Actors playing a role take on different accents all the time – some more successfully than others! But that’s temporary. Is it possible to make a permanent change to the way you talk?
There are a few reasons you might want to change your accent. Maybe you’re an actor taking on a role. Maybe you’re learning a new language and want to be able to sound more like a native speaker. Maybe you feel that your existing accent identifies you closely with the region and/or social class you come from, and you want to avoid the associated stereotypes.
So is it possible? Let’s find out.
Accents are formed in childhood. Babies are, of course, born without any accent at all. That means that the vast majority of us start life with the potential to learn any language, adopt any accent, and pronounce any word.
For instance, until they’re about eight months old, both American babies and Japanese babies can tell the distinction between ‘ra’ and ‘la’ if people make those sounds around them. However, accents develop quickly. By the time babies actually start talking, they know to pronounce words in the same way as the people around them – which means Japanese babies have lost the ability to distinguish between ‘ra’ and ‘la’, because there’s no real difference between the two in the Japanese language.
Bidialectalism
By the time you’re an adult, the language-learning part of your brain is already formed, so it’s much harder to learn a new language and to change your accent. However, if you move to a new place, or just change the people you spend time with, you may notice some changes to the way you speak. This is called ‘bidialectalism’, and it doesn’t happen because you’re being fake or phony. It just comes naturally to us to mimic the way the people around us talk, because – at least on a subconscious level – we want to fit in.
But when we meet up with people from back home, our accents are likely to be stronger than ever.
Levelling
As it has become possible for more of us to move to new areas – and to be exposed to other accents through TV and online – regional accents as a whole have begun to change. This is a phenomenon linguists refer to as ‘levelling’: different accents beginning to ‘level off’ and become less diverse. For example, it’s expected that over the next 30 years, the distinctive accent typical to the North East of England will simply become part of a more generic ‘North England’ accent.
Foreign Accent Syndrome
There’s one strange exception to the rule that people’s accents generally do not change enormously when they get older. This is Foreign Accent Syndrome. It’s a very rare medical condition whereby patients who have survived a head injury or stroke suddenly begin to talk in an accent they didn’t have before.
Only about 100 people in the world have been diagnosed with Foreign Accent Syndrome, and doctors don’t know exactly what causes it. We certainly wouldn’t recommend bashing your head against a wall in an attempt to wake up speaking flawlessly accented French.
Although the intensive (and expensive!) voice coaching used by the likes of Meryl Streep can help you adopt a temporary new accent for an acting role, permanently altering your accent as an adult is a different matter. Beyond the modulations you might make to fit in with those around you, we’re afraid you’re unlikely to see much of a change.
