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Americans of Chinese heritage with southern accents living in the Mississippi Delta
- Thread starter Orkidea
- Start date
This thread: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nD__Pw1r-I8
What accent would you expect French immigrants in the region to have?
Lights and Waves
Member
My jaw dropped as soon as they started talking.
Interesting, I didn't know there was a community like that in Mississippi. I lived in Mississippi for 13 years and Asian people pretty much didn't exist in my area.
[edit]
Reminded me of this video.
https://youtu.be/iwDgA9LUVMA?t=8s
[edit]
Reminded me of this video.
https://youtu.be/iwDgA9LUVMA?t=8s
Escape Goat
Member
I remember when I was younger and I heard an Asian person with a British accent. I didn't know any better. I was just a kid.
DiscoJer
Member
Threads like this make me wonder where the heck Gaffers grew up. Despite being a suburban kid in St. Louis, we had a lot of kids of Indian, Chinese, and Middle Eastern ancestry (hell, my own cousins are Iranian) in school that I grew up with. The only ones that ever talked any different were the two kids from Australia.
Cpt.Underpants
Member
Would yo look at that, people who grew up in the south have Southern Accents...
Aziz Ansari has a Southern Accent from growing up in SC.
I guess, it's shocking to some that there are people of Chinese decent in Mississippi? Doesn't surprise me that there are Asians, or any other heritage besides black and white, in the South, or any other state.
Some of you here really should get out more.
Aziz Ansari has a Southern Accent from growing up in SC.
I guess, it's shocking to some that there are people of Chinese decent in Mississippi? Doesn't surprise me that there are Asians, or any other heritage besides black and white, in the South, or any other state.
Some of you here really should get out more.
Please be joking.
I imagine a lot of this
Yeah, my life.
Its still fucking COOOOOOL! lol. I watched the whole damn video just soaking it in. Its completely normal and natural but still!
I don't think cross cultural comparisons work super well here. Malaysia with its long history of very visible immigrant populations being a particularly poor comparison.
I've explained it above. I could see it coming from the same sentiment for some people, but I think it's a fundamentally different idea.
I think it is the age of the people in the video for many who have commented. I read the title and immediately thought "what's so weird about that?". But I was expecting 20-40 year olds. Not 70 year olds.
Aside from just the obvious "The person selling hates black people" the fact that it was considered dirty by the community at large probably means that even if you wanted to sell to black people it would have cost you money from the white people who would shun you for doing it.
Look at the wage gap they highlight in that video, the white market was plenty big, even if the black one was larger in terms of population the income gap was gigantic.
I just mean there are lots of factors, even if they all trace back to 'racism'.
Seductivpancakes
Member
You do realize Chinese people have settled in America for over a 100 years right?
People tell me I have a New York City accent all the time, which can be contributed to the fact that I was raised in New York City.
Hell, you don't even have to live in a place your entire life to adopt its accent. I know plenty of folks who've studied abroad for 2-3 years and returned with different accents. People adapt very quickly.
Not every asian talks like Jackie Chan or Apu lol.
Randolph Freelander
Member
Good grief.
You're not born sounding "Chinese," folks. You sound like where you're from.
You're not born sounding "Chinese," folks. You sound like where you're from.
Being a British-born Filipino growing up in the centre of London, my relatives wherever I went (back in The Philippines, in Canada, in West Coast USA, etc.) always found my British accent strange, almost endearing.
Coming from such a multicultural city like London, it's not that surprising to me personally that people pick up regional accents and dialects, especially if they were born and/or raised there. I've got a friend who emigrated from Philippines to the UK when he was 11 but he has never been able to shake off his authentic home accent.
Coming from such a multicultural city like London, it's not that surprising to me personally that people pick up regional accents and dialects, especially if they were born and/or raised there. I've got a friend who emigrated from Philippines to the UK when he was 11 but he has never been able to shake off his authentic home accent.
SHAFT MASTER
Banned
Reminds me of that American country singer who a black guy that I always thought was a white dude until my mate showed me a pic of him.
Blew my mind when it happened
Blew my mind when it happened
No one has said anything to that effect I think.
There are some issues with this. The first being this isn't necessarily true, I have some traits of the accent associated with the place where I was raised but on the whole most Americans would not place my accent as being from that place. In my own case there were clearly socio-economic, educational, and ethnic issues at play.
The second being that clearly one of the things people were surprised about was the long standing presence of Chinese Americans in a region generally overwhelmingly associated with White people, and specifically the white people that were already in the area circa the Revolution, and the descendants of their slaves. People seem to find the fact that these people were even there interesting, which is part of why it was in the documentary. Also on this note, the Southern Accent, probably more than any other American regional accent, has a lot of pretty specific cultural baggage. That's part of the reason I get comments about not sounding like I'm from where I'm from pretty much every single day, but my good friend from California who does not sound particularly Californian has never been told this.
Finally there is the issue of how we even define where you're from for such purposes anyway. It's clearly descriptive, not prescriptive. We associate regional accents with specific places because that's how some people that live there tend to speak. How that association comes into existence is pretty central to this issue. This centrality is demonstrated by the fact that White Southern American English and Black Southern American English are distinct to some degree. There is something more complex going on with how we think of accents, and it's part of why commenting on accents is different from commenting on language use ability.
lunchtoast
Member
Darius Rucker?
SHAFT MASTER
Banned
The video doesn't make it clear, but it sounds like this community is shrinking and will probably disappear. Seems like none of their kids stick around there and move for work and stuff, so it was nice to document this.
And i think people are surprised just because it's rare, like when I meet a white guy speaking perfect Cantonese, a British man who worked in the HK police for decades.
Edit: white guys with Chinese accents for English would be even rarer, since that implies they were born and grew up there and learnt the English language from a Chinese speaker farther than from family or go to an international school.
And i think people are surprised just because it's rare, like when I meet a white guy speaking perfect Cantonese, a British man who worked in the HK police for decades.
Edit: white guys with Chinese accents for English would be even rarer, since that implies they were born and grew up there and learnt the English language from a Chinese speaker farther than from family or go to an international school.
I don't see the malice in this thread that other folks are seeing. At the very least, as an Asian-American myself, hearing that accent from someone who looks like that definitely would have at least made me go "Oh, wow. Huh. That's different."
I mean, it's a rare accent in general, so that particular combination is not going to be very common regardless. Can't blame people for being surprised or fascinated.
I mean, it's a rare accent in general, so that particular combination is not going to be very common regardless. Can't blame people for being surprised or fascinated.
That sounds kind of amazing. How many white folks live in China, anyways? (Or other East Asian countries, for that matter...)
Yeah, that struck me as well. None of the people documented looked young outside of photos, so clearly there was a lot of migration going on. In a way, though, in this day and age, it's kind of inevitable, isn't it?
I dont really consider a new york accent to be a white accent though. Same with bay area and other california accents.
This is fascinating to alot of people, but some people in this thread think we should feel guilty for thinking that.
Patterbits
Member
Yeah a friend of mine that met online years ago from Georgia revealed to me that he was Korean. I had only ever heard his voice so I was a bit surprised.
Pretty cool. Reminds me of, I think it was Skittles, commercial where they were showcasing the oddity of a Scottish korean with an accent. Neat quirk of regional accents.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2Z5s8BKric
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2Z5s8BKric
Yeah. It does say the area has gone downhill and there are few jobs, more drugs and Chinese stores get targeted for robberies. I wouldn't want my kids to stick around there either they got them to college and study pharmacy etc.
Indrid Cold1
Member
That was pretty jarring lol. In a good way. And that scran looked amazing. Especially the bacon fried rice.
Exactly, I have an aunt who was married to an American surgeon during the 60's and 70's and lived in the US for nearly 20 years. She now has a really nice soft Scottish accent with a bit of a Southern lilt to it.
Theres also videos on YouTube of white people with really heavy Jamaican accents which is quite cool but is the same thing, just a white guy brought up in Jamaica.
andthebeatgoeson
Junior Member
I'm getting the 'southern' after living in Philly and Jersey all my life but moving to ATL over the past 6 years. It happens. You are around people and you pick up accents. But I'll tell you what, I'm fittin to whup some of y'all if you don't get right.
Fixed2BeBroken
Member
Cause Chinese people supposed to talk and sound Chinese! When they don't they don't fit into the stereotypical racist little box in their minds. Stay woke.
This reminds me of when Charles Barkley said he thought it was weird whenever he heard a black person with a english accent. It's incredibly ignorant.
I know! why didn't they speak broken english! It's just SO confusing. They LOOK Chinese. They should SOUND chinese!!!
also I am reminded of this video for some reason, shit still makes me laugh.
CrocMother
Banned
Interesting, thanks for sharing!
This reminds me of the German communities in Texas.
This reminds me of the German communities in Texas.
IdreamofHIME
Member
I don't understand the oddity in it. Maybe you have to be American.
