Accent

[Johnyxxx]

Hello.

Can anybody tell what accent the lady in the video speaks? She was an American but her accent does not sound like an American one. (I cannot hear the American "r" at all)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tH4aJ92PFg

Thanks a lot.

 

[Charlie Bernstein]

Good question. I'd like to see what others think.

To me, it sounds like the so-called "mid-Atlantic" accent, from the days when American Hollywood movie stars tried to sound a bit British. (Get it? The accent sounds like it's from the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.)

It became so popular that many upper-class Americans started using it in the 1930s and '40s.

 

[GoesStation]

It's Louise Brooks, a major star in the late silent picture era. She grew up in Kansas, USA. In the interview she speaks with the mid-Atlantic accent that film stars of the time learned in elocution lessons — as dramatized below.

 

[probus]

We had a similar phenomenon in Canada back then. It was a snobbish fake British accent now called Canadian dainty. I don't think anybody actually spoke that way in real life.

 

[Andromeda]

Hello.

Can anybody tell what accent the lady in the video speaks? She was an American but her accent does not sound like an American one. (I cannot hear the American "r" at all)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tH4aJ92PFg

Thanks a lot.

It is an acquired accent of American actors and higher class society who adopted a fictionalised upper-crust intonation. It is an American-British hybrid. Some linguists think it is faux-British. It seems Jackie Kennedy spoke with that accent.

 

[Johnyxxx]

It is an acquired accent of American actors and higher class society who adopted a fictionalised upper-crust intonation. It is an American-British hybrid. Some linguists think it is faux-British. It seems Jackie Kennedy spoke with that accent.

That was exactly my thought when I heard the accent for the first time - a hybrid of American and British accent.

 

[Tdol]

Mind you, she did live in Europe for a couple of years, so it could be because of that.

 

[Charlie Bernstein]

Mind you, she did live in Europe for a couple of years, so it could be because of that.

Good thought. Keep in mind that it really is a good example of Hollywood's mid-Atlantic accent.