impressions : less educated & unrefined.
• No laws to protect someone from being discriminated against because of accent.
• Data suggest those with little to no accent are placed into more prestigious jobs and positions over others.
• Those with vastly different accents can express distrust of one another.

...the solution

• Be careful on first judgements
• Judge someone on grammar and the content of their words, not how it sounds.
• Educate yourself with the distinctions on the accent of someone else.
• Link people with similar accents.

Fun Stuff

The pig was rubbed in oil before being wrapped in foil and then placed in the soil which was toiled by hand.

Questions?