Current Events > How do you feel when someone says a word in another language with an accent?..

(+) Yeah! (+)

Theyre saying it correctly but literally changing their accent when they say the word to say it correctly.

So if they say any japanese words theyll literally say just the japanese words with a japanese accent.

I think it completely kills the flow of their sentence as they stop at the word, change accents, then say it in another accent.

More so: How would you feel if someone who didnt speak english changed their accent to say, country, if they happen to say a country term to someone while all other words are said in their native language and accent?

If they're a native-speaker to that language it's understandable. If they're not, I don't judge them harshly or anything because they're trying to be respectful but it just sounds bad.

Also, I think it's impressive when people have enough mastery of being multilingual that they tune their accents to whatever language they're speaking. If a native speaker pronounces a Spanish word in an American accent while speaking English but differently when speaking Spanish, that's pretty cool to me. I think about these things as an immigrant.

Pow_Pow_Punishment posted...

If they're a native-speaker to that language it's understandable. If they're not, I don't judge them harshly or anything because they're trying to be respectful but it just sounds bad.

Also, I think it's impressive when people have enough mastery of being multilingual that they tune their accents to whatever language they're speaking. If a native speaker pronounces a Spanish word in an American accent while speaking English but differently when speaking Spanish, that's pretty cool to me. I think about these things as an immigrant.

What if they dont realize theyre being offensive by making a stereotypical accent?

What if a native speaker thought they were being respectful by saying all english words with a strong and almost ridiculous southern accent?

Edit: Weird example: my wife can speak spanish and english fluently but has an american accent as she grew up mostly here. Spanish speakers sometimes say she sounds silly speaking spanish with an american accent.

Whos even right there? Shes a little annoyed cause it makes it seem like shes not a real Uruguayan/Spanish speaker cause she has no accent but she kind of blows them off.

If theyre not native speakers it sounds poserish.

Im guilty of this when using a Klingon word

Huh

Can't say I really care. Never even thought about it until now.

If the person is fluent in that language, I don't see a big issue.

But like, my wife's family all have to pronounce Italian words with heavy accents, even though none of them speak any Italian. It's obnoxious. I'm saying prosciutto, and they're all talking BRRRREZHOOOT

Fucking Aron Sanchez and his thacos

... Fine, I'll do it myself:

https://youtu.be/fKGoVefhtMQ?si=EY0HfNYyjZKQSWWD

I was born in a foreign country to USA and certain words I say with an accent.
My supervisor makes it a mission to correct my pronunciation but I do not think he fully understands how inappropriate, offensive and discriminatory his actions truly are.

There is such things as an offensive accent, so it's a case by case basis. As long as their intent isn't about being offensive, that's fine. If they're told that the way they say it is offensive and still continue doing it, then they're going into the "asshole" territory at that point. Let's just say, as a person who is more fluent in Vietnamese than English, I have more respect for an American that can correctly say my last name and even more respect if they can even pronounce the "Ng" sound in "Nguyen".

Prestoff posted...

There is such things as an offensive accent, so it's a case by case basis. As long as their intent isn't about being offensive, that's fine. If they're told that the way they say it is offensive and still continue doing it, then they're going into the "asshole" territory at that point. Let's just say, as a person who is more fluent in Vietnamese than English, I have more respect for an American that can correctly say my last name and even more respect if they can even pronounce the "Ng" sound in "Nguyen".

When it comes to specific stuff like that you can just ask the person to help you say it and they normally do are are generally glad you made the effort to say their name right....

Prestoff posted...

There is such things as an offensive accent, so it's a case by case basis. As long as their intent isn't about being offensive, that's fine. If they're told that the way they say it is offensive and still continue doing it, then they're going into the "asshole" territory at that point. Let's just say, as a person who is more fluent in Vietnamese than English, I have more respect for an American that can correctly say my last name and even more respect if they can even pronounce the "Ng" sound in "Nguyen".

Wait. Is that not just 'win'?

I do it with a lot of Spanish words but I live in New Mexico.

FolkenRawr posted...

Wait. Is that not just 'win'?

"Win" is what I tell Americans to say because they don't know how to make the "ng" sound. But the fact that you know to say "win" when you see "nguyen" already puts you above majority of other Americans I met.

Prestoff posted...

"Win" is what I tell Americans to say because they don't know how to make the "ng" sound. But the fact that you know to say "win" when you see "nguyen" already puts you above majority of other Americans I met.

Do you have an example of someone saying it correctly and clearly?

I picked up the basic pronunciation but I doubt I know the proper one.

My husband does that. I'll be like "say that one more time" just to poke fun at him.

I do this instinctually, may have something to do with how my brain is wired for language but I need to consciously choose to pronounce a foreign word with a midwestern accent and I feel dumb for doing so.

exceptions are some common Spanish words probably because theyre used with English so commonly

When I learn French, saying it correctly kinda automatically forces an accent, tbh.

French, imo, is easier when I dont open my mouth as wide as English. And my voice comes from my throat more. If I dont try changing how I literally talk, I wont pronounce it correctly.

I assume its the same for others youre observing.

Prestoff posted...

"Win" is what I tell Americans to say because they don't know how to make the "ng" sound. But the fact that you know to say "win" when you see "nguyen" already puts you above majority of other Americans I met.

I cringe every time I see your last name since I have no idea how you're really supposed to say it, lol. I honestly wouldn't attempt it since I wouldn't want to be insulting.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought even in Vietnamese there's some variation in how you can say it.

DrizztLink posted...

Do you have an example of someone saying it correctly and clearly?

I picked up the basic pronunciation but I doubt I know the proper one.

If you got the basic pronunciation, most Viets would actually applaud you for even getting that part correct. You're already step above the "nuh-guy-in" or "nuh-goo-yens"

With that said, I prefer to actually say it rather than type it because I don't know if I'll be able to do it justice typed out. The anglicized way to correctly say it would be "nu-win" but it's in one syllable (every vietnamese word is one syllable), with the "nu" part being more softer to make the "ng" sound, and the "win" part more emphasized to make the "uyen" part.

Now with that said, there's different pronunciations because of dialects as well, but I don't think we need to go there lol.

Bass posted...

I cringe every time I see your last name since I have no idea how you're really supposed to say it, lol. I honestly wouldn't attempt it since I wouldn't want to be insulting.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought even in Vietnamese there's some variation in how you can say it.

And that's fair, most of us expect other people in getting it "wrong" so when someone does say it correctly some of the first generations would laugh, clap, praise, or even ask you how you know how to say it correctly (most of the answer is because they married someone Viet or have friends/family of someone who is Viet with that last name).

But yeah, we follow the French rule in accents changing a word completely. So saying a vietnamese word a certain way is going to completely change the meaning of a word if you say it in a different accent, and different accents change the way the vowel of a word works like saying it in a higher pitch versus a low pitch. My cousins name is Vu, but if you say it in a incorrect accent you might accidently say it to mean a women's nipple for instance lol.

And then there's the whole dialect North vs South pronunciation that I won't even get into lol.

Nothing. It only sucks when I can't understand what they are saying due to their accent.

I'm not a jerk about it to them, but it does suck.

Correcting someone's pronunciation because of their accent is discriminatory and can be seen as racist or xenophobic.

Prestoff posted...

"Win" is what I tell Americans to say because they don't know how to make the "ng" sound. But the fact that you know to say "win" when you see "nguyen" already puts you above majority of other Americans I met.

To be devils advocate for a bit... it's not about Americans not "knowing hot to make the sound" as much as it is that the sound just isn't differentiated at all in English. it sounds the same to us because of how brains get wired. some aspects of a first language will NEVER go away, even with virtuosic fluency.

it's why a nature spanish speaker will often say "estudent" for "student" and a fracophone will say "ze" for "the"

it's not something most people will every really learn. some people can get rid of accents, some just can't, so you shouldn't expect that non native vietnamese speakers will ever be able to pronounce it correctly.

and that's true if you think about names translating between languages anyway. My name changes pronunciation in English, French, and Japanese. It would be unfair to say a Japanese speaker is pronouncing my name wrong when those sounds don't exist in Japanese.

all that said, it's not that hard to add a little "Hnng" sound at the beginning of "when", like "Gwen" but without any "g" sounds if you really want to show off. In linguistics that ng sound is called a voiced velar nasal. again this is all but impossible unless you have basic training in linguistics. To someone else it should SOUND like "when" but to you, the speaker, you should be able to feel that you are using your nasal passage to make the "ng" sound at the beginning.

also literally everyone should know to pronounce "Nguyen" as something like "When" or "win"

Reminds me of this bit from a commercial lol

https://youtu.be/hjBXJR3_SRw?t=24

I kinda thought what OP was saying was a relatively common occurrence.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=AKkHfkvpw34

PerseusRad posted...

I kinda thought what OP was saying was a relatively common occurrence.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=AKkHfkvpw34

Theres a right way and a wrong way.

That sketch shows the offensive wrong way.

It makes me feel like eating a croissant filled with mozzarella cheese

Prestoff posted...

"Win" is what I tell Americans to say because they don't know how to make the "ng" sound. But the fact that you know to say "win" when you see "nguyen" already puts you above majority of other Americans I met.

My buddy just tells everyone to say "Nwen". "Dung" is the Vietnamese name people seem to really have trouble with.

If you're doing it like Peggy Hill it's bad

Otherwise it's fine, it's a little pretentious at times maybe but it's fine. Like Giada saying Italian words with a heavy accent.

Nothing wrong with wanting to use the proper sounds.

kinda funny people feel weird about imitating sounds because the only context they've seen it happen is for mockery

Robot2600 posted...

To be devils advocate for a bit... it's not about Americans not "knowing hot to make the sound" as much as it is that the sound just isn't differentiated at all in English. it sounds the same to us because of how brains get wired. some aspects of a first language will NEVER go away, even with virtuosic fluency.

it's why a nature spanish speaker will often say "estudent" for "student" and a fracophone will say "ze" for "the"

it's not something most people will every really learn. some people can get rid of accents, some just can't, so you shouldn't expect that non native vietnamese speakers will ever be able to pronounce it correctly.

and that's true if you think about names translating between languages anyway. My name changes pronunciation in English, French, and Japanese. It would be unfair to say a Japanese speaker is pronouncing my name wrong when those sounds don't exist in Japanese.

all that said, it's not that hard to add a little "Hnng" sound at the beginning of "when", like "Gwen" but without any "g" sounds if you really want to show off. In linguistics that ng sound is called a voiced velar nasal. again this is all but impossible unless you have basic training in linguistics. To someone else it should SOUND like "when" but to you, the speaker, you should be able to feel that you are using your nasal passage to make the "ng" sound at the beginning.

also literally everyone should know to pronounce "Nguyen" as something like "When" or "win"

I'm not a linguist like you, so I'll admit I don't know more about languages than you but I only go for anecdotal evidence and from what I've seen anytime I try to have an English speaker try to pronounce the "ng" part correctly, it never really registers for them and I think because there's no English word that starts with a "Ng" which makes sense. The only time a "ng" is ever together is a "ing" ending at the end of a word. So I basically tell them that "nuh-win" or "win" works just fine.

But I do appareciate the word "Hnng" as a good word to use as reference to get people to say the word "correctly". I might try that on my coworker to see if that will help him say my last name "correctly". And I say "correctly" because even I get criticize for saying some Vietnamese words wrong because both my parents are from the North so they say Vietnamese words in an unpopular dialect way. Which is why I don't take issue if people can't say a word correctly, because I would be the biggest hypocrite of them all.

The Vietnamese throws me off because I want to pronounce it like the Icelandic , but I know it's not the same letter.

This has been a really interesting, informative topic

And yes, I'm sitting here out loud practicing 'Nwin' in one syllable

My understanding of Nguyen is that it's a "Ngwyen" kind of sound, depending on the regional dialect.

Lairen posted...

Theyre saying it correctly but literally changing their accent when they say the word to say it correctly.

You realize you can't pronounce another language correctly if you don't make an attempt to do this, right?

sacree blue!~~~

I too am a linguist

language nerd gang 8)

Personally when it comes to nasals, I tell people to start saying 'bong' and slowly dropping the ng.

xGhostchantx posted...

You realize you can't pronounce another language correctly if you don't make an attempt to do this, right?

sacree blue!~~~

I too am a linguist

language nerd gang 8)

Personally when it comes to nasals, I tell people to start saying 'bong' and slowly dropping the ng.

But you clearly understand a difference and are playing coy.

on one hand I sort of agree with you that it makes more sense to just stick to the accent of whatever the language most of your sentence is in.

but on the other hand, I remember my grandmother pronouncing the name of the aircraft company Bombardier as Bomb-ba-DEER

kirbymuncher posted...

on one hand I sort of agree with you that it makes more sense to just stick to the accent of whatever the language most of your sentence is in.

but on the other hand, I remember my grandmother pronouncing the name of the aircraft company Bombardier as Bomb-ba-DEER

You dont necessarily have to change your accent to say the words right. My wife speaks spanish with an american accent yet still gets complaints about her not sounding hispanic.....

When you say they use another accent, do you just mean that they say the word correctly?

You mean trying to speak it properly? There's an account I follow in IG of a TX white woman who speaks Japanese and trying to sound more Japanese when in say Japan is definitely going to be more appreciated by them than her sound like some Japanese Redneck. Or at the least her bit is her speaking Japanese well (which she does) with a slight southern accent she can't totally escape and then when she relistens to it over the phone she sounds super U.S. southern like Aldo Raine speaking Italian.

I also think in general it's natural for your voice to change when speaking different languages. When I speak Spanish it's deeper and has a different cadence than my English.

Kradek posted...

Or at the least her bit is her speaking Japanese well (which she does) with a slight southern accent she can't totally escape and then when she relistens to it over the phone she sounds super U.S. southern like Aldo Raine speaking Italian.

Air-uh-gat-oh

Cruciferous posted...

Otherwise it's fine, it's a little pretentious at times maybe but it's fine. Like Giada saying Italian words with a heavy accent.

Thank you for reminding me of the name of the woman that irked my nerves doing it.

She was actually born in Italy though, so it probably makes me an asshole.

You dont need to change your accent at all to say words right...

I guess anyone who immigrated to america and doesnt try to change their accent when speaking english is rude and not trying to say the words right according to yall....

Yall offensive as hell.

Just had to sneak the stupidest post of my day in before I go to bed huh?

Doe posted...

Just had to sneak the stupidest post of my day in before I go to bed huh?

Yes you did. Congratulations.

Lairen posted...

You dont need to change your accent at all to say words right...

I guess anyone who immigrated to america and doesnt try to change their accent when speaking english is rude and not trying to say the words right according to yall....

Yall offensive as hell.

Uh, ESL people are definitely self-conscious of their accents, worry it makes their English sound poor, and often strive to mitigate it so that they sound more proficient in English.

I live on the U.S.-Mexico border and have met many Spanish primary speakers and on the Internet non-Hispanics I've seen often apologize for how their English sounds due to their accent.

I once dated this Mexican girl who was a green card holding legal resident, had such great English considering she didn't learn it until like middle school when she started coming to school here, and yet she was very self-conscious that she "had an accent" she would sometimes apologize for.

It's very normal for people to want to mitigate/erase whatever natural accent they have due to their primary language when trying to sound the best that they can when speaking another language. The point is to successfully communicate with another person, having an accent obfuscate the language when communicating with someone who has that language as their primary language can make that a challenge.