Can anyone NOT from Australia or New Zealand actually tell the difference in accents?

Question

Just out of curiosity....I lived in England where I was continually asked if I was an aussie!! grr
I lived with an aussie (with a very broad accent) and an english guy and asked after a year if he could tell the difference in accent.....he couldn't!! Can anyone else actually hear the differences in accent....or duffrunces un uksent as we say it here apparently.

Answer 1

That's funny...I always thought the New Zealand accent sounds more like an English accent than Aussie! I take it you're a kiwi. ; ) The Aussie accent is very different from English accent. The way I explain it to people is this: for an Aussie accent, start with an English accent .. end then fletten out ye veh-wuls (and then flatten out your vowels).

A New Zealand accent sounds more like an English accent to me, but not a proper Londoner accent. Maybe I don't hear that much of a difference because I've not been overly exposed to NZ accents. I've only really heard just a handful (mainly from LOTR dvd Special Features section, where many NZers were interviewed. I thought they sounded more English with just a slight hint of the Aussie on certain vowels, but not all...and definitely not as broad!)

I'm from California, USA, btw. I've done theater for years and have something of an ear for accents. English and Aussie are two of my faves.

Oh, I just remembered something. One difference I remember between NZer and Aussie accent when saying "chips": chups (NZ) vs cheps (almost cheeps, Aussie). lol

The way you've explained the phonetic for "duffrunces un uksent," that's definitely closer to some British accents...more northern Brit. Pretty close to Welsh, actually. Very interesting!

Answer 2

I'm also Aussie and I guess for us there is a real difference between the accents. I live in Croatia now, and I've just started to tell some slight differences between the guys here and say Bosnians or Serbs, its really hard.

But a funny story I heard is about a foreigner who moved to New Zealand, then to Australia after a few years, and asked someone in Aus for a 'pig' to hang up her clothes. The Aussie finally worked out what she was saying and cracked up laughing. But the person had no idea that she said something funny. She thought a clothes 'peg' really was a pig!!

Poor thing, accents make life difficult at times.

Answer 3

When I came to Aussie and NZ from Britain and Canada, I'd lived here for about a year before I could tell the difference. It seems amazing; I can easily tell now. But I've been back to Britain a couple of times, and there's a part of Essex where the accent is exactly like NZ. Now I can tell the difference between a Southland accent and the rest of NZ.

Answer 4

Theer are four major accents in the USA and two in Canada with a lot of smaller ones. There are hundreds of accents in the UK. Australia is developing regional accents quite quickly and it is already easy to pick people from Adelaide.

Anyone with an ear for speech patterns should be able to hear the differences in accents. Australia and New Zealand are quite distinct.

Answer 5

I can not tell the difference in the accents, they sound the same to me, even the southafrican accent.

I´m Mexican moved to England a few months ago and I´m just starting to notice the accents of the Londoners, northern England and Scottish.

Before moving here all british accents sounded the same, someone has to live and talk to the people every day in the country to really notice the differences

Answer 6

Good God!! I hope so.
I'm Australian, and live in California USA now. People always ask if I am English.
I just asked my husband if he can tell the difference between Aus/NZ accents (he works with a NZ guy). He said he can hear the difference in accents between me and his NZ coworker but cant identify the distinct sounds enough to be able to recognise if someone is Australian or from New Zealand.
Did that make sense????

Answer 7

I was born and grew up in Canada, have lived in Australia for 'donkey's years', as they say here. When I first came here, I could not tell the difference, but I find it easy to tell now. As a matter of interest, most Aussies ask if I am American...

Answer 8

I think it is the same deal as us (Kiwis and Aussies) trying to tell the difference between a Canadian and a US accent. - try telling a Canadian that they sound like an American and you will get a very similar response to telling a Kiwi they sound like an Aussie.

Answer 9

i am Aussie & yes there is a huge diffrents we sound nothing like nz or english people mate lordy how insaulting

Answer 10

Does it matter, I for one can not tell the difference and i don't care, well i am a Manchester United fan