Accented English
I'm thinking about language, which isn't entirely surprising, because I'm well me and also because I'm in the process of looking through the Brit pick betas on my Hermione story (which is finished, yes, but I don't know if I'll post it today or not).
Now, I'm a bad girl, and a lot of the time with my American-based fandoms I don't get every story beta-ed but with this HP stuff I wouldn't dream of that, because I know how easily thrown out of a story I can get by non-Americanisms. And also, to the extent that I notice, with Americanisms in HP fic as well. Which is interesting because I can notice even when the author isn't just getting obvious things "wrong." That means that there's a subtle network of things--of tone--that I can pick up on even though I've only spent one month in the UK in my life, when I was 14.
Anyway, I'm aware that this can be a controversial issue, esp. in Supernatural fandom. I don't remember specifics but I know that there's been wank in SPN fandom about this. Like with non-Americans being over-sensitive to corrections and American readers being insensitive about the ways they go about correcting. It's made me v. delicate in my own FB-ing about things like reading a story where Sam or Dean refer to the "boot" of the Impala or what have you.
I get that in a way, better now, because I know that I feel a bit vulnerable when I send an HP fic off to a British beta. Perhaps because the English language is usually something that I feel facile with, etcetera. Interestingly, I didn't write BtVS for the longest time because I was terrified of trying to write Spike-talk. And then, after I'd been doing it for a bit, my Spike voice was one of the things I was most often complimented on. Of course, writing Spike fic doesn't make me feel prepared for writing HP fic really at all, because his accent is a bizarre, idiosyncratic invention - both extratextually by the American actor who plays him and canonically in the way that "Spike" was a new identity created by William.
But anyway, this isn't about that. As far as I'm concerned, it's really important to be aware of dialect when you're writing (But then, dialogue is really important to me when I'm reading). It's also important not to be an asshole.
What *does* interest me are things like the way that, for example, oxoniensis has explained all these class issues to me re: the way the characters speak. I mean, I KNOW that class comes through in American dialects as well and that it's something that I'm unconsciously aware of when I hear other Americans speak.
Throughout my life, people generally tell me that I have a "neutral" accent and this troubles me, because I think it's rather unfair to consider any one accent the "norm." But yes, my own accent is quite close to what you hear on television, etcetera as a transparent American accent. I come from New England. This is part of it. But also, my mother is from Washington, D.C. and my father is an ex-patriot German who speaks five language fluently and has entirely "lost" his German accent. Except if he wants it. I know that my dad has gotten himself out of scrapes before by pretending he can't speak English very well. And I've heard him put his accent "back on" before when doing impressions of his own father, etcetera. And it was always so jarring - to hear my father suddenly sound like "a foreigner." Far more jarring to hear him speak accented English than hearing him speak in other languages, which he does all the time, him having been on the phone on international business calls much of my life. The other thing he does is - when surprised or really angry - start cursing in German.
When greenapricot and I were in South Carolina a few weeks ago with brandil, moosesal and jwynn I was acutely aware of my Yankee-ness. I remember we were talking at one point about this - I asked Pri at the dinner table if she was especially aware of her accent. She said yes, but Brandi just said, "oh, you guys don't have accents." But of course, we do - I mean, we *do* speak differently than Brandi. But then I thought about the fact that Brandi spends much more time listening to accents different than her own on TV and movies than I do. And the way that I speak isn't marked the way she does is.
Except when I went home to Vermont after I'd been living in California a few years, people sometimes remarked that I "talked funny." And when I got drunk and called my boyfriend at the time (born and bred in CA) he laughed and told me I was talking "Vermontian." Mostly it was the slang and the fact that I was speaking really, really fast. And then there's the fact that there actually *is* a very discernable Vermont accent, but it's mostly dying out. I mean, I *know* what it sounds like, but I've rarely heard it employed by people under thirty. And it's a very class-based thing, in that I generally associate it with farmers.
But! You see, I don't have a Boston or a Maine accent and it's not just a thing about how I'm not from either of those places. Because I've met people from those places with pretty much the same accent that I have.
Hmmmmm. I curse all the time. I use a lot of slang. But I know the fact that I'm somewhat over-educated and so are my parents also comes through. And it means it's possible for me to shift my speech depending on the situation. I know what's "correct" but I semi-consciously reject it a lot of the time. Often, I think, because I abhor snobbery. Of course, I think most of us *know* that we have different modes. I distinctly remember when we were in SC, some middle aged man with a strong southern accent was flirting with Brandi and she "put on more of the South" for him, giggling about it after. Probably because he came up to us to ask where we were from, expecting us for visual as opposed to linguistic reasons to be outsiders.
Academic language is also a different form of English. And it's one that I'm incredibly conscious of trying to not necessarily inflict on everyone I speak to - or in my LJ posts as well. Like, when I post meta, I try to make sure not to just use jargon that might not be accessible to all my readers without explaining it.
But, as we all know, "fanspeak" is also something acquired. And that is much harder for me to shift out of! I'll be babbling along to one of my RL, mundane friends and they'll invariably stop me with a quizzical expression on their face. (Side Note: I really appreciate how in the back of his latest book, Henry Jenkins included a glossary of fannish terms as well as academic terms equally.) But likewise, in online fandom I've noticed that one's ability to pick up terminology can be really obvious. Like it can be quite apparent when someone's not that quick to absorb the lexicon.
Wow, rambly. My last thought is how I think that the last few years online have really affected my relation to English beyond the fanspeak thing. Because, you see, all this interaction with Brits and Australians and Kiwis etcetera has made it seem normal to me to use terms that people around me in my RL would not. Yet still, when I use the word "shag" in a comment online it's unremarked upon but if I do it out loud to an American friend it sounds ironic...or something.
Anyway! I often wonder what you all *sound like* in real life. Do you do the same with me? RL people who read this journal are always telling me that my posts read just like me talking (I'm a fast and furious talker, er) but of course, the way you actually sound out your vowels is something that can't be translated, eh?
ETA: One thing that I find amusing and one thing that I find distressing: how so many Americans seem to just automatically find any British accent to be "fancy," but how often I hear people basically equating ALL Southern US accents with bigotry and/or lack of education. Actually those are both distressing if you think about it. Heh. I was quite proud of myself when I included the detail in my Sam/Hermione story that Hermione's accent sounded posh to Sam but she was always telling him that it really wasn't all that much.
Now, I'm a bad girl, and a lot of the time with my American-based fandoms I don't get every story beta-ed but with this HP stuff I wouldn't dream of that, because I know how easily thrown out of a story I can get by non-Americanisms. And also, to the extent that I notice, with Americanisms in HP fic as well. Which is interesting because I can notice even when the author isn't just getting obvious things "wrong." That means that there's a subtle network of things--of tone--that I can pick up on even though I've only spent one month in the UK in my life, when I was 14.
Anyway, I'm aware that this can be a controversial issue, esp. in Supernatural fandom. I don't remember specifics but I know that there's been wank in SPN fandom about this. Like with non-Americans being over-sensitive to corrections and American readers being insensitive about the ways they go about correcting. It's made me v. delicate in my own FB-ing about things like reading a story where Sam or Dean refer to the "boot" of the Impala or what have you.
I get that in a way, better now, because I know that I feel a bit vulnerable when I send an HP fic off to a British beta. Perhaps because the English language is usually something that I feel facile with, etcetera. Interestingly, I didn't write BtVS for the longest time because I was terrified of trying to write Spike-talk. And then, after I'd been doing it for a bit, my Spike voice was one of the things I was most often complimented on. Of course, writing Spike fic doesn't make me feel prepared for writing HP fic really at all, because his accent is a bizarre, idiosyncratic invention - both extratextually by the American actor who plays him and canonically in the way that "Spike" was a new identity created by William.
But anyway, this isn't about that. As far as I'm concerned, it's really important to be aware of dialect when you're writing (But then, dialogue is really important to me when I'm reading). It's also important not to be an asshole.
What *does* interest me are things like the way that, for example, oxoniensis has explained all these class issues to me re: the way the characters speak. I mean, I KNOW that class comes through in American dialects as well and that it's something that I'm unconsciously aware of when I hear other Americans speak.
Throughout my life, people generally tell me that I have a "neutral" accent and this troubles me, because I think it's rather unfair to consider any one accent the "norm." But yes, my own accent is quite close to what you hear on television, etcetera as a transparent American accent. I come from New England. This is part of it. But also, my mother is from Washington, D.C. and my father is an ex-patriot German who speaks five language fluently and has entirely "lost" his German accent. Except if he wants it. I know that my dad has gotten himself out of scrapes before by pretending he can't speak English very well. And I've heard him put his accent "back on" before when doing impressions of his own father, etcetera. And it was always so jarring - to hear my father suddenly sound like "a foreigner." Far more jarring to hear him speak accented English than hearing him speak in other languages, which he does all the time, him having been on the phone on international business calls much of my life. The other thing he does is - when surprised or really angry - start cursing in German.
When greenapricot and I were in South Carolina a few weeks ago with brandil, moosesal and jwynn I was acutely aware of my Yankee-ness. I remember we were talking at one point about this - I asked Pri at the dinner table if she was especially aware of her accent. She said yes, but Brandi just said, "oh, you guys don't have accents." But of course, we do - I mean, we *do* speak differently than Brandi. But then I thought about the fact that Brandi spends much more time listening to accents different than her own on TV and movies than I do. And the way that I speak isn't marked the way she does is.
Except when I went home to Vermont after I'd been living in California a few years, people sometimes remarked that I "talked funny." And when I got drunk and called my boyfriend at the time (born and bred in CA) he laughed and told me I was talking "Vermontian." Mostly it was the slang and the fact that I was speaking really, really fast. And then there's the fact that there actually *is* a very discernable Vermont accent, but it's mostly dying out. I mean, I *know* what it sounds like, but I've rarely heard it employed by people under thirty. And it's a very class-based thing, in that I generally associate it with farmers.
But! You see, I don't have a Boston or a Maine accent and it's not just a thing about how I'm not from either of those places. Because I've met people from those places with pretty much the same accent that I have.
Hmmmmm. I curse all the time. I use a lot of slang. But I know the fact that I'm somewhat over-educated and so are my parents also comes through. And it means it's possible for me to shift my speech depending on the situation. I know what's "correct" but I semi-consciously reject it a lot of the time. Often, I think, because I abhor snobbery. Of course, I think most of us *know* that we have different modes. I distinctly remember when we were in SC, some middle aged man with a strong southern accent was flirting with Brandi and she "put on more of the South" for him, giggling about it after. Probably because he came up to us to ask where we were from, expecting us for visual as opposed to linguistic reasons to be outsiders.
Academic language is also a different form of English. And it's one that I'm incredibly conscious of trying to not necessarily inflict on everyone I speak to - or in my LJ posts as well. Like, when I post meta, I try to make sure not to just use jargon that might not be accessible to all my readers without explaining it.
But, as we all know, "fanspeak" is also something acquired. And that is much harder for me to shift out of! I'll be babbling along to one of my RL, mundane friends and they'll invariably stop me with a quizzical expression on their face. (Side Note: I really appreciate how in the back of his latest book, Henry Jenkins included a glossary of fannish terms as well as academic terms equally.) But likewise, in online fandom I've noticed that one's ability to pick up terminology can be really obvious. Like it can be quite apparent when someone's not that quick to absorb the lexicon.
Wow, rambly. My last thought is how I think that the last few years online have really affected my relation to English beyond the fanspeak thing. Because, you see, all this interaction with Brits and Australians and Kiwis etcetera has made it seem normal to me to use terms that people around me in my RL would not. Yet still, when I use the word "shag" in a comment online it's unremarked upon but if I do it out loud to an American friend it sounds ironic...or something.
Anyway! I often wonder what you all *sound like* in real life. Do you do the same with me? RL people who read this journal are always telling me that my posts read just like me talking (I'm a fast and furious talker, er) but of course, the way you actually sound out your vowels is something that can't be translated, eh?
ETA: One thing that I find amusing and one thing that I find distressing: how so many Americans seem to just automatically find any British accent to be "fancy," but how often I hear people basically equating ALL Southern US accents with bigotry and/or lack of education. Actually those are both distressing if you think about it. Heh. I was quite proud of myself when I included the detail in my Sam/Hermione story that Hermione's accent sounded posh to Sam but she was always telling him that it really wasn't all that much.