Accent sample - Damian, Uriel, Travis etc please comment

>><<Then after you master the r's, you should work on your vowels--make the corrections I posted previously such as been->bin; gets->gits. Then, you will no longer speak with as pronounced an accent.>>

Setting aside the question of whether L should speak American English or not, pronouncing "gets" as "gits" is not a "correction" necessary to speak standard American English. If L pronounced it as "gits", it would not make her accent sound more American in general, it would just give her a Southern regional accent.

You may not be aware of this, but "gets" is by far the most common pronunciation of that word in American English, and "gits" sounds distinctly "off" to my ears.

I would no more advise L to say "gits" than I would advise her to use a peculiarity of my own Northeastern speech, such as pronouncing "drawer" like "draw", or "aunt" like "ahnt".<<

Agreed most definitely. I likewise strongly perceive [gIt] for "get" as a distinctly marked form associated with southern NAE dialects rather than something which is characteristic of NAE in general.

Just because it's written "gets" doesn't mean it should be pronounced with an "e". I pronounce it as "gits". Just because knight is spelled with a "k" and a "gh" doesn't mean they're pronounced now-a-days.


>> You may not be aware of this, but "gets" is by far the most common pronunciation of that word in American English, and "gits" sounds distinctly "off" to my ears. <<

Maybe it's the most common by non-native speakers who are speaking English, but unless you're reading something letter by letter, it should be pronounced "gits"--unless you yourself have an accent.

>> Agreed most definitely. I likewise strongly perceive [gIt] for "get" as a distinctly marked form associated with southern NAE dialects rather than something which is characteristic of NAE in general. <<

Are you saying that you never say "git" for "get"?

>>Just because it's written "gets" doesn't mean it should be pronounced with an "e". I pronounce it as "gits". Just because knight is spelled with a "k" and a "gh" doesn't mean they're pronounced now-a-days.


>> You may not be aware of this, but "gets" is by far the most common pronunciation of that word in American English, and "gits" sounds distinctly "off" to my ears. <<

Maybe it's the most common by non-native speakers who are speaking English, but unless you're reading something letter by letter, it should be pronounced "gits"--unless you yourself have an accent.<<

The notion of "accent" is subjective, and all it really means in a native-speaker context is that the person speaking natively speaks a different dialect than oneself.

And when you say "should", are you just speaking in the context of your own dialect, as if one is speaking about North American English in general, the pronunciation of "get" with [I] is most definitely not predominate (rather that with [E] is).

>>Are you saying that you never say "git" for "get"?<<

Correct. The vowel I have in "get" is always [E] or [3] and never [I].

<<Just because it's written "gets" doesn't mean it should be pronounced with an "e". I pronounce it as "gits". Just because knight is spelled with a "k" and a "gh" doesn't mean they're pronounced now-a-days.>>

I pronounce "knight" as "nite", and I pronounce "been" as "bin". But I do not pronounce "get" as "git".

<<Maybe it's the most common by non-native speakers who are speaking English, but unless you're reading something letter by letter, it should be pronounced "gits"--unless you yourself have an accent.>>

Absolutely false. The pronunciation with [E] is by far the most common pronunciation by native speakers (including Travis and me) in the United States. Basically, the reverse of your statement is true: in American English it should be pronounced with [E], unless you have a Southern US or AAVE accent.

<<Are you saying that you never say "git" for "get"?>>

I never say "git" for "get", and neither does anyone that I know. Ever.

~~~

I'm not deriding the "git" pronunciation; I'm just saying that it's strongly regionally marked, and it's definitely not the most common pronunciation in the US. You have to realize that not everyone speaks exactly as you do.

>> the pronunciation of "get" with [I] is most definitely not predominate (rather that with [E] is). <<

Get with an "e" really is predominant? I didn't know that. Well, I suppose that might be true--many people in this country speak with an accent, but here in the Northwest we have no distinctive accent at all--we speak exactly like the newscasters on the television.


>> Agreed most definitely. I likewise strongly perceive [gIt] for "get" as a distinctly marked form associated with southern NAE dialects <<
>>I'm just saying that it's strongly regionally marked, and it's definitely not the most common pronunciation in the US.<<

Well, the Northwest is about as far away from the Southeastern or AAVE accent as you can get. I don't see how it could be a "marked southern form".

>>>> the pronunciation of "get" with [I] is most definitely not predominate (rather that with [E] is). <<

Get with an "e" really is predominant? I didn't know that. Well, I suppose that might be true--many people in this country speak with an accent, but here in the Northwest we have no distinctive accent at all--we speak exactly like the newscasters on the television.<<

A lot of people say (and sincerely think) they speak "accentlessly", but that does not mean they do (accent is relative to begin with, one must remember). For instance, it is a common stereotype of Midwesterners that we think we speak "accentlessly" (even though in some parts, such as here in Wisconsin, that does not necessarily hold true either).

And anyways, the reason why many people speak with an accent and you do not is that you likely perceive things relative to your own dialect here, whether you realize it or not.

>>>> Agreed most definitely. I likewise strongly perceive [gIt] for "get" as a distinctly marked form associated with southern NAE dialects <<
>>I'm just saying that it's strongly regionally marked, and it's definitely not the most common pronunciation in the US.<<

Well, the Northwest is about as far away from the Southeastern or AAVE accent as you can get. I don't see how it could be a "marked southern form".<<

Yes, I have actually heard of such being present in the Northwest as well, but I would still not call it representative of North American English in general, especially from the perspective of a non-native speaker.

Ditto everything Travis said. By the mere act of speaking English, you are going to use some accent. Even if "the newscasters" happen to speak with the same accent (which is debatable anyway), it's still an accent.

As for "git", I'm not asserting that it never occurs outside Southern US and AAVE. I've likewise heard of the pen-pin merger occurring on the West Coast, even though it's still most strongly associated with Southern US and AAVE.

>> A lot of people say (and sincerely think) they speak "accentlessly", but that does not mean they do >>

I went to Wisconsin, and I could definitely hear a very strong accent--but no-one there thought I had an accent at all. When I commented on their accent, they insisted that they spoke exactly like I did.

>>I went to Wisconsin, and I could definitely hear a very strong accent--but no-one there thought I had an accent at all. When I commented on their accent, they insisted that they spoke exactly like I did.<<

You may speak closer to General American than most people here, and the matter here is that General American and things that are not all to far from it are unlikely to be really perceived as "accented" offhand. Consequently, you may still have been perceived as being relatively "unaccented", and as many may not realize that there are significant differences between speech here and more General American-like forms, they may think that they speak just like you do.

<<I went to Wisconsin, and I could definitely hear a very strong accent--but no-one there thought I had an accent at all. When I commented on their accent, they insisted that they spoke exactly like I did.>>

So their accent peculiarities were more salient to you than yours were to them. Regardless, you all have accents. (If you want to be sure, go to London, Scotland, or New Zealand, and ask them if you have an accent.)

Even "non-regional" accents like General American and RP are still accents.

This old issue has been rehashed so many times on this forum.

L wasn't trying to speak American English in the first place.

<<L wasn't trying to speak American English in the first place.>>

I know, which is why this argument such a completely ridonkulous and irrelevant digression from what the thread was originally about. That's Antimoon for ya.

...this argument *is* such a...

Ridonkulous, Lazar?

So, L, are you going to 'fess up to what you are or just drag it out forever? Obviously no one's gotten close by guessing.