Losing your accent

I wouldn't worry at all about losing your American accent. Studies have shown that children of a certain age will lose their native accent but it doesn't usually happen to adults unless they deliberately try to lose it. Intonation and cadence will stay the same although you may replace American words with British ones and that really doesn't affect accent per se. Some people naturally have an "ear" for languages and can imitate; those with these abilities that are acute may unknowingly take on a different accent but it will be slight. If you don't want to lose your American accent, you most likely won't.

I have been called Irish a handful of times... most common is Canadian though... I guess I can understand that, I lived in Whatcom County, WA...

I'm from Whatcom County, as well!   

Even before I started travelling and way before I moved to the UK, people would ask where I was from or they'd say I sounded Canadian.    Makes sense, since we're right next to the border.   

I may sound Canadian, but I don't say 'eh'.    I'd probably be discriminated against in Whatcom Country for saying 'eh'    .... unless I was in the gas line at Costco.    hehehehe

I'm good/bad (depending on your opinion) at picking up accents without realizing it.  I'm from Indiana originally and left during college for Tennessee.  After a week or two around my relatives there, my midwestern friends would tease me about my southern accent.  Now it's pretty much a southern accent most of the time.  Even I can hear it now.

When I visited my fiance in England I was asked by the gentleman checking my paperwork in the Atlanta airport after my flight home about my accent.  He clarified asking why I had a British accent if I was American.  LOL  That was after two weeks.  I don't even realize I'm doing it.  I'm worried that I'll sound like a fake or poser for something I don't realize I'm doing.

Maybe I missed my calling and should have been a character actor.  Of course it would help if I could act.  I can't.  LOL

I find it interesting how the British are so quick to pick up on slight accent changes. So I think it's so funny when people try to fake it. I know for me I tend to replace greetings or words with the ones used here but I don't think my accent has really changed any. People can tell I'm American after about 2 words....lol.

DS has been in the US for about 15 years and laments losing his Yorks. accent (although he does still say "gar-idge"). I was teasing him the other day about a job posting I saw online for a company in London. They wanted someone who could speak "US" 

I grew up outside of Boston but never really developed the accent (unlike my siblings and dear mother).  Between leaving the US and now (almost 10 years) I have lived in the UK and Australia.

My American accent has definitely softened, and I get asked a lot of I am Canadian or Irish.  If someone guesses where in the US I am from, I get California a lot.  It is really a mixed bag.

I met several Americans who sound like they are just off the plane but have been here for 10+ years.  I have met several people who sound positively and naturally British.

Interesting.....   this works the other way around as well.  I am a Brit living in the US for 17 years now. 

Americans can usually tell I am from England, but have often thought Australia, NZ, S.Africa (Ireland -rare, and Atlanta, GA !!!?).

Over in UK, they typically can recognize the accent, but I think are slightly thrown off by my phrasing, and word choices - I am sure I have picked up lots of American ways of saying things.

I sometimes feel a bit "mid Atlantic", a strange feeling hard to describe.

H

I have lived here nearly two years and my american accent is very nearly GONE!  Some british people cannot tell in the slightest that I am american anymore.  Most people ask me if I am from Cornwall, or Ireland.  I didn't do it on purpose but working with a customer based job (sales) it just sort of happened.  My family back in america because i sound british now.

I have lived here nearly two years and my american accent is very nearly GONE!  Some british people cannot tell in the slightest that I am american anymore.  Most people ask me if I am from Cornwall, or Ireland.  I didn't do it on purpose but working with a customer based job (sales) it just sort of happened.  My family back in america because i sound british now.

Wow, that happened fast!  I've been here for over 6 years and as far as I can tell I'm just the same.  Whenever I speak up at work (asking the volunteers to do something, etc.) I still get  stares from customers as if I was speaking Swahili.  It's a bit annoying and makes them seem like hicks.  I don't mind questions and curious comments and am happy to talk about where I'm from, why I'm here now, etc.  I just don't like the stares.

Wow, that happened fast!  I've been here for over 6 years and as far as I can tell I'm just the same.  Whenever I speak up at work (asking the volunteers to do something, etc.) I still get  stares from customers as if I was speaking Swahili.  It's a bit annoying and makes them seem like hicks.  I don't mind questions and curious comments and am happy to talk about where I'm from, why I'm here now, etc.  I just don't like the stares.

I know that stare! The glazed over look in their eyes, you just know they're thinking, 'oh wow, her accent sounds different, how should I ask where she's from?'   The moment I see the stare, I know the question's coming

Well here's something a bit strange for you -
I had my business lines cross with my past and I was on the phone the other day with a person I used to work with 8 years ago.  He knew we had the same name, but he actually didn't put 2 and 2 together that I was the same person at all (because of my "Scottish accent") until I asked him something that the average person wouldn't know about it unless you knew him.  I really threw him off actually!!! 

My accent is different in that I've toned down my accent to Boston Light. I've found that if I speak the way I normally would to people who don't know me, they're not expecting me to have that accent, so I have to keep repeating myself until I use Boston Light or just general American.

My dentist (who is not from here) asked me what part of Scotland I was from. That was pretty funny.   I've gotten Irish the most and Austrialian and Canadian a few times, but never American. Not sure why. I sound very American to me and no one back home has thought my accent has changed. My vocabularly has changed, but I still sound American.

I've gotten the Irish thing several times. Even yesterday when I was speaking to the older gentlemen that walk their dogs every morning when I walk chicklet to school. One of them looked at me kind of funny and said OH! I didn't know you were Irish. LOL...I said well that's because I'm not. I've gotten Canadian, Australian, and hey you're a Geordie!

As for the stares, I typically get them from children when they overhear me talking. I can remember in Cornwall last summer we stopped at a pub for a meal and there was a family with a young child and an older child of about 11. The 11ish year old just kept staring at chicklet and myself...so I made a goofy face at her and she looked away for the rest of the meal. I think I scared her  crazy lady that talks funny 

I never really lost mine in the 2.5 years I was in Scotland, but I definitely picked up the intonation and rhythm, which caused people at home to say my accent had changed. My enunciation changed slightly as well. But I wasn't anywhere near sounding Scottish!

Now that I've been back in the US for nearly a year (how time flies!) I'm fully back to my good ole NJ way of speaking. Though, the funny thing is if I talk in depth at all about Scotland, that enunciation thing kind of creeps in. Same if I'm in a job interview, which I think is because I really got the bulk of my professional training and job interview experience in Scotland. It must flip some kind of switch in my brain, which must be trying to associate the way I speak with what I'm speaking about. So weird.

And I know that customer stare as well! When I was working at HMV I would get it all the time. I'd ask someone a question when I was at the till (Would you like a bag? Can I help you with anything else?) and they'd just look at me for a second and say something along the lines of 'That's not a local accent!'. Sometimes I'd joke and say 'Oh! Is it not??' 

Though, the funny thing is if I talk in depth at all about Scotland, that enunciation thing kind of creeps in. Same if I'm in a job interview, which I think is because I really got the bulk of my professional training and job interview experience in Scotland. It must flip some kind of switch in my brain, which must be trying to associate the way I speak with what I'm speaking about. So weird.

I think it does depend on the context -- what you're speaking about and the person to whom you're speaking. When I'm talking to family here I fall back into Light Boston (as Plain Pearl says) but if I'm talking to someone professionally -- especially on the phone -- I tend to enunciate more.  Then too, I met someone at work who came from Belfast and had a very slight Northern Irish accent. I asked where she was from and gradually we both were talking stronger 'Norn Iron'.