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Re: CHAT: This or that that.

From:Daniel Lawrence <daniel@...>
Date:Wednesday, February 14, 2007, 22:35
As I understand it this type of accent mimicking (called phonetic
convergence by linguists) is not specific to people who are
linguistically-oriented. There is some sociolinguistics research
being done in this area. Now if I can only dig up a reference....
Well, there's a PDF by Jennifer Pardo, entitled "on phonetic
convergence in conversation interactions" here:

http://www.stanford.edu/~eckert/PDF/pardo2006.pdf

Hope that helps/is of interest.

Best,

~ Daniel

On Feb 14, 2007, at 4:50 PM, Remi Villatel wrote:

> On Wednesday 14 February 2007 19:04, Mia Soderquist wrote: > >>> Now, I'm in a good company! I don't even realise that - my wife ofen >>> tells me that I immediately start imitating accent of my >>> interlocutor! >> >> I do the same thing. Sometimes I catch myself and try to stop, >> particularly if I am starting to echo regional accents in American >> English, my native language. I don't want people to think I am >> making fun > [---CUT---] > > Count me in! Mimicking accents is a second nature for me too. > > I didn't realize until I encountered the strongest french accent: The > southern accent. After a week, I was talking like an "autochthon", I > couldn't help it and didn't even notice the southern accent any > more. Since > I never felt that my northern usual companions had any peculiar > accent, I > can't remember if they "caught" the southern accent too or not. > They made > no remarks about my accent, I was the one doing them. > >> I wonder if this is a habit peculiar to the more linguistically- >> oriented >> mind, or if it is just something that everyone does to a degree. > > Good question... but I think that Isaac already gave us the answer. > If his > wife --not as much linguistically-oriented as us, I guess-- > noticed, it > must mean that it is something specific to "us". > > -- > ================== > Remi Villatel > maxilys_@_tele2.fr > ==================