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http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,23967748-662,00.html

Australian teens taking on American accents

Robyn Ironside

July 04, 2008 12:14pm

AS if following the fashion and food fads of Uncle Sam was not enough,
young Aussies are adopting a US twang in their everyday speech.

University of Queensland linguistics expert Roly Sussex said that as
the most impressionable group in society, teenagers were very
susceptible to imitating what they saw as being "snazzy or powerful",
The Courier Mail reports.

"It's called the prestige model," Professor Sussex said. "Prestige is
a very powerful motive and they (teenagers) will go with the
pronunciation that belongs to the most impressive context.


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"At the moment and this has been the case for some time now, that's
American English.

"They see or hear these things being used by people like on MTV for
example, and think 'gee, I want to be like that'."

He said one of the most notable differences in pronunciations was the
emphasis put on the first syllable of a word.

"We're now hearing DIS-tribute, RE-search and CIG-arette quite
regularly. This is an American pattern we are starting to pick up and
follow."

It was not just pronunciations that were being Americanised but our
spelling, vocabulary and grammar as well, he said.

"We're seeing more and more examples of American words used in place
of Australian words such as sidewalk for footpath and park brake,
instead of handbrake," Professor Sussex said.

"There is a service centre at Hervey Bay spelt 'center' and a 'fitness
center' on the way to Cleveland.

"Most of the words of approval we use now are American - great, cool,
neat, filthy and fat.

"Australian terms like ace and grouse are now almost invisible, as is
' hooroo ' for goodbye."

He said it did not help that most of Australia's singers used an
American accent - singing "lurve" instead of "love".

"We follow all sorts of American patterns of behaviour," he said.

Speech teacher June Finney said anything American was highly regarded
by young people and it "stood to reason" pronunciations were changing
to mimic the American accent.

"We live in a period where anything goes and sadly that seems to apply
to our speech as well," Ms Finney said.

But Professor Sussex said it was unlikely the Australian accent would
ever be completely erased.

"The original identity will persist," he said


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