Do you hide your accent during interviews?

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humuhumu

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vut akk-cent? i haff no akk-cent.

hehe I don't think you should hide an accent. Quite honestly, I like hearing people who have accents, it's so refreshing and neat. If we all talked the same way, that would be so boring :sleep:
 
I'm from the south but I dont make any attempts to hide my accent, I had intereviews in quite a few places and I dont think it made any difference.

I also like some of the southern accents.

Actually I like accents in general. I think my favorite is the accent of Africans with English accents.
 
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I'm from Louisiana going to med school in Ohio, and I never considered hiding my accent. It's part of who I am.

I'd rather have my southern accent than some of the accents out there. Anyone watch the Amazing Race? Whenever the Godlewskis speak, it's like fingernails on a chalkboard.
 
Sometimes I wish I could hide my accent (I am originally African raised in France) but it is deeply rooted! :laugh: I wouldn't want to lose it just hide it during interview time :D . My english is good (after all I have all intentions of practicing Medicine in the States)but I always wonder if it can affect the decision of the adcom?
 
doctoresse said:
Sometimes I wish I could hide my accent (I am originally African raised in France) but it is deeply rooted! :laugh: I wouldn't want to lose it just hide it during interview time :D . My english is good (after all I have all intentions of practicing Medicine in the States)but I always wonder if it can affect the decision of the adcom?

I doubt it. I've known many medical students with foreign accents.
 
I actually invent a fake English accent at my interviews.
 
as long as you have good grammar, i doubt having a southern accent will hurt you. just avoid the ain'ts, fixins and double negatives. :)
 
Don't nobody go loosin' their southern accents! :D Seriously though, I love accents, it's the spice of life that makes the world interesting. Be proud of your accent! I love imitating accents, but I feel left out that I'm from California, so my natural way of speech is "accentless" and boring (unless Californian is an accent). As a bonus, redheaded girls with southern accents are muy caliente by my book. It's a shame that many accents will probably be decimated as ease of transportation continues to mix the country's population.
 
rocketman said:
I actually invent a fake English accent at my interviews.
Wow, I thought I was the only one. So this is what it's like when doves cry?
I whip out the Boston Brahmin accent because it makes me feel superior to other people.
 
I interviewed at a school in Philadelphia, and they actually commented on how disappointed they were that I did not have a Boston Accent. (Even though I was born and raised just outside the city, I never seem to have developed it- I wasn't hiding anything.) As I left I told them I'd try hahhhdah to get the accent down.
 
Being from the south, you quickly see what a huge difference there is in people's accents... unfortunately, i think the level of accent-ness correlates with education level (at least in my experience). ive met people from pennsylvania that had way more of what some people might call a 'southern' accent than most people i encounter everyday (in the hospital/academic setting)... I don't think I have much of an accent, but some people tell me i do when i interview (i think people like it ? esp. up north).......


anyways. this reminds me of when i was a little kid and this other kid on the swim team had a pretty bad lisp. i really liked him and felt sorry for him when other kids would make fun of him, so i started talking with a lisp and telling other people that it was cool. we were 'best friends' for a month, until i felt bad about lying to him and told him i didn't really have a lisp.


random randomness.
 
I hope that schools don't mind a gal w/ an accent. Granted, I'm not going to call my interviewer "darlin' " or anything, but.... I wouldn't even know HOW to change it! Its in my blood.
 
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To all, don't knock the Southern accent. Even though you never mean to get it (like me), it tends to grow on you after living there and pretty much being around other southern accents for many years. Personally, I love it and I wouldn't give it.




desiredusername said:
Wow, I thought I was the only one. So this is what it's like when doves cry?

And no, only Prince knows what its like when doves cry. :D :D
 
I think as long as you enunciate your words properly, don't mumble, squeak etc. you shouldn't have a problem. Southern accents are enviable...you guys sound laid-back and relaxed all the time!
 
Dixie06 said:
I hope that schools don't mind a gal w/ an accent. Granted, I'm not going to call my interviewer "darlin' " or anything, but.... I wouldn't even know HOW to change it! Its in my blood.
LOL... you go, Dixie! We Southerners are just like everyone else... we have a casual vocabulary that has a lot of slang, and a business vocabulary which does not. The business vocabulary gets used in an interview, although I will admit that my "ing" endings are a little soft (e.g., "talking" comes out sounding like "talkin'..."). But I think a nice Southern accent, and the Southern sensibility that comes with it, is a nice addition to any medical school class. :p I cracked-up laughing years ago when I read a guy from New York who said that he could always spot somebody from Tulsa on the telephone because we are the only people in the world who end a business conversation with "bye-bye."
 
Southern accents are HOT. Under no circumstances should any of you tone them down :D
 
desiredusername said:
Wow, I thought I was the only one. So this is what it's like when doves cry?
I whip out the Boston Brahmin accent because it makes me feel superior to other people.

"You're Milhouse too? I thought I was the only one."

"A pain I know all too well..."

"So this is what it's like when doves cry."
 
Risa said:
Southern accents are HOT. Under no circumstances should any of you tone them down :D

Can I get an 'amen'? :D I get hot and bothered when a girl breaks out with the drawal. :p
 
Goose-d said:
I don't think I have much of an accent, but some people tell me i do when i interview (i think people like it ? esp. up north).......

I also thought interviewers in NY enjoyed the accent. I didn't realize I really had much of an accent until I moved to NY from VA. I always find myself talking to cashiers when I'm checking out at stores. They almost always say "Where are you from?" I realized I must really have an accent if almost every person I randomly talk to asks where I am from. Sometimes people tease me about my southern accent, but then they say it's "cute". At least interviewers will remember you if you have a accent. :)
 
i figured going to school in illinois for 4 years had helped neutralize my new york accent somewhat. but, it's been pointed out by more than one interviewer so far. one of them said "oh, so you're from 'lawng island.'" pronounced just like that (lame!). :thumbdown:
 
Risa said:
Southern accents are HOT. Under no circumstances should any of you tone them down :D

Done and Done! I never plan on doing it :D
 
From that article humuhumu linked:

"Tobolski's class is all about getting rid of accents, mostly Southern ones in the heart of the former Confederacy, and replacing them with Standard American Dialect, the uninflected tone of TV news anchors that oozes authority and refinement."

I don't know about you, but I've never thought of the plasticized english of news anchors as particularly refined or authoritarian, and they DO definitely put their own inflections into it.

Australian accents have to be my favorite though. :thumbup:
 
I'm Southern.

I can't.

Although I do have fun impressioning the accent of the person I'm talking to and seeing how long it takes them to figure it out....
 
tacrum43 said:
Australian accents have to be my favorite though. :thumbup:

*Australian accent* "The dingo ate your baby." (Obscure Seinfeld quote)
 
exlawgrrl said:
as long as you have good grammar, i doubt having a southern accent will hurt you. just avoid the ain'ts, fixins and double negatives. :)

...and the ever popular, "git-er-done".
 
I've fallen in love with the Southern Accent....especially on women. Ahhhhh, so brilliant and sexy at the same time.
 
I have a caribbean accent and I hide it all the time, like when I am at school or work or out in public. If I didn't people would hardly understand me. I have mastered a plain american accent and it's great!
 
I have a pretty strange Southern accent. When I leave the South, people always know it's southern, but down here, they cannot tell what it is exactly. One of my Harvard interviewers pointed out my accent as one of my selling points. I thought that was pretty funny.
 
I don't have much of an accent. My speech professor this semester even asked where I was from because of the way I talk. He found it interesting that I have lived here in Alabama for my whole life, and didn't speak like most people here do.
 
I've lived so many places that I have bits and pieces of Wisconsin, California, and Arkansas tucked away in my speech... I don't think I have an accent, but when I go up north they comment on my Southern accent, but when I interview down here, they comment on my Yankee accent. Whatever my accent is, I'm not conscious enough of it to hide it from the adcoms...
 
mashce said:
I've lived so many places that I have bits and pieces of Wisconsin, California, and Arkansas tucked away in my speech... I don't think I have an accent, but when I go up north they comment on my Southern accent, but when I interview down here, they comment on my Yankee accent. Whatever my accent is, I'm not conscious enough of it to hide it from the adcoms...
I have a similar problem. Most people here in Birmingham can tell from my accent that I spent time up north. However, people elsewhere can tell that I am from the South.
Actually, there are several different accents in Alabama. People from Mobile sound different from the rest of the state, & people from rural areas in the north eastern part of the state sound different from other rural folks. Also, you can often tell what part of Birmingham & what social class someone is from by listening carefully.
I tend to use different degrees of my accent, depending on the audience. One of my interviewers was from a small town in rural Alabama. I upped the drawl a bit in my speech. Another of my interviewers was midwestern. Of course I toned down the accent a bit for him. Some of this switching is unconscious, but sometimes I do it intentionally. Some words I can't de-southern, however, even if I try. "Fries," for instance; if I try to say it any other way than 'fraahs' I just sound like an idiot.
Is anyone else irritated by the frequently bad southern accents used in TV & movies? Especially when they use words completely incorrectly. Y'all is a plural expression, (or takes multiple objects), but in books & on TV people use it when speaking to (or about) just one person. As long as an actor doesn't sound like they are from Boston or Brooklyn, they can play a Southern character without trying a fake accent.
I like the midwestern accent also, as long as the speaker isn't too nasal with their voice.
 
Hahaha - I sound like Francis McDormand in Fargo! I have a spectacular Minnesota accent with just a hint of Canadian from living in a border town. It rocks.
 
Now that I've lived in the South for two years, I just sound ridiculous. I don't sound Southern at all, but my friends make fun of me for my slight drawl. I'm working on losing my "Oregon mumble." People in Alabama can't understand me unless I'm shouting. :laugh:
 
rocketman said:
I actually invent a fake English accent at my interviews.
Help with my english accent. It is terrible, it's almost as bad as when I try to have a conversation in german with a native.... =(
 
Hawaii creole english: Ho bra, wut u wen ask
English translation: Excuse me, but could you please repeat your question

It took a lot of restraint
 
I have an African accent that is quite noticable, but not overbearing. People won't understand me though when i'm nervous, or when I get emotional (which is rare). I don't like accents that are too heavy. Don't go too much out of your way to hide an accent, or you'll end up looking bad.
 
Shrami said:
I have an African accent that is quite noticable, but not overbearing. People won't understand me though when i'm nervous, or when I get emotional (which is rare). I don't like accents that are too heavy. Don't go too much out of your way to hide an accent, or you'll end up looking bad.

Too true. Accents are a definite plus if you can still be understood in English. Specifically, I dislike really, really thick accents that make is impossible to understand....and yes, it looks and sounds bad.
 
I grew up in Texas, and when I hear people speaking with a Southern twang around me, I tend to speak with a twang right along with them. If I'm out of state, I tend to lose the twang, but not intentionally. I don't have to try at all to minimize my southern accent (though one word I can't get rid of is y'all) :p . It just seems like if I don't hear the Texas accent, then my brain knows to keep it out of my speech. Pretty interesting.
 
Blue Orchid said:
when I hear people speaking with a Southern twang around me, I tend to speak with a twang right along with them. If I'm out of state, I tend to lose the twang, but not intentionally. Pretty interesting.
Isn't this how accents perpetuate? Isn't it why Madonna has a British accent after growing up in Detroit? Wait, she's just a trend *****.
 
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