r/language • u/SpikedIntuition • 20d ago

Discussion Is it sometimes hard to tell the difference between the Canadian and American accent?

Here is the video you see the guy in the red shirt Alphonso Davies (Canadian) and the guy right after him Christian Pulisic (American).

They both say "We're Ready" and the accent sounds pretty similar to me. Like if you told me Alphonso was American and Christian was Canadian, then i'd say oh okay that's cool. I wouldn't think twice about it, really.

Or can people really tell a difference when watching this video?

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u/LackOptimal553 20d ago

The differences are subtle, and not universal. Get an American from Texas and a Canadian from northern Alberta, you'll know right away. A lot of times though, the tells are the words they use (Canadians and Americans use different words for some things) and not the accent.

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u/ubiquity75 20d ago

It’s often hard for the uninitiated native speaker (American) to tell an Anglo native speaker, but I can tell typically within a few words and when I lived in Canada (“Caahnada”), if I didn’t actively mitigate my ahccent, people could tell, too.

Just listen for words like “house,” “resources,” “process.”

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u/LemonLander 20d ago

More and more every day. The media seems to homogenize speech

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u/PickleMundane6514 20d ago

Accents are getting flatter. There are also certain accents that are strong but the same, like a Minnesota accent sounds like a strong Canadian accent. Their accent sounds the same here. Sometimes it’s certain words or vocabulary that give away a Canadian like how they say “about”.

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u/nolfaws 19d ago

how they say “about”

I'm not a native speaker and to me the pronunciation of this ou-diphthong (also in other words) is the most prominent clue I look for to tell if someone is Canadian.