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The importance given to your accent when speaking English is something that I have posted on before here and elsewhere. I have an accent that is not easily identifiable to English speakers outside Ireland. Some people think I am Canadian, others correctly identify an Irish accent but many are just left stumped. Most Irish people do recognize my accent immediately and assume I am from Dublin because the way I speak is not far removed from the much maligned D4 accent. When they find out I am from Clare there is inevitably a discussion as to how I 'lost' my accent. The whole issue makes me very uncomfortable and I try my best to avoid getting into this discussion in the first place.
For Irish people growing up outside Ireland the accent issue is even more pertinent. Some Irish people are very reticent to accept that you can be Irish and not speak with an Irish accent. Declan Ganley, the leader of the Libertas movement in Ireland, is an example of an Irish person who has been the subject of a number of undermining remarks relating to his accent. This is despite the fact that he was born to two Irish parents and moved to Ireland at the age of thirteen. While growing up my own father was always considered English by people in my home town despite his Manchester Irish background. While I was studying in England the use of any anglicisms in my speech would be picked up by my friends on my visits home.
It is something of an irony that Irish people are so attuned to English accents considering that the Irish so resolutely abandoned their own language, shifting the country from being primarily Irish speaking to being almost completely English speaking in the space of a hundred years. In any case having a distinctly Irish accent is something important for many Irish people and even with my accent my very Irishness has been called into question.
For my own children I expect this issue to arise in the future when they say they are Irish or half-Irish. (But you're no really Irish, are you? But you don't have an Irish accent...) My eldest daughter Luna now speaks English well enough that you can hear an accent and the funny thing is that she speaks with an accent not unlike mine. This is probably because she is a language isolate and I am the only English speaker she has regular contact with. At her Irish dancing classes the children who sound the most Irish are also language isolates with one Irish parent who go to Dutch schools. The children who go to the international schools all speak excellent English and have more contact with the same traditions that Irish children experience but ironically they have English accents.
Conservatives should be able to avoid asking for Clegg's help
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In the wake of the Observer’s Ipsos-Mori poll, which suggested that the
general election could result in a hung parliament, Nick Clegg has indicated
that, ...
3 hours ago
3 comments:
Really? That's a strange way to judge Irish-ness, I mean some people just pick up accents very easily and hence lose the previous one. I've had people comment that I don't have an English or a Tipp accent, but I've been in Dublin for 20 out of (almost) 37 years so that's fair enough. I had an irritating issue in my youth where I had an English accent as far as Ireland was concerned and an Irish accent as far as the English were concerned.
Of course it is illogical. If you are measuring Irishness on language then surely fluent Irish speakers are the most Irish not people with strong Irish accents speaking English. Is a Dub who reads The 'Irish' Sun, supports an English soccer team, shops in British chain stores and watches only British television more Irish than somebody growing up in London who plays traditional Irish music, supports the local GAA team and has just come back from 2 weeks learning Irish in Gweedore?
Accent is not a good marker but it is an obvious one. I wish that I did not speak the way I do because I know that my accent says too much about me to anybody who knows what they are hearing. At the same time I do not go out of my way to get rid of this accent because having a neutral accent is a big advantage in an international environment. Almost every day I hear complaints about English speakers who make no effort to speak in a standard way, I don't have to make any effort to be understood so that is one good thing at least.
Interesting points. Funnily enough, I also tend to forget that an English accent doesn't necessarily mean I'm not Irish. In fact Jenny's English accent belies her long Irish/NI ancestry which includes C S Lewis and the shipbuilders McIlwaine and Lewis. But people always assume she's 100% English. And as you say, why does an Irish accent make you Irish rather than familiarity with the Irish language and culture?
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