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With roughly 1,700 samples from 135 countries and territories, and more than 170 hours of recordings, IDEA is now the largest archive of its kind. IDEA’s recordings are principally in English, are of native speakers, and include both English-language dialects and English spoken in the accents of other languages.
- Asia
Listen to accents and dialects of Asia. Please select a...
- Middle East
Listen to accents and dialects of the Middle East. Please...
- Caribbean
Listen to accents and dialects of the Caribbean. Please...
- Dialects & Accents
Listen to accents and dialects from around the globe. On...
- SPECIAL COLLECTIONS
Listen to IDEA's Special Collections, including Holocaust...
- SUBMISSIONS
Learn how to submit a sample to IDEA. Thanks for your...
- GLOBAL MAP
Select samples from our map to hear subjects speak their...
- WHAT’S NEW
Welcome our 46th Australian subject Thursday, April 25,...
- CONTACT
Questions about IDEA? E-mail the archive's director and...
- Recording Guidelines
This page explains how to create and edit mp3 recordings.But...
- Asia
Apr 27, 2012 · Together with invaluable overviews of numerous regional accents and dialects, this fifth edition provides a detailed description of key features of Received Pronounciation (RP) as well as several major non-standard varieties of English.
- London
- 5th Edition
People also ask
Can you copy a British accent?
What is the International Dialects of English Archive?
What is London English accents & dialects?
What is a dialect in linguistics?
- Contents
- Why Listen to English Accents and dialects?
- Websites For Listening to English Accents Online
- English Accents in TV Shows and Movies
- Podcasts and audiobooks
- Tips For Listening to Different Accents in English
Lucky for you, there are lots of different resources you can use to hear how people speak all over the world. Hearing different ways of speaking can be very interesting. It can also be very useful. Here’s why: 1. It can be difficult to understand an accent or dialect if you aren’t familiar with it already. 1. Listening to people talk English natura...
The International Dialects of English Archive (or IDEA) is a website with a huge amount of recordings from all over the world. IDEA recorded people reading a short story that was written specifically for hearing the different ways people pronounce sounds in the English language. On IDEA, you can listen to dialects by country, residence (where someone lives), gender or age. You can hear native English speakers of all kinds. You can even hear how someone sounds when they’re born in one place bu...
The Dialect Blog looks at how people speak in areas of America, England and Ireland. You can find a specific area you’re interested in and find out what kind of dialect that area has. The explanations may be difficult to understand for anyone who isn’t a linguist (someone who studies languages), but it’s a great place to find out what makes each dialect different. For example, you can learn that people from New England(the Northeastern states of America) often don’t pronounce the “r” sound at...
If you’re more interested in American or Australian dialects, you can find them in theSpeech and Accent Archive. Here, you can listen to the accents of people all over the world as they speak a phrase. To hear people from a specific area, you can browse by region. To explore further, you can also browse by language.
The above websites can help you hear different dialects, but they are limited to short samples. If you really want to hear a dialect used naturally, try watching TV shows and movies from the area you’re interested in. “Friends” (which we mentioned above) is good for the New York accent. Nancy Donovan on the show “30 Rock” has a Boston accent. New Y...
If you listen to podcasts or audiobooks to learn English, you can probably find a reader who uses the dialect you’re interested in. To hear a smooth British accent, you can listen to books read by Stephen Fry. For an excellent American narrator, try Ron McLarty. You can hear him read “Inherent Vice”by Thomas Pynchon. Some audiobooks even have more ...
Focus on Intonation and Stress Patterns.Pay attention to the rise and fall of the voice (intonation) and the emphasis placed on certain words or syllables (stress patterns). This can differ signifi...Practice Active Listening.Actively engage when listening to different accents. Try to identify specific sounds, words, or phrases that are pronounced differently from what you’re accustomed to hear...Slow Down and Replay.If you’re having trouble understanding a certain accent, pause, rewind, and replay the audio or video. Listening multiple times can help you catch nuances and decipher unfamili...Use Visual Context.Watch videos or movies with subtitles. If you come across an accent that you struggle to understand, visual context can provide clues about what’s being said, making it easier to...Listen to accents and dialects of England. There are currently 115 samples from England, organized into nine regions: Southwest, Southeast, London, East, West Midlands, East Midlands, Yorkshire and Humber, Northwest, and Northeast.
- Cockney. This is one of the UK’s most famous dialects, and it goes hand in hand with London. It came about as the dialect of the London working classes, especially in the poorer East End of the city.
- Estuary English. Here’s another dialect that is London-based. The ‘Estuary’ in question is the Thames Estuary, and this dialect is spoken by people who live along its stretch.
- Yorkshire. Yorkshire is a big county in England, and lots of people speak with a variation of the Yorkshire dialect as a result. Known as ‘God’s Own County’, Yorkshire has a delicious dialect.
- Northern Irish. The Northern Irish accent is quite a beautiful one, and a strong one too. The first thing you’ll probably notice about Northern Irish is how many letters seem to be missing from words when people speak it.
English speakers from different countries and regions use a variety of different accents (systems of pronunciation) as well as various localized words and grammatical constructions. Many different dialects can be identified based on these factors.
