Quote Originally Posted by bae View Post
My daughter specializes in language.

Just a few years ago, my uncle came by here to visit for a few weeks. He arrived speaking a sorta-Midland accent and vocabulary. My own accent is a mishmash of Southern California/PNW accents.

She observed with horror that after spending a day chatting with each other and telling old family stories, we had both reverted to the Appalachian speech patterns of our youth.

She's one to complain, I never know what accent she'll step off the plane with when she comes to visit. Last time it was very Welsh, though to be fair she had just been in Wales for months, speaking Welsh.
Some people are accent sponges and others never ever lose theirs. My MIL lived in this country for 60 years and sounded just as Glaswegian when she died as she when she first set foot in this country. I, in fact, am known to use many of her Scottish expressions.. I check my "line" when I leave the supermarket, I'll say an agitated person as "up to high doh;" if I'm happy with something I might say I'm "fair pleased." The dialect is so cool and musical I can't resist co-opting it from time to time.

In general, it's annoying when people adopt an accent too quickly--it seems fake, but I think sometimes it's a way to connect with and integrate in the community.

Alan, I'm always fascinated by how many Southern accents there are. There's Texas, and Louisiana, and Georgia, and Tennessee--all variations on the theme. Dave Ramsey said that went he went to radio, he had to get a speech coach to mitigate his accent.

Personally, I don't have an accent.