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SUBJECT: ACCENTS OF ENGLISH
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The regional accents of English speakers show great variation across the areas where English is spoken as a first language. This article provides an overview of the many identifiable variations in pronunciation, usually deriving from the phoneme inventory of the local dialect, of the local variety of Standard English between various populations of native English speakers. Local accents are part of local dialects. Any dialect of English has unique features in pronunciation, vocabulary, and grammar. The term "accent" describes only the first of these, namely, pronunciation. See also: List of dialects of the English language.

Non-native speakers of English tend to carry over the intonation and phonemic inventory from their mother tongue into their English speech. For more details see Non-native pronunciations of English. Among native English speakers, many different accents exist. Some regional accents are easily identified by certain characteristics. Further variations are to be found within the regions identified below; for example, towns located less than 10 miles (16 km) from the city of Manchester such as Bolton, Oldham and Salford, each have distinct accents, all of which form the Lancashire accent, yet in extreme cases are different enough to be noticed even by a non-local listener. There is also much room for misunderstanding between people from different regions, as the way one word is pronounced in one accent (for example, petal in American English) will sound like a different word in another accent (for example, pearl in Scottish English).

**BRITISH ACCENT**
Usually, when people learn to speak a second language, they use the sounds and pronunciation rules (and often grammar) of their native language. This is what gives them an accent. They are not aware of the British set of “speech rules”. That’s because they were never taught this in school. Their teachers probably were not native English speakers and they were not aware of such things.

This can be a big problem because speaking with a heavy accent can lead to misunderstanding. A strong foreign accent can affect job prospects. However, by acquiring a better British accent people can have better communication with potential employers, clients, colleagues and staff.

There are many schools and classes which teach English all around the world. However, most of them are focused on word lists and grammar rules. Very few of them address the “speech rules”. This is because many of the teachers are not native English speakers and they simply do not know of these “speech rules”. Many of them are even making errors themselves, speaking with a strong regional accent and teaching all of those things to you!

One more big problem – most English schools teach written English. The students are “studying English” instead of listening and speaking. That’s a real disaster. The students are not prepared for real speech in the real world. They can do very well at English tests, but they can’t understand native speakers with their native English accents, and the native speakers can not understand them.

If you are often asked to repeat yourself when you speak English, then you definitely need to improve British accent. It is not only a question of the pronunciation of different sounds, but also of speech melody and word connections.

When children learned their first language, they constructed a mental inventory of their native language’s speech sounds. Those sounds became a part of their speech. When they are learning a second language, they insert these speech sounds into the new language, in our case into English. Now, when they speak English, they reach into that inventory and come out with many substitute sounds. Some of them are close, but actually incorrect. These repeated errors in conversation with native speakers often cause them to be misunderstood.

How to learn a British accent? In order to master an English accent you must first immerse yourself in audio training by listening to the native speaker and doing repeating exercises many times.

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**AMERICAN ACCENT**
American English is a set of dialects of the English language used mostly in the United States. Approximately two-thirds of the world's native speakers of English live in the United States. English is the most common language in the United States. Though the U.S. federal government has no official language, English is the common language used by the federal government and is considered the de facto language of the United States because of its widespread use. English has been given official status by 28 of the 50 state governments. The use of English in the United States was a result of English colonization. The first wave of English-speaking settlers arrived in North America in the 17th century. Since then, American English has been influenced by the languages of the Native American population, the languages of European and non-European colonists, immigrants and neighbors, and the languages of slaves from West Africa.

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SCOTTISH ACCENT
Scottish English refers to the varieties of English spoken in Scotland. It may or may not be considered distinct from the Scots languague. It is always considered distinct from Scottish Gaelic, a Celtic language. The main, formal variety is called Scottish Standard English or Standard Scottish English, often abbreviated to SSE. SSE may be defined as "the characteristic speech of the professional class [in Scotland] and the accepted norm in schools." In addition to distinct pronunciation, grammar and expressions, Scottish English has distinctive vocabulary, particularly pertaining to Scottish institutions such as the Church of Scotland, local government and the education and legal systems. Scottish Standard English is at one end of a bipolar linguistic continuum, with focused broad Scots at the other. Scottish English may be influenced to varying degrees by Scots. Many Scots speakers separate Scots and Scottish English as different registers depending on social circumstances. Some speakers code switch clearly from one to the other while others style shift in a less predictable and more fluctuating manner. Generally there is a shift to Scottish English in formal situations or with individuals of a higher social status

 Scottish English results from language contact between Scots and the Standard English of England after the 17th century. The resulting shifts to English usage by Scots-speakers resulted in many phonological compromises and lexical transfers, often mistaken for mergers by linguists unfamiliar with the history of Scottish English. Furthermore, the process was also influenced by interdialectal forms, hypercorrections and spelling pronunciations.

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**QUESTIONS**
Which accent is more difficult?What do you think,why? Which one do you like most? Can we speak a language that is not our mother tongue like a native speaker?

**VIDEO**
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**PHOTOGRAPH**


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