Who has the most Standard American accent?
August 23, 2007 1:28 AM Subscribe
Please, everybody answer!
What celebrity (living or dead) do you think has the most standard American accent?
I'm trying to get as many opinions as possible. If you have a few celebrities in mind, you can list them. It doesn't matter if you are American or not. I want anyone who has an opinion on this to answer. You can even ask your friends, families, and coworkers and list their answers, too!
When this is finished, I plan on making a pronunciation model based on the most common answer, for use in ESL teaching. Thanks, everybody!
I'm trying to get as many opinions as possible. If you have a few celebrities in mind, you can list them. It doesn't matter if you are American or not. I want anyone who has an opinion on this to answer. You can even ask your friends, families, and coworkers and list their answers, too!
When this is finished, I plan on making a pronunciation model based on the most common answer, for use in ESL teaching. Thanks, everybody!
This post was deleted for the following reason: "Every answer is okay" opinion polls really aren't what askme is intended for.
To an extent I think it's unanswerable... the U.S. has nearly as much landmass as all of Europe, and each European country has a number of discernible accents for each native language. New York City alone basically has an accent for each borough. I'm not sure there is a "standard" to speak of. Best I can offer you is accents that aren't inherently indicative of a particular geographic region of the U.S.
As far as that goes... with the exception of Matt LeBlanc, most of the cast of Friends seemed of indeterminate origin, plus there's a lot of material to work with for both genders. Maybe start there?
posted by Riki tiki at 1:46 AM on August 23, 2007
As far as that goes... with the exception of Matt LeBlanc, most of the cast of Friends seemed of indeterminate origin, plus there's a lot of material to work with for both genders. Maybe start there?
posted by Riki tiki at 1:46 AM on August 23, 2007
Stephen Colbert, from Wikipedia: "As a child, he observed that Southerners were often depicted as being less intelligent than other characters on scripted television; to avoid that stereotype, he taught himself to imitate the speech of American news anchors from an early age."
posted by thelongcon at 2:14 AM on August 23, 2007
posted by thelongcon at 2:14 AM on August 23, 2007
NBC's Brian Williams, or any local newscaster. I've heard it said that broadcasters are trained to speak with a Columbus, Ohio "non-accent" - considered (fact? urban legend?) to be generic American.
posted by Sweetie Darling at 2:16 AM on August 23, 2007
posted by Sweetie Darling at 2:16 AM on August 23, 2007
General American. "The area that is most free of these regional properties is indicated on the map: eastern Nebraska (including Omaha and Lincoln), southern and central Iowa (including Des Moines), and western Illinois (including Peoria and the Quad Cities but not the Chicago area)" They list Johnny Carson, Tom Brokaw, Walter Cronkite...
posted by blacklite at 3:00 AM on August 23, 2007
posted by blacklite at 3:00 AM on August 23, 2007
I'd be careful with picking just any American news anchor. Walter Cronkite has a very distinctive accent, as does Tom Brokaw. Dan Rather has very strong hints of a Texas accent, and Peter Jennings was Canadian.
Brian Williams and Katie Couric are good choices, though. So is Matt Lauer.
There's also Lynne Russell, formerly of Headline News and currently of CBC Newsworld.
posted by oaf at 3:12 AM on August 23, 2007
Brian Williams and Katie Couric are good choices, though. So is Matt Lauer.
There's also Lynne Russell, formerly of Headline News and currently of CBC Newsworld.
posted by oaf at 3:12 AM on August 23, 2007
There just isn't a standard accent. People around the country just talk differently. You don't even need to travel that far to find differences in accent. But to me, Katie Couric sounds pretty neutral and accent-free. About the only media I listen to anymore is NPR, so they mostly sound pretty neutral to me.
posted by DarkForest at 3:29 AM on August 23, 2007
posted by DarkForest at 3:29 AM on August 23, 2007
I couldn't say. Being from NY, we have no accent.
posted by wile e at 3:51 AM on August 23, 2007 [1 favorite]
posted by wile e at 3:51 AM on August 23, 2007 [1 favorite]
Before anyone from Cleveland jumps in saying they're neutral and everyone comes to learn from them, I just have to say, I'm from Columbus and I can tell a native Clevelander the moment they open their mouths.
I like Stephen Colbert, as someone mentioned above. I don't watch TV news so I couldn't tell you who on there has a neutral accent. But if they are an educated Midwesterner, that'll probably be most helpful. I think people who grow up Midwest and then move elsewhere (someplace that encourages them to get rid of the nagging idiosyncrasies of their regional accent) will be your best bet, so if you can look at some reporters' backgrounds, that might lead you to what you're looking for.
posted by olinerd at 3:55 AM on August 23, 2007
I like Stephen Colbert, as someone mentioned above. I don't watch TV news so I couldn't tell you who on there has a neutral accent. But if they are an educated Midwesterner, that'll probably be most helpful. I think people who grow up Midwest and then move elsewhere (someplace that encourages them to get rid of the nagging idiosyncrasies of their regional accent) will be your best bet, so if you can look at some reporters' backgrounds, that might lead you to what you're looking for.
posted by olinerd at 3:55 AM on August 23, 2007
Tim Allen.
/yes, I'm from Detroit too. Midwesterners don't have accents, until you ask us to pronounce "aunt". ;)
posted by Myself at 5:29 AM on August 23, 2007
/yes, I'm from Detroit too. Midwesterners don't have accents, until you ask us to pronounce "aunt". ;)
posted by Myself at 5:29 AM on August 23, 2007
There's no standard accent; it's just a silly idea. There are accents which may seem "stronger" than others to a plurality of Americans - especially those from the Northeast and deep South.
I prefer the educated Chicago area accent (nothing like the "Da Bulls" thing), because it's a little harder to specify than other accents, but still has some nice distinguishing characteristics missing from other "vague" accents which seem to lose certain vowel sounds. Anyone who's watched the news in Kansas and Nebraska and has discovered that local (-ly born and bred) broadcasters don't have it in them to make the distinction between "law" and "la" or "caught" and "cot" knows what I mean! They make this (and other) distinction(s) in Chicago without the overall accent being overtly obvious as coming from the place - one can tell someone's from New York (usually) in a way that one can't tell someone's from Chicago. There's a "belt" along the Great Lakes which more or less share this accent.
My belief is: greatest variety of phonemes without many distinct regionalisms = best approximation of a standard form.
For me that's this "upper Midwest" accent.
I'm not a native English speaker; I've lived in many parts of America and probably speak more like an East Coast native than a native of anywhere, so I'm not biased in favor of this accent - it's not one I even really have.
posted by Dee Xtrovert at 5:32 AM on August 23, 2007
I prefer the educated Chicago area accent (nothing like the "Da Bulls" thing), because it's a little harder to specify than other accents, but still has some nice distinguishing characteristics missing from other "vague" accents which seem to lose certain vowel sounds. Anyone who's watched the news in Kansas and Nebraska and has discovered that local (-ly born and bred) broadcasters don't have it in them to make the distinction between "law" and "la" or "caught" and "cot" knows what I mean! They make this (and other) distinction(s) in Chicago without the overall accent being overtly obvious as coming from the place - one can tell someone's from New York (usually) in a way that one can't tell someone's from Chicago. There's a "belt" along the Great Lakes which more or less share this accent.
My belief is: greatest variety of phonemes without many distinct regionalisms = best approximation of a standard form.
For me that's this "upper Midwest" accent.
I'm not a native English speaker; I've lived in many parts of America and probably speak more like an East Coast native than a native of anywhere, so I'm not biased in favor of this accent - it's not one I even really have.
posted by Dee Xtrovert at 5:32 AM on August 23, 2007
Another vote for no such thing. A Midwestern accent is still an accent, even if it was the one picked as an example for newscasters.
posted by dame at 5:34 AM on August 23, 2007
posted by dame at 5:34 AM on August 23, 2007
Give strangeguitars a break; I'm sure he knows there's no "standard" accent, and that he's not interested in trying to debate whether there is such a thing or not. If you read the question, he's doing a project where he's going to choose one voice, so he's interested in which voices people think are most representative of some mythological "standard."
On topic: There are lots of flat Midwestern voices that might represent some idea of a standard accent, but if you want an interesting voice to boot, I would suggest Charles Osgood (CBS Sunday Morning and Radio)
posted by pardonyou? at 6:13 AM on August 23, 2007
On topic: There are lots of flat Midwestern voices that might represent some idea of a standard accent, but if you want an interesting voice to boot, I would suggest Charles Osgood (CBS Sunday Morning and Radio)
posted by pardonyou? at 6:13 AM on August 23, 2007
Of course there's no such thing as "no accent", but the linguistic designation that's important is "no discernable accent," as in a morphologist with knowledge of American accents couldn't extract any usable information about the subject's sound patterns except that the person spoke North American english. Lots of newscasters who are trained in neutral American sounds would fit the bill. I am not a morphologist (I have a more general undergraduate linguistics background so I'm familiar with most aspects but an expert in none of them), but I Peter Jennings (who I think was Canadian) is an excellent example. Stone Philips as well.
Keep in mind that this is a bit contentious. You'll probably always be able to find someone who is a native speaker of the potential answer's subdialect who can hear clues to the potential answer's origins given a large enough sample of their speech. (or at least claim to.)
posted by Mayor Curley at 6:19 AM on August 23, 2007
Keep in mind that this is a bit contentious. You'll probably always be able to find someone who is a native speaker of the potential answer's subdialect who can hear clues to the potential answer's origins given a large enough sample of their speech. (or at least claim to.)
posted by Mayor Curley at 6:19 AM on August 23, 2007
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by allkindsoftime at 1:40 AM on August 23, 2007