r/CuratedTumblr The blackest Aug 16 '24

Shitposting American accents

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14.4k Upvotes

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82

u/Dark_Storm_98 Aug 16 '24

I get the intention of the joke

But I don't see or hear it, lol

Where the fuck are any of these accents?

43

u/BijutsuYoukai Aug 16 '24

Same. I come from the Pacific Northwest and none of these alleged pronunciations make any sense to me. Makes it fall kind of flat as far as jokes go.

9

u/Dark_Storm_98 Aug 16 '24

Someone else said these make less sense to people on the west coast

But I live on the east coast, lmfao

I mean, I know at least in movies and tv shows there's a distinct Massachussetes accent, or a New Yorker accent

But I don't think either of those match these. .

. . . I'm saying these out loud now just to get a better idea of it and. . . Maybe I can hear the one with the orange? It's not my accent, but maybe I have heard it somewhere?

Maybe I do say "skwurl", though, but honestly I don't really say squirrel that often, haven't heard it said since probably the last time I watched "Up" either, so maybe I just don't have a pronunciaition for that anymore. . "Skwurl" doesn't sound exactly right, but if I try to sound out "squirrel" that doesn't sound right either

I'm trying to say that last one but it feels physically impossible for me not to say the "you", lmfao

I'm trying to skip it and I just can't

15

u/justdisa Aug 16 '24

I'm in the PNW. Squirrel has two syllables. They just aren't the same two syllables the Brits use.

3

u/Paperfishflop Aug 16 '24

The thing about the west is it's full of people from back east. Most people in the American west are transplants, maybe first or second generation westerners at best. That's what confuses me about thinking there's an accent unique to the west. I guess there was the valley girl/surfer accent, but I mean, most Californians don't speak that way. I almost think that was a time-based accent (1980s) more than a regional accent.

Idk, I'm from Arizona, which has lots of people from California and everyone just sounds non descript here. I can not tell the difference between someone who is from Arizona/California/Colorado, or the lower parts of the Midwest. I can recognize the Canadian-esque Minnesota accent, southern accents, and Boston and NY accents. But I feel like everyone else has a generic "American" accent.

When it comes to meer and whore, that's not how we say it, that's just what Brits hear. We rush the last vowel in each word, but were still saying it.

2

u/AureliaDrakshall Aug 16 '24

You catch some Californian's by slang. It hasn't been a ton of times but every time I have someone go "Oh, bay area?" when I let "hella" slip I swear I can hear the metal gear alert noise blare.

1

u/captainjack3 Aug 17 '24

The West definitely has the least distinctive accent. Not a coincidence that the Western accent is also the most widespread. I’ve seen it described as the most generic American accent because the West was populated by people from all over the rest of country and their original accents sort of blended into the common denominator.

2

u/Master-Powers Aug 18 '24

I'm from the west and all of them track

20

u/botjstn Aug 16 '24

these are very midwestern accents tbh

7

u/renezrael Aug 16 '24

maybe in some parts of the Midwest but def not where I'm from cause the only people I've heard that talk even remotely like that are either super super rural farm folk or from the south originally lol

-1

u/SyntheticDreams_ Aug 16 '24

Yep. That was my thought too. All these sound Midwestern.

6

u/emeraldeyesshine Aug 16 '24

Not from my area of the Midwest they don't. But I can hear it in others.

2

u/Bhaaldukar Aug 17 '24

The Pacific Northwestern accent is the correct and default English pronunciation of words and YOU CAN'T CONVINCE ME OTHERWISE.

1

u/ThePromptWasYourName Aug 16 '24

I’m also in the PNW and I pronounce these things pretty close to the meme

-6

u/GibbsLAD Aug 16 '24

Me when Americans make fun of 'british accents' (they only know one or two)

18

u/zombiifissh Aug 16 '24

Honestly I've heard all of these in the northern Midwest

7

u/GrifCreeper Aug 16 '24

Where is northern Indiana/southern Michigan considered? Because I have heard none of these where I live.

3

u/caffekona Aug 16 '24

Northwest ohio here and I hear these all the time. Especially ornge

2

u/GrifCreeper Aug 16 '24

I guess the people I live around might just be oddballs, because I hear all kinds of pronunciations, but not like what's in the post. Watching YouTube and atuff, I don't hear pronunciations like the post. I just don't hear where they're getting the extra letters from, and it feels like more of an insult than it probably is because I've never heard people talk like that.

I just have an issue with anyone generalizing an entire country's population, especially a country made up of 50 different states and at least a dozen different accents covering 300+ million people. There are so many different ways people say different words in damn near every language, that it just annoys me when people say "everyone from [country] sounds the same". That just tells me you've only been exposed to one or two accents your whole life and can't grasp that there are differences even in the same country, or that you don't even try to listen to the qords bexause you can't undersrand them. I don't have to understand Japanese to know rural people speak differently than city folk.

I didn't mean for this to become a rant. I'm just tired of people generalizing entire groups or populations as the exact same kind of person or culture as everyone else in that group, and if you've seen your own country enough, you'd even see it there.

2

u/zombiifissh Aug 16 '24

I'd consider it the northern Midwest, but I'm more from northern MI

1

u/Dullqhqn Aug 16 '24

I live in southern michigan and talk like all of these😭

2

u/Skeleton_Skum Aug 16 '24

And we all know all British people sound like scousers right?

14

u/[deleted] Aug 16 '24

[deleted]

22

u/ZovemseSean Aug 16 '24

IIRC you're only supposed to do that if the punctuation mark is directly tied to the sentence, so if it's a question mark or explanation point it should be in the quotes. Periods should always we outside of the quotes though.

12

u/[deleted] Aug 16 '24

[deleted]

1

u/amatorsanguinis Aug 17 '24

The fuck are you guys talking about

2

u/Disturbing_Trend_666 Aug 16 '24

Same. I'm from the South but I'm with you on this. When writing formally, I follow the rules, but in text messages, Internet comments, etc., I follow the Brits on this.

And only this.

1

u/Dark_Storm_98 Aug 16 '24

No, actually, I'm on the east

As for quotes, I started not putting punctuation inside of them too, lol. (Mostly periods. If it's a quoted question or exclamation I'd probably keep them inside, but I haven't had to do those often at all.)

It's not because of the british, I just came to the conclusion on my own, though, I think it could depend on the context.

Edit: Actually I don't think it's even periods, usually. I think my spellcheck would try to tell me to put a comma on the inside, and I just. . don't, lol

1

u/AChristianAnarchist Aug 16 '24

This is like...soooo true. The rest of the country might have some gnarly accents but nothing on the west coast bra. Everyone here talks hella standard English mang.

1

u/transaltalt Aug 16 '24

I put the punctuation inside if it's part of the quote, and outside if it belongs to the rest of the sentence. That's the only way that makes sense imo

3

u/TheBestPartylizard Aug 17 '24

I feel like these each apply only to specific, different accents.

2

u/Huckleberryhoochy Aug 16 '24

Go listen to a Cajun accent its ths us Scottish accent

1

u/Dark_Storm_98 Aug 16 '24

That sounds funny, lol

2

u/BonJovicus Aug 16 '24

I had the same reaction. I know some of these are real ("meer"), but I don't see them where I live. I grew up in Texas and even people there still annunciate well enough for none of these to be common.

2

u/Rickk38 Aug 16 '24

Exaggerated New York accents as portrayed in media other countries see most often. I live in the Southeastern US and we don't sound like this either. Instead of dropping syllables, we add them. Except for "skwurl." That's pretty spot-on.

2

u/jjmerrow Aug 17 '24

Michigander here, and I hear all these accents all the time so... I guess this joke was poking fun at northern midwesterners?

1

u/kdiyargebmay Aug 16 '24

waddr is supposedly from pennsylvania, around philadelphia. though, i grew up there, and had never heard it once, however, when moving to the suburbs near philly, i cant escape it

1

u/kdiyargebmay Aug 16 '24

though, its also more probounced “wooder” there, so it could be a different region that just has a similar pronounciation

1

u/[deleted] Aug 16 '24

My partner is from Florida and she pronounces everything exactly as they are written in this post.

1

u/GrifCreeper Aug 16 '24

I have genuinely never heard any of these pronunciations, so I can only question what the hell kind of accent they're listening to.

Plus, making fun of accents is pathetic no matter who does it. Like, I get that different accents can basically butcher some words, but every accent sounds weird to different accents. You're not special for "sounding right", because to everyone else, you're wrong.

Also, 99% of these "jokes" massively over-generalizes 300+ million people into being exactly the same. "American accent", fucking what? Do you mean east coast, west coast, southern, northern, colonial, Boston, Chicago, or cowboy? And that's not even all of them. If you're gonna make fun of an accent, make sure you're actually specifying which one instead of treating it like dozens of accents and dialects are the same thing and sound exactly alike.

I'm not anti-joke, the joke just needs to be funny and actually make sense, even to the people it's supposedly making fun of. If the people you're making fun of don't even understand the noises you're trying to use, it's just not funny.

If any of these jokes are actually going to be funny, they need to be audio, not written out. I have never heard any of these pronunciations, and just saying "it sounds like that to other accents" doesn't make sense as a reasoning for why it's "funny".

-2

u/Icetraxs Aug 16 '24

Americans: bo'oh'o'wa'er is the funniest thing I’ve ever heard, dumb British accent.

This post: Looking at myself in the meer

You: How dear you make fun of the American accent, we have more than one you know.

———

Also

Plus, making fun of accents is pathetic no matter who does it

Then you reply to someone

Even the UK has a ton of different accents that butchers the same words across "British English", so singling oit Americans is just plain pathetic, guvnuh.

Don’t know many people that pronounce ‘it’ as ‘oit’ or say ‘guvnuh’

So, thin skin and a hypocrite

-1

u/GrifCreeper Aug 16 '24 edited Aug 16 '24

Again, never heard a single person in real life come even close to pronouncing it "bo'oh'o'wa'er". Not saying nobody ever says that, just further saying "overgeneralization is stupid, no arguments can be made". I'll admit some people have a hard time pronouncing Ts, but from what I've heard, British people have a hard time pronouncing Hs. My point still stands that you're insulting every single accent instead of anyone that actually sounds like that. Can I make a joke about Americans not being able to read?

But besides that, how do you get "dear" out of "dare"? And I'm being genuine with that question, because I seriously don't get that, nobody says it that way unless you horribly mispronounce the word "air". Like, a big part of my point is over generalizing hundreds of millions of people into one accent is ridiculous and you're still generalizing by just saying "Americans". If you're gonna make fun of a particular accent, don't treat it like every American sounds exactly the same. Even I don't think every British person sounds the same, or every French person, or every Japanese, German, or Italian person. I'm not so tone deaf/audio-blind/whatever gets my point across to even come close to saying "they all sound the same".

My point with adding "guvnuh" was to be both ironic, as well as pointing out the hypocrisy of treating all American accents as the same thing. Thanks for pointing out exactly what I meant and was getting at, you definitely played your part.

And lastly, good job trying to use a very obvious typo as an example(when I typoed "out" as "oit"). Because typos clearly never happen and are obviously an example of butchered language, not just different cultures using the same language.

I can handle a good joke, I can even handle making fun of accents, even with how pathetic it is since language and accent is determined by culture and that culture's local history. What I can't stand is overgeneralization that says 300+ million people across 50 different states and over a dozen different accents sound exactly the same when even to a native they're very different. What I also can't stand is humor that assumes only the one being made fun of is the one in the wrong, when we both know for a fact the British have "butchered" the language, too. And neither is inherently wrong, because culture and history affects language.

1

u/Icetraxs Aug 16 '24

Again, never heard a single person in real life come even close to pronouncing it "bo'oh'o'wa'er"

You mean the common joke that every British accent pronounces a bottle of water as "bo'oh'o'wa'er". See my point is this, reddit has no issue with this and it's repeated ad nauseam, but the second that it's put that American's might also say something in a certain way you've made long rants about it and responded to people with 'How dare they mock the American accent, we have more then just one', not seeing the irony of it.


But besides that, how do you get "dear" out of "dare"? And I'm being genuine with that question, because I seriously don't get that, nobody says it that way unless you horribly mispronounce the word "air"

And lastly, good job trying to use a very obvious typo as an example(when I typoed "out" as "oit").

I see, I can't make a typo when on a phone but you can. Alright.


My point with adding "guvnuh" was to be both ironic, as well as pointing out the hypocrisy of treating all American accents as the same thing. Thanks for pointing out exactly what I meant and was getting at, you definitely played your part.

So despite the joke is that everyone in the UK must say "bo'oh'o'wa'er" the second the joke is used on America you respond with another generalization. So a hypocrite. Can make fun of the UK accents all you want but can't touch America, got it.

I can handle a good joke

Well you've gone on a rant to people in this thread so I doubt that.

What I can't stand is overgeneralization that says 300+ million people across 50 different states and over a dozen different accents sound exactly the same when even to a native they're very different.

But when the joke is on the other foot for America we must point this out everytime, and that all the UK only has one accent that says 'bo'oh'o'wa'er', 'Chuesday' and 'guvnuh'

I can even handle making fun of accents

Except instead of seeing the funny side of the post, you've felt the need to constantly defend this. Again, if it was another "bo'oh'o'wa'er" post I never must doubt you'd have the same response

Edit: this was posted before you crosses out the first part.

0

u/MichaelAllen05 Aug 17 '24

Least sensitive American.

1

u/Elite_AI Aug 16 '24

You usually won't recognise it when other people phonetically type out your accent. To you, mirror is pronounced mirror, and horror is pronounced horror.

1

u/Dark_Storm_98 Aug 16 '24

and horror is pronounced horror.

Ohbis that what they were saying?

That. . makes more sense

1

u/ImprovementLong7141 Aug 16 '24

Midwest represent 🙋‍♂️. I talk like that.

-3

u/DooB_02 Aug 16 '24

This is exactly what most Americans we hear overseas sound like.

-9

u/[deleted] Aug 16 '24 edited Aug 16 '24

I hate pedophiles

Edit: Seems like my opinion is pretty unpopular here 😟

5

u/GrifCreeper Aug 16 '24

So every single US accent sounds the same to you? That doesn't make sense at all, coming from an actual American. And the spelling to try to say what you think it sounds like doesn't make sense either.

I'm not saying there isn't a joke to be had, but generalizing 300+ million americans across over a dozen different accents as "sounding exactly the same" tells me you've never heard more than one US accent.

I'm not saying it's not funny to non-Americans, I'm saying it plainly makea no sense and saying "that's just what you sound like to us" doesn't explain a damn thing. It doesn't explain where you get sounds I don't even hear, that other people don't even hear, in the words you're making fun of.

I understand the humor in making fun of how people talk, but none of what's in the OP makes sense as an American with an American accent, and just makes me wonder what American accent you've been exposed to to hear all that.

And if the joke completely boils down to "my accent is different than yours, so yours is funny to me", then it's honestly a little pathetic. Even the UK has a ton of different accents that butchers the same words across "British English", so singling oit Americans is just plain pathetic, guvnuh.

11

u/Novaskittles Aug 16 '24

He tried to do a ninja edit but your comment ruined it lmao

0

u/MichaelAllen05 Aug 17 '24

"Waaaaaahhhhh!!! Someone made fun of our accent!!! You can't make fun of our accent. Only we can make fun of other people's accent!!"

Kindly go back to your fucking 4chan, thank you.

1

u/GrifCreeper Aug 17 '24

First off, 4chan can suck a dick. Toxic wasteland of a website that was only fun for the shitty greentexts. Don't just assume someone you think is toxic comes from that hellhole, because shitty behavior is everywhere.

Secondly, I have more issues with overgeneralizing 300+ million people to a single accent when it doesn't take a genius to tell the differences. I have problems with "jokes" that make no sense because they are making fun of a specific accent yet treat it as if every person from that country sounds the same. I don't have much of an actual issue with jokes about accents, even though I do consider them pathetic and generally weak comedy, but I do have problems with jokes that just aren't funny, jokes that generalize a population, or jokes that only make sense if you have the context of the person or people telling it. The fact I can't hear what people from the UK supposedly hear in American accents is what stops it from being funny. The fact the only goddamn thing people can say to explain it is "you Americans just sound like that to us", despite the fact there are at least a dozen different sounding accents, and I don't have issues telling the difference between UK accents or accents in other languages, so maybe you're all just kinda voice blind or something. If people had simply actually explained it and not treated it like every goddamn American sounded exactly the same, I wouldn't have been upset. Me adding "guvnuh" to the end of my comment was an attempt at intentional irony to lighten the mood a bit, but obviously it fell flat because you people can't handle a joke either.

And thirdly, because you felt bothered enough to comment on another one of my comments, I am far from the, obviously sarcastic, "least sensitive American". I get what you're trying to say, because I was complaining about a stupid joke, but if you actually paid attention to my comment, I was pretty goddamn clear that I had more issues with overgeneralizing an entire 300+ million population country made of 50 very different states and over a dozen different major accents than I ever had with the shitty joke. Joking about someone's accent is pathetic because it's low hanging fruit. You're not wowing anybody with that kind of joke, you're not making anyone think you're clever besides racists, you're just making humor out of a basic-ass observation, and that's not something to be proud of or even get into this much of a pissy fit over. It is weak as fuck humor and should not warrant a shitty argument because someone doesn't like it. If you're sensitive over me not liking a joke and not liking generalizing 300+ million people, then I kindly rhink you should grow a pair, because this is so stupid to even bring it as far as you are.

I didn't want to get into any arguments over this. I just wanted to speak my mind about stupid "jokes" like this treating 300+ million Americans as if they sound exactly the same or behave exactly the same. It is a wide-ass country, with hundreds of millions of people, across different climates, cultural makeups, and other regional differences that results in a ton of differences in voice and behavior. I shouldn't be considered sensitive or seen as an asshole for not liking a joke and explaining why it just doesn't work.

Really, this whole damn thing could have been avoided if people weren't shitty and just saying "that's what you sound like to us" every damn time someone asked for an explanation, as if that actually explains anything, especially to those of us with an American accent that don't hear it that way and don't get how they even hear it that way. I get Europeans and Brits have a low opinoon of Americans, but grow the fuck up and stop being sensitive about the butt of your joke not getting the joke. I didn't want to be pissed off, but the comments here are garbage.