American standar accent

Could you tell me which accent is the original standard american accent? which states is it from?

What is often today called "General American" is most likely an idealized version of the formal registers of dialects spoken throughout Midwest in the first half of the twentieth century up to circa 1950, besides various areas of the Upper Midwest such as probably Wisconsin, Minnesota, and North Dakota. It does not correspond as closely to any actual dialects today, though, as dialects descended from those in that area have undergone changes that have brought them further apart since then, such as the Northern Cities Vowel Shift around the Great Lakes region, and the California Vowel Shift in various areas of California (remember that California English is basically descended from the same dialects as those in the Midwest today, circa 1950).

If you mean "original" in terms of "oldest", then I guess it would probably be the non-rhotic northeastern accent that Franklin Roosevelt spoke in. That was the "standard" accent until World War II.

But if you're talking about the current-day "standard American" accent, then Travis is correct.

No one really speaks 100% "General American," as it's a somewhat hazy concept to begin with. I think it's easier to define General American by what it *isn't* than what it is. It isn't nonrhotic, it has diphthongs for /aI/ (as compared to Southern /a/ or /A/), it doesn't have Canadian Raising, etc. Some other things are fuzzy as to whether or not they're considered General American. For instance, some would say both "cot-caught" merged people and non "cot-caught" merged people may speak General American, but traditionally General American has been thought of as maintaining the distinction. So right there that automatically makes at least 40% of the US which does not distinguish "cot-caught" (like me) have a non General American feature in their speech. We could really say that about a lot of features of North American English--I have some in my speech that are consistent with traditional General American and some that aren't. Probably the largest difference for me may be found in my vowels, as they've been influenced by the California Vowel Shift, which is definitely a large step away from General American. However, it's important to note that just because no American speaks 100% General American, that doesn't mean their accent is necessarily stigmatized. At least my dialect is not nationally stigmatized even tho I have clear differences from General American in my speech.

I just think that "standard American" means "anything that isn't negatively stereotyped"

If one does have to specify what "General American" is, which is practically by definition idealized and formal, one can probably vaguely write it out, with respect to phonology, as:

Is rhotic
Has "father"-"bother" merger
Lacks "cot"-"caught" merger
Has "Mary"-"merry"-"marry" merger
Has "nearer"-"mirror" merger
Has "horse"-"hoarse" merger
Has merged /@/ and /V/
Has merged /@`/, /3`/, and /Vr\/
Lacks Canadian Raising
Lacks phonemic vowel length
Has yod-dropping
Prefers diphthongal /e/ and /o/
Prefers [O] over [o] before /r\/
/U/ does not exist before /r\/
Realizes /t/ and /d/ intervocalically (including across word boundaries) as [4] except when following vowel is stressed
Realizes intervocalic sonorant + /t/ or /d/ clusters as said sonorant followed [4] (unless said sonorant is /n/, where then said [4] is not present), except when following vowel is stressed
Preserves /A/ as [A] before /r\/ followed by an unvoiced stop
Preserves /aI/
Preserves /h/ except in clitics
Preserves /T/ and /D/

and on and on and on and on, but you get the picture...

And yes, the above, underneath it all, is very vague, all things considered.

You're speaking GAE if Americans do not ask "hey, where are you from?" upon hearing you speak. This is possible throughout a very large area of North America (both the U.S. and part of Canada). That type of consistency exists nowhere else, although some areas come close. Certainly there is nothing like it in the UK, where pronunciations seem to vary from one street to the next in some areas. A large swath of Australia has a pretty consistent pronunciation, although some areas have distinctive accents (they all tend to sound the same to me in isolation, but Australians notice the accents).

What regularly surprises me overall is just how similar all standard English pronunciations tend to be. Phoneticists dramatically exaggerate the differences. In real life, everyone understands everyone, for the most part, and often accents aren't even noticed if one has regular contact with English speakers from many different areas. South Africans sound a lot like the English, and Nigerians don't sound much different from people in Iowa.

I beg to differ. I've heard a few South Africans, and they sound nothing like the British!

I agree with you about how the South Africans sound, Uriel. They sound more like New Zealanders than Englishmen.

And Nigera=Iowa? I mean, come on.

correction: Nigeria

Goddamit! ;-) First I misspell "Nigeria", then I misspell my own username. I give up. :-(

You'll have to insist that we call you "Miss Lazara" now!

I agree with the assessment that a person is speaking GAE if other Americans do not ask where you are from.

Although Travis, many many Americans HAVE the cot-caught merger. How can speakers of GAE lack it?