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Accent Expert Explains Similarities Between Different Accents | WIRED

Many accents from different parts of the English-speaking world actually have a ton of similarities. Dialect coach Erik Singer talks about how this happens, and breaks down which mouth and tongue shapes correlate to the sounds we hear. Also, check out the free WIRED channel on Roku, Apple TV, Amazon Fire TV, and Android TV.…

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Many accents from different parts of the English-speaking world actually have a ton of similarities. Dialect coach Erik Singer talks about how this happens, and breaks down which mouth and tongue shapes correlate to the sounds we hear.

Also, check out the free WIRED channel on Roku, Apple TV, Amazon Fire TV, and Android TV. Here you can find your favorite WIRED shows and new episodes of our latest hit series Tradecraft.

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Accent Expert Explains Similarities Between Different Accents | WIRED

79 Comments

  1. Ezra Dreyar

    October 23, 2019 at 1:46 pm

    HE’S BACK 😍💕💕💕💕

  2. Melissa Peterson

    October 23, 2019 at 1:49 pm

    I watch these videos not for the mouth sounds but for the Eric sounds

  3. Dani Hatton

    October 23, 2019 at 1:51 pm

    I really want him to do a series of 5 min tutorials of how to do popular accents correctly!

  4. derdiedas9911

    October 23, 2019 at 1:54 pm

    God bless Erik Singer !! Dudes a genius

  5. Megat Harith

    October 23, 2019 at 2:03 pm

    All i went is to hear Erik speak in those accents

  6. wishywashywara

    October 23, 2019 at 2:05 pm

    Back by popular demand!!

  7. Charlie Onions

    October 23, 2019 at 2:11 pm

    Fish and chips chips

  8. Anonimo69 ANONIMO

    October 23, 2019 at 2:11 pm

    By the thumbnail I thought it was some complex maths thing

  9. Ace-of-Wands

    October 23, 2019 at 2:15 pm

    01:14 As if we haven’t already spent every past video of his mimicking the sounds and mouth shapes he describes 😂😂

  10. Justine Helene

    October 23, 2019 at 2:15 pm

    Have you ever done a video about how one becomes a dialect coach?

  11. kinderriegel junkie

    October 23, 2019 at 2:26 pm

    I love this man.

  12. ChaseTheSun

    October 23, 2019 at 2:30 pm

    is it just me or does the Boston accent have similarities with an Australian accent?

  13. Buckaroo Banzai

    October 23, 2019 at 2:42 pm

    If YouTube banned all non Erik Singer videos, it would still be the top video streaming platform.

  14. Lauren Piro

    October 23, 2019 at 2:46 pm

    Oooh yeah, more Language Daddy

  15. Furkan Aktaş

    October 23, 2019 at 2:46 pm

    Fish and Chips!

  16. bladervn

    October 23, 2019 at 2:48 pm

    I see Erik Singer I click

  17. rawnak

    October 23, 2019 at 3:02 pm

    It’s ant man

  18. Egg with 5000 subscribers

    October 23, 2019 at 3:06 pm

    Its fake, His brain is a paid actor..

  19. Joel Weiss

    October 23, 2019 at 3:06 pm

    Erik Singer needs to go on tour. ASAP

  20. Jonny P

    October 23, 2019 at 3:14 pm

    I had an epiphany yesterday that English and American are opposite ends of the spectrum on the same plane and australian/kiwi/south african are all somewhere in between

  21. Rhys McGoIdrick

    October 23, 2019 at 3:14 pm

    About the Boston/Irish thing. I imagine that originally English had that fronted sound.

    “Car” is a short form of “carriage” after all and I don’t say “Cahr-ridge” but “caar-ridge”.

  22. Rico Ten

    October 23, 2019 at 3:18 pm

    A friend of mine visited relatives in Pittsburgh. She remarked that for “It is,” they said, “Utt uzz.” That seems to be the kit-centering you referred to.

  23. lavkian

    October 23, 2019 at 3:29 pm

    Anyone else have a raging clue after listening to this man?

    No? Just me?

  24. Tom Wylde

    October 23, 2019 at 3:36 pm

    please Erik, audiobook now please please please

  25. shmook

    October 23, 2019 at 3:36 pm

    King

  26. Antonie de Koning

    October 24, 2019 at 10:17 am

    The reason he’s on so many of these videos is cause Linguists struggle to find jobs and this is at least something to do other than awkwardly staring at random people talking in public.

  27. M J

    October 24, 2019 at 10:57 am

    I will never not click on Erik Singer’s videos. Holy cow, this stuff is interesting!

  28. Vermoot

    October 24, 2019 at 11:04 am

    Can anyone recommend any good books about all this? (english accents, their evolution, the study of accents, etc) Preferrably with accompanying audio examples

  29. Eric Yang

    October 24, 2019 at 11:33 am

    Wired should fund Erik to start his own youtube channel

  30. IamNoodly

    October 24, 2019 at 12:36 pm

    MOAR

  31. Mary S.

    October 24, 2019 at 1:10 pm

    I’d love to see a video with Erik that mentions the Newfoundland accent(s) (there are some variations, though they’re largely very similar). I think it’d be pretty cool

  32. Matt Bassett

    October 24, 2019 at 2:35 pm

    More of this man!!

  33. Shauday Smith

    October 24, 2019 at 3:43 pm

    so flipping good!!!

  34. Shanaynay

    October 24, 2019 at 5:39 pm

    Thank you so much I love your vids! I’ve been practicing accents as a hobby for years n your vids definitely help me fine tune them!

  35. Laura M

    October 24, 2019 at 5:53 pm

    Canadian accents do some major mouth raising.

  36. Allison Scruggs

    October 24, 2019 at 7:22 pm

    thanks Eric, love u

  37. Kate Mullins

    October 24, 2019 at 7:46 pm

    Safe to say this is now the “Erik Singer” channel? … and I’m AOK with that 🙂

  38. M S

    October 24, 2019 at 8:03 pm

    Get. this. guy. a. TV. show.

  39. Rob Ballantine

    October 24, 2019 at 9:07 pm

    Comment sections under Erik Singer videos are the most pleasant places on the internet

  40. kittadyne

    October 24, 2019 at 10:15 pm

    I wanna hear Eric DO more accents

  41. Obr Kenobi

    October 24, 2019 at 10:48 pm

    I love this series! May Eric singer be with us foreva and eva.

  42. Jennifer Dharmaratnam

    October 25, 2019 at 2:16 am

    As a student in linguistics, this just made things so much clearer for me

  43. Andi Alexander

    October 25, 2019 at 3:00 am

    This is my favourite one yet!

  44. David G Austin

    October 25, 2019 at 6:18 am

    I see Erik in the thumbnail, I hit the “like” button before I’ve even started watching. Somebody PLEASE give this guy his own channel!

  45. SpaceMonkey

    October 25, 2019 at 6:30 am

    Could you do a segment on the weird somewhat half-British-half-Californian-sounding accent that pop-punk and pop-emo bands adopt, a la Blink-182 or Green Day?

  46. whanowa

    October 25, 2019 at 7:21 am

    We need a video of Eric Singer doing 25 accents.

  47. Justine Kerford

    October 25, 2019 at 10:15 am

    I did three years of Linguistics in varisty and I think I get some things about vowels better now then I did when I graduated. So interesting! Also think I now understand why people might confuse South African and New Zealand accents when that didn’t make sense before

  48. Crash

    October 25, 2019 at 1:12 pm

    i would listen to this mf talk about accents all god damned day

  49. Joseph Fuller

    October 25, 2019 at 3:29 pm

    *Question:* While I believe that pronunciations that have the sounds clearly distinguished are correct, which pronunciation of the word “genre” is closer to its etymological roots?

    Is it the /ʒ/ sound like in the French “je ne sais pas” or the /dʒ/ sound like in the English name “John”?

  50. Joseph Fuller

    October 25, 2019 at 3:29 pm

    *Question:* While I believe that pronunciations that have the sounds clearly distinguished are correct, which pronunciation of the word “genre” is closer to its etymological roots?
    Is it the /ʒ/ sound like in the French “je ne sais pas” or the /dʒ/ sound like in the English name “John”?

  51. KaptSuolisolmu

    October 25, 2019 at 6:59 pm

    I love these Eriks dialect videos

  52. Crismodin

    October 25, 2019 at 7:34 pm

    So when is Erik going to buy WIRED and turn it into a language university?

  53. imshinycaptain

    October 25, 2019 at 7:49 pm

    This is way better than any dialect coach I’ve ever had.

  54. Sara Fet

    October 25, 2019 at 9:12 pm

    i have 2 phonetics professors, my phonetics professor and erik

  55. Nixycat

    October 25, 2019 at 10:19 pm

    My fave series!!! <3 As an Aussie, I love hearing the breakdown of Aussie/Kiwi/South African accents, as they're all quite similar but so hard for other speakers to nail! 😀

  56. jgranahan

    October 26, 2019 at 12:16 am

    Really awesome!

  57. Teri Davis

    October 26, 2019 at 2:22 am

    I *love* these videos!!! More please!!

  58. lindsayyy

    October 26, 2019 at 2:42 am

    ERIK HAS A TATTOO

  59. j Cadence

    October 26, 2019 at 11:09 am

    Very cool. I love you ES!

  60. mllebiddies

    October 26, 2019 at 11:52 am

    Omg… THANK YOU for (finally!) explaining this with a visual aid! Been watching these videos for a long time and I have the hardest time visualising/understanding some of the explanations of the tongue placement in the mouth. More, please!!

  61. Kristin Cornejo

    October 26, 2019 at 7:33 pm

    I want to see Erik Singer doing all the accents in a compilation video.

  62. ymustisignin

    October 26, 2019 at 8:35 pm

    I want to hear Erik break down Ozzie Osbourne’s accent

  63. Kana Beats

    October 26, 2019 at 8:53 pm

    Crazy how our tongue do dat

  64. Crazziii

    October 27, 2019 at 2:25 am

    So he’s South African?!

  65. Grant Coble

    October 27, 2019 at 4:05 am

    Things I appreciate:
    1. That the Wired YT team hired Erik Singer to dot hat first “accent breakdown” video
    2. That Wired took note that the video struck a chord with viewers.
    3. That Wired and Erik are willing to ride this roller coaster as far as it goes
    4. That the videos have turned into mini lectures on linguistics

  66. Keonna Gardner

    October 27, 2019 at 6:43 am

    Can we do a 5 levels video featuring Erik Singer. I’d like to see him explain this to people at differing levels. It would be cool.

  67. Steven Clauson

    October 27, 2019 at 7:04 am

    Is anybody else dying to hear this guy actually perform accents? I want to know just how well all of his professional knowledge might translate to performative skill.

  68. Do You Speak?

    October 27, 2019 at 12:48 pm

    Why does Erik Singer not have his own channel yet? *edit* He does, there just isn’t much there 🙁

  69. Jack Paul

    October 27, 2019 at 1:00 pm

    Like the weather girl of vowels

  70. DonnaLuuuu

    October 27, 2019 at 10:20 pm

    Maaan I would love for him to tell us what he thinks about the accents in the Oscar Pistorius lifetime movie

  71. Sanguillermo 76

    October 27, 2019 at 10:40 pm

    Next episode: expert breather breaks down 10 breathing scenes in movies

  72. Raymond K Petry

    October 28, 2019 at 12:23 am

    *_…chart lacks ‘my-favorite’ A-sound {bate}, which is brighter than the ‘eh’-sound {bet}…_*
    *_…chart also lacks das ü-klang {führer, crude} more-closed than the ʉ-sound {crewed}…_*
    *_…also puzzling, the chart alignment of front-vs-back e.g. y-{near-j}-vs-y-grec-{near-g}…_*
    *_…(I’m thinking that chart is for how-to-simulate using diphthongs for ‘mid-phthongs’)…_*

  73. ElBacanDelgado

    October 28, 2019 at 4:34 am

    Episode request: Talk about Finnegan’s Wake

  74. Radspakr

    October 28, 2019 at 8:14 am

    Keep bringing him back this stuff is really interesting, I’m curious if he knows the history of accents how do they form?

  75. Baerschenarts

    October 28, 2019 at 5:41 pm

    More of Erik!!!

  76. Tyree Brown

    October 28, 2019 at 6:46 pm

    I’m always participating in the activities he gives lol.

  77. Christy Dethlefs

    October 28, 2019 at 7:27 pm

    I love these videos!! Thank you

  78. salmourn

    October 29, 2019 at 3:34 pm

    god u know what just w this one map and him walking thru different ways our mouths are positioned it feels so much easier to do an accent

  79. chichoskruch21

    October 29, 2019 at 3:42 pm

    Let’s just change WIRED to Erik Singer & co at this point

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