I was speaking to a Prof in the Mechanical Engineering department, and he asked me which courses I was taking.
"Hmm... Expert Systems... Supply Chain Engineering..."
"Supleichen Engineering?"
"Supply. Chain. Engineering."
"Oh! SupPLEIGH Chain Engineering! I've noticed that you Indians tend to speak with a flat tone... I have a student under me who does that a lot and people tend to go to sleep during his presentations... often even I can't understand him and I have to ask him to repeat himself. You really must learn to speak with more inflection and enunciation."
I hope he was looking at the road and driving rather than at me, because I had my mouth open for a whole 3.14 seconds. Now, I happen to be a better English speaker than most people back home, and in fact my Telugu and Tamil are both quite terrible and I speak in English most of the time. So it was quite deflating to hear that my spoken English was not upto the mark.
It's not merely a question of accent... I guess Americans would say I have a trace of the "Indian" accent, but it is more a question of inflection (er... accent includes inflection, yes, that's not all there is to it so I am justified in emphasizing on the inflection bit). I have to retrain myself to speak in the manner that not too long ago I teased others for speaking with "an exaggerated show-offy American accent". My new frame of reality shifts the definitions and what was exaggerated is now normal and what was normal is now "flat".
No wonder that people who stay in the US for longer than a year come back with a completely different inflection with respect to English, but zero change with respect to other languages. It doesn't "grow" on them but is, rather, forced on them. I think the standard Hindi movie US-returned Bridegroom's accent is not as contrived as I used to believe... though I still believe that the "degraded virtues" associated with such a stereotype is quite exaggerated!
But that is a topic I am inclined to avoid... so...
Cheers,
Prashanth.
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10 comments:
Wow you are studying Supply Chain Engg ? Cool ...
Vc
" ... because I had my mouth open for a whole 3.14 seconds ..."
How I laughed reading that!!!
I am really enjoying the gradual adaptation process of Prashanth here ....
Now coming to accents ... whether it "grows", "forced", "adapted" or "put-on"; its only natural to change ....
But wonder if there is something called correct or original accent??
If UK maybe called the birthplace of English; then we got, Scottish, Welsh, Irish accents...and even London has more than Cockeny! So does "British Royal Family" has rights over the proper accent???
Just wondering ....
But these "regional" differences pales out when we compare British with American, Canadian or Australian accents .... Then in the US itself the Southern and Northern accents are so different. Bush has such a heavy Texan accent, which is even more pronounced in case of Laura Bush!! Then the Blacks and Latinos speak so differently... its really interesting.
Then we got the American-Indian (not Indian-American which refers to Native-Americans) accent which again has interesting regional influences - Tamil, Telgu, Punjabi, Gujrati, Bengali, Bihari....!!!
I donno about Pennsylvania, but here, in Chicago "hot" becomes haaat; ... By and large .. herb becomes 'erb; lieu-te-nant (not lef-ten-ant), man-da-tooo-ry (mandatory)...
Good to see this post come up,
I was waiting for the 51st episode ...
*I
btw, if I'm not mistaken the US of A does not have any official language; not even English...
.. I see just a mention of "degraded virtues" ... hmmmm ...
good to know your broad view...
That would be pi seconds..
Hmm..I try not to do that...if he doesn't get it..I repeat and repeat till he does..
this is surprising..considering chinese accents..and the plethora of accents that one sees on a daily basis..most people don't really mind what accent you have..
Aah so u r having a problem there. Its got less to do with the way we pronounce our words (drawl) and more to do with the way we modulate our speech. ie pace and volume. Some people tend to swallow syllables without quite realizing it. As the prof said, the monotony could also be due to the lack of voice modulation. I guess both the Brits and Americans tend to be very exuberant in their speech, if you've noticed they keep changing their pitch pretty often. I say 'thank you' like a robot: quick and rapid. But the Brits here do it with a little higher pitch on the 'Thank' part.
Vc,
Trust me, there is nothing cool about Supply Chain Engg.
Intern,
You speak like an American yourself.
Ramani,
He's a bridge buddy of mine and was just trying to be helpful I guess. Professionally there is nothing to connect us.
Kirthi,
There you are! Did you go chasing after the Loch ness monster for stealing your cookies and beat it on the head(s)? Or maybe it was the Wipro bureaucracy, I hear they are tougher than Loch ness creatures.
No spee , kk is busy with hmm hmm vampires.. she's writing about it..
Trust me to drag any topics to movies; though many times I consciously stop myself doing so ... Well not now ....
After seeing the "National Treasure"; I was reading the IMDb Message Board, and one of the topics (????? dont remember whichone ) had evolved or rather degenerated into a discussion on accents ... culminating into highlighting an increasing trend in Hollywood movies to show villain with English/Brit accent ...
How true ....
Of course, this adventure thriller "National Treasure" had the Brit as the slick, sleek, smooth baddie. One of the alltime greatest villains, the brilliant, cunning n psychotic Dr.Hannibal Lecter in "Silence of the Lambs" was of course, Sir Anthony Hopkins. John Lithgow was the creepy villain in Shrek; interestingly the moment Anakin Skywalker changes into Darth Vader in "StarWars".. his accent also changes to English; then Christopher Lee was the evil Saruman in "LOTR"; Jeremy Irons in Die Hard ....
But hey, I find British accent very alluring n very endearing ... Hugh Grant, Kate Winslet, Catherine Zeta-Jones .... Then ofcourse we got ultra suave, sophisticated, debonair 007 actors ... Sean Connery, Roger Moore, Pierce Brosnan ... and in the latest run for the next Bond-guy I would vote Clive Owens way above Jude Law ...though I like Jude as well....
Never mind what these guys say. It is natural that they find our accent a bit difficult to understand but if u ask me, it is better to stick with our accent than try to fake theirs, unless they are really hard pressed to understand (which shouldn't actually be the case). When i try to speak with their accent, it sounds somewhat phony to me (but thats my opinion)
Who is *Intern? Isnt the 7th post by her? I would like to know her.
Intern,
Oh, that's probably because a British accent sounds more sophisticated... and sophistication makes for more convincing evil-ness (for lack of a better word). Thanks to the 007 legend, that's a class of heroes also best fit with the "suave" british accent.
My vote for bond is Colin Farell, though...
Sundeep,
The American accent sounds phoney to us, but remember that is normal for them... so don't hold it against them in any way... but if you want to stick to your standard accent, that is your choice! I'm okay with altering my accent if it will help me to make myself understood better.
Anon,
You would like to know more about Intern? Heehee.. good luck in your endeavour!
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