110 réponses à ce sujet

[Psymayn]

Chas1024 wrote...

Yes, she was born and grew up in Orlais but would have learned Ferelden from her Ferelden mother. She would have had no occasion to speak Ferelden with the Orlaisions and so pick up an accent. Her bard skills of blending in meant she was adept at affecting different accents. Her time in Lothering would have given her ample opportunity to acquire a local Feralden accent. The only reason to use an Orlaision accent would be to appear Orlaision, but why?

One of my parents friends are from England, he lived until he was 20 and then moved to Denmark and have lived here for 30 years, but he still have a very remarkable british accent, so remarkable that it is sometimes hard to understand what he says in Danish. This should answer your question, an accent is not something you just ''pick-up''.

[pepe5454]

I think an accent can be picked up though. I work with a scottish man who you would never know was not raised in the states until his wife would call him on his cell phone then out of the blue wham full on scottish accent and you were always scratching your head going where the heck did that come from.

[Sarielle]

Not sure if it's been said (I got tired of the childish back and forths going on by page 2) but when it says she's able to mimic noble or sevants' accents...I always assumed it was ORLESIAN accents. The same way an English speaker might be able to mimic the English nobility's accent or a cockney one, but wouldn't necessarily speak French with a perfect French accent.

EDIT:

pepe5454 wrote...

I think an accent can be picked up
though. I work with a scottish man who you would never know was not
raised in the states until his wife would call him on his cell phone
then out of the blue wham full on scottish accent and you were always
scratching your head going where the heck did that come from.

My boss has commented on this with me. I have a heavy mountain accent, and I tone it down on nights I answer the switchboard for the simple fact sometimes people have trouble understanding me, and I need to be able to verify spellings n such. But, when someone calls in from the area I live in, my boss says he can always tell because I fall back into my natural accent -- unconsciously, but I do it.

Modifié par Sarielle, 27 janvier 2010 - 10:10 .

[TyroneTasty]

I want to eat Leliana's accent. It's delicious.

Modifié par TyroneTasty, 27 janvier 2010 - 10:59 .

[KariTR]

pepe5454 wrote...
I agree with what you are saying.  Some words in languages are the same but mean different things depending on the pitch or tone so it's very difficult toi pickup but I still would consider that learning the language.  You have to be able to force your tongue sometimes to do things its not used to doing learning a new language.  Accent I was more thinking of variances within the language like an australian speaking english vs an american speaking english.  They can say the same thing but the ozzy is going to kind of mumble parts of words and add pitch where the american would not or even the variance in the U.S. southern drawl vs a philly accent.  It is something you can pickup but you will probably still sound like you have an american accent to an australian even though you may sound like and australian to someone from the U.S.  Leli might actually be similar to this maybe to an orlesian she has a slight ferelden accent she may have picked up.

Very true, especially as we don't know how Orlesian she sounds compared to one never having learned a second language. They may think she sounds completely Ferelden (just like that other Orlesian, Duncan!)

[Sericenthe]

I don't care what her accent is, it's sexy.

[Bibdy]

My dad's American and I moved to the States about 5 years ago after being born and raised in England until I was 22.



Would you condemn me for still having an English accent? Where exactly do you get off telling people what their accent should be?

[TyroneTasty]

I think we should give the OP a break. He's not saying, "LOL She talks funny! How come?" He just doesn't understand how an accent could stick with someone, which isn't malicious, just naive.

[Euteras]

Bathead wrote...

From personal experience, one gains an accent from where you are raised, not from your parents. My entire family (Mom, Dad, Brother and me) were all born in Ireland. My parents had lived there most of their lives, until they moved to Canada when my brother was eight and I was one year old. About seven years later, we moved to the U.S. Right up until my parents passed a few years ago (Dad in 99, Mom in 2000) They had kept their accents, albeit somewhat ameliorated by then, right up to the end. Me and my brother however have no discernible accent other that American, even though we lived with our Irish accented parents all our lives. Our environment influenced our accents, NOT our parents.

I think it works both ways. I'm from southern California and have met an occaisional first generation American. I can hear the difference between latins, orientals, arabics and others. Sometimes I can even pick out the country or region. I can't tell the difference between a Cambodian and Vietnamese but I can tell the difference between them and Chinese. I can hear a Tagolog accent in an American born Philipeno (Sp?).  I'm sure any of these first generation Americans have an american accent to the people in their parents native countries. I don't have any practical experience with this side of the accent dynamic but I do remember my midwestern cousins telling me that they thought I sounded a bit like a Mexican. In So Cal different ethnic or nationalitie groups tended to live in close proximity so the idea of learning an accent from your surroundings still applies here.  

[Kiwiya]

Even if you learn a language from a native speaker without an accent, you'll have one for some time, just because of how you're used to making sounds in your native language, and it'll always be pretty easy to fall back into that speech pattern. I've spoken German for years, but I can still sound horrifically American at it if I'm feeling lazy. x)

[LunaticCross]

Well, I thought I'd share my own situation.



I'm from California, specifically the Bay Area. I'm also a first generation Vietnamese American. However, growing up the only other people I spoke Vietnamese to was my parents and aunt. It just so happened that I had more Chinese American friends and no Vietnamese.



Incidentally, people have most often assumed that I do not speak any Vietnamese because I sound so Americanized. On the flip-side, when I do speak Vietnamese to other Vietnamese people, they always ask when I arrived in the U.S. because my accent sounds very southern Vietnamese. Usually, the only clue that I'm American-born is when I screw up the Vietnamese grammar when speaking because I am applying English grammar rules.



So, I do understand the OP's reasoning. However, who's to say Leliana's mother even taught her the Fereldan tongue? Maybe she only spoke the Orlesian language and had to learn Fereldan as a necessity later in life? That would account for the accent. I know many immigrant families that forbid the use of their ethnic language and only allow English even though the parents don't speak much English either. Consequently, when the child does finally learn the parents' language, they speak it with an American accent.



I will admit that I am one of the more...unique outcomes.



Anyways, I don't really ponder this while I play. I just know I like Leliana's accent when she talks.

[WilliamShatner]

Chas1024 wrote...

Why does Leliana speak Feralden with an Orlaision accent?

Sex appeal.

Pure logic.

[David Gaider]

Err... I was taught German by my parents when I was young, and it is their native tongue. I can affect a German accent but I didn't pick it up naturally just because I knew the language. As for other people, some pick up accents where they live very quickly... others not so much. I know an Irish woman who has lived here ever since she was a teenager and her accent is still very strong.



As for Leliana, she was born and raised in Orlais. She has an Orlesian accent. She could probably choose to disguise her accent if she wished, but she doesn't bother. Clearly she has not picked up the Fereldan accent even though she's speaking the local language.



As for Corinne Kempa, the voice actress, she is a French actress who has been living in London for some time. A good match, I think. I also find her voice sexy as hell, so... yeah. Weird what some people will assume, I guess.

[Joshd21]

She's hot, enough said

[Xandurpein]

David Gaider wrote...
As for Corinne Kempa, the voice actress, she is a French actress who has been living in London for some time. A good match, I think. I also find her voice sexy as hell, so... yeah.

Amen to that!

[Old Chorizo]

Rolenka wrote...


Foreign accents don't come from hearing them, they come from brain development.

If a person is raised only hearing and speaking french, their brain and oratory muscles become accustomed to making those sounds. If they learn english, they will have a french accent, period -- it takes years to overcome. Learning english from a person with a french accent has nothing to do with it.

Accents within a language (british, southern, midwestern, etc.) are easier to mimic and can in fact be picked up by accident if you live in that region long enough.

It only takes me a couple Guinness' to start sounding like an Irishman! 

[Maria Caliban]

ejoslin wrote...

I think a far better question is why everyone from Antiva in this game has a different accent.

Different regions of the same country. I don't have the same accent as a New Yorker or someone from Georgia or Texas.

[Bann Duncan]

Chas1024 wrote...

jon 45 wrote...
You don't seem to understand how accents when speaking foreign languages come about. It is not that everyone who is French, Spanish, German or Italian learned to speak English with a distinctive accent instead of learning the proper Queen's English, it is that despite the fact that they are trying quite hard to speak clear English their naturally acquired accent comes through. It requires some talent and training to overcome this, and even then people are bound to slip back into their native accent when not actively trying to sound differently.

I do understand that. My point was that Ferelden is not a foreign language to Leliana.  I assumed she learned it form her mother before or at the same time as she learned Orlesian. Cildren who are bilingual from an early age don't tent to have an accent in either language. It is possible that Leliana learned only Orlesian as a child in which case the accent would have been natural when she learned Ferelden when much older.

Listen. I grew up with four mother languages, of which one was English and I grew up in the US. My parents are native speakers of the other languages yet when I speak them, it is still tinged with the American accent's influence.

Are you bilingual or are you just BSing?

[-Rykno]

In Demark we have a french prince who is married to our queen, he have spent a lifetime in Denmark, and his danish sounds horrorfying. He doesn't speak danish, he doesn't speak french, he speaks frenish. But then again, he is french, what can you expect

Modifié par -Rykno, 13 février 2010 - 02:45 .

[Statulos]

Suron wrote...

because once you learn french/spanish/whatever other language you immediately have the proper accent and pronunciation..right..amirite?

exactly...

Why DO those of oriental decent still have that accent even though they speak English???? What purpose does it serve???

tl:dr - don't be an idiot

I have been living in Indiana for two years now and though my accent is thinner, it becomes evident that I´m not from the Midwest. I do not speak my mother language (Spanish) here and that´s probably why I have my accent mellowed a bit but still, 24 years living in Spain have made a very good job on not being able to speek like a Hoosier irregadless of my time here. It´s also very funny when I speak in Latin or describe Latin terms with Late-Republic pronunciation.

Maria Caliban wrote...

ejoslin wrote...

I think a far better question is why everyone from Antiva in this game has a different accent.

Different regions of the same country. I don't have the same accent as a New Yorker or someone from Georgia or Texas.

Considering that Antiva is based on Italy, language over there should also be interesting. I have seen a Sicilian forcing his dialect on purpose so a guy from Lombardy could not understand him.



I mean, I don´t sound like Zevran and many people have difficulties pointing down at where I´m from but they know FOR SURE that English is not my first language.

Modifié par Statulos, 13 février 2010 - 04:30 .

[FollowTheGourd]

Intontation is probably one of the harder parts to get right, and easily gives you away as a non-native speaker and makes your use of the language sound worse than it is, even if your word-usage and grammar is impeccable. E.g., the best I can do with German is make some people wonder if I'm from the north (which is supposedly more English-sounding).

Also, in the case of modern English, it doesn't help that our vowels are also more dipthongy than in some other common European languages.

And even if you could do the intonation correctly, it's the one part I find more comfortable speaking "natively" anyway - maybe something to do with thought patterns. Not to mention somebody might actually want to stress where they're from and so speak with a noticeable accent.  Plus it gets even worse when you try to speak the language naturally... English likes to predictably "slur" words more than, say, French, which seems to prefer eliding syllables more (not that my French is any good to know for sure, and I'm sure they have exceptions like "je ne sais pas" -> "je sais pas" -> "chai pas" -> "I dunno").

Modifié par FollowTheGourd, 13 février 2010 - 05:24 .

[FierachEredasSoulchiou]

Leliana's probably speaking with that accent since its the easiest one she had picked up/learned since her upbringing.

[Special_Agent_Goodwrench]

She has the accent because it is 100% pure sexy, 100% pure awesome and 99.9% loved by everyone. (Still can't believe that there are some people who hate her accent. Bloody blasphemy! *Shakes fist*)



Simple as that.

[Stuffy38]

-Rykno wrote...

In Demark we have a french prince who is married to our queen, he have spent a lifetime in Denmark, and his danish sounds horrorfying. He doesn't speak danish, he doesn't speak french, he speaks frenish. But then again, he is french, what can you expect

Haha and your Princess Mary is from the same state as me in Australia   Small world.

[Chas1024]

Ye gods, I thought this thread was dead and buried but it has now come back to haunt me. Well, at least it won the achievement of a contribution from the man himself, David Gaider.