Having studied accents and dialects in theatre, I find this actress's ability to slip in and out of 21 accents in 2 minutes nothing short of amazing. Listen for yourself.
As a TESL teacher, I am very conscious of my accent when speaking to students, because I want to speak clearly and be understood and to have them emulate my pronunciation. But there just is no such thing as a neutral English accent. The so-called trans-Atlantic accent now just conjures the image of Katherine Hepburn.
Sure, you may believe you are accent-less, but that is a subjective judgment relative to where the listener is from and how they speak. Since I'm from Maryland, I have more or less a Middle Atlantic American accent. But my accent sticks out like a sore thumb in any other U.S. region, and even more so in UK-accent-partial Europe.
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I agree that the "neutral" accent doesn't exist. Like when this dude (heh) from Australia said that he liked my accent, and I just kind of looked at him, dumbfounded.
It's especially difficult when you're teaching learners who are more used to UK RP, and the vocabulary, in general.
And yes, whoa! That woman was (is) amazing!
Julie, I wish that I had seen this before yesterday. I am leading a guided reading group in Alex's 5th grade class and just yesterday we had a discussion about dialects. This would have been perfect! I'll have to bring it along for next time.
Yes, she is impressive. (although, being from Washington state . . . I didn't hear the Seattle example as distinct. That is just normal US-English, isn't it?)
Enjoy your Spanish Springtime!
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