Actually it is ideal to speak a language with d accent of d owners if u can achieve it. I mean think about how yr language sounds when a non indigene speaks it with his own native accent...imagine that thick Igbo accent and d Ekiti flavour in spoken English or when some Yorubas speak Hausa ....not nice on d ears!
My grouse is when u are forcing d accent....arrrrggghhh. If u can't do it well, then quit trying n stop making a fool of yourself
My humble submission

Abraham2013:

I understand wat u r saying and its d truth buh u r misunderstanding d OP. Wat d OP is trying to say is dat if u r in UK or america, do ur american accent, no problem. Buh wen u come back to naija and u r in abakaliki, plz drop d american accent and speak wat people will easily comprehend.
I see no reason y a newscaster in a radio station in uyo should sound like Chris brown.

ryt on point. u jus said my bit. very fake newscasters are all over our radio stations corrupting local pronounciations and forming fake foreign accent.

@@@@

this is the reason Biafra must be restored

IGBO lingo must live

pledge your support!

God bless u shedraq......d tin don de
turn norm for our society......

zoboizee:

ryt on point. u jus said my bit. very fake newscasters are all over our radio stations corrupting local pronounciations and forming fake foreign accent.

what if you cant drop it? and what is Local pronunciation?

If it is not you , it can never be you . if have not got a british accent and you fake one , it is always obvious , thats why one can tell who has got the accent and who has not when people speak. what we should strive to do is communicate effectively. No wonder many are bleaching .... always wanting to be like .... arent we tired of this false life.

99.9% Nigerians are suffering from colo-mentality. If you like speak like a British, you can never be a British.

As someone who grew up in the United States,I have never heard of a nigerian that was raised in Nigeria without a Nigerian accent. I can always tell a difference. There are levels when it comes to accents. Some accents are thicker than others. If one grew up in a rural/village setting, their accent would be considerately different from someone that grew up in a bigger city where they are more exposed to people of other tribes and cultures. I went to college with many international students from Nigeria; students from big wealthy families, and I can assure you that their accents were noticeable. They spoke proper english and I understood them clearly, but they still sounded different from other Americans. This leads me to my next point. Speaking proper English doesn't equate to having an American or British accent. There are certain nuances that comes with being apart of a culture and people from that culture easily notice when others lack those nuances. I don't think Nigerians are "faking it." I believe a growing number of people are trying to speak proper English without the ubiquitous sounds of "ooos, ehhhhs and "ahhs" that have been added to nigerian English which completely changes the pronunciations of those words. To each his own.

Op, it is called mental slavery.

I don't know if you have travelled to these countries before, if you have not, you will not understand my point, these are the people you deal with everyday, you can not do without them

Fulaman198:


They are not understanding you on purpose and your inferiority complex is allowing them to affect you and change who you are. Most people don't even attempt to change, Japanese, Russian, Brazilians, Chinese, other parts of Latin America and Europe. So why are you trying to sound more American or British while they are not?

Abraham2013:

I understand wat u r saying and its d truth buh u r misunderstanding d OP. Wat d OP is trying to say is dat if u r in UK or america, do ur american accent, no problem. Buh wen u come back to naija and u r in abakaliki, plz drop d american accent and speak wat people will easily comprehend.
I see no reason y a newscaster in a radio station in uyo should sound like Chris brown.

Lmao @ "sounding like Chris Brown in Uyo"

nobilis:


And for those mentioning culture And pride about culture, I wonder when English language became part of your culture. So what has a "Nigerian accent" got to do with culture? Do tell.

My brother, abeg hol' this 1 Naira. You dey yarn sense


@Topic
It does NOT matter what accent you speak in. HOWEVER, what DOES matter is the authenticity of that accent.

What qualifies as authentic you might ask?
1. You CAN NOT (by any means) have an authentic accent specific to a society you have NEVER lived in for a significant amount of time (at least 5 years of verbally active daily interaction).

2. You do NOT consciously predetermine pronunciations and sentence phrasing while speaking. It is a natural flow process.


Many OAP in Nigeria (as far as i know) have lived for significant periods abroad, so they should get a pass.
However, the ones that SHOULD be called out are those who were born and lived their entire lives in Nigeria.
Also, those who lived in some weird non-English speaking country, but fake an American or British accent.

That's like me going to visit Naija from the U.S and talking with an Indian accent.
Like - "my friend, this is wery wery nice"

I would really love to listen to that "LAFA awards" the OP spoke about. Is it available online somewhere?

Well!! I cant speak for everyone but there are some people who grew up around white folks and just picked up an accent. if you lived around white people in a white neighborhood I believe that's a different case. I did for about 18 years straight and I have a mixed accent and I do get judged for it a lot.

majekdom2:
those guys you mentioned dont speak good english .... listen to their interviews properly again.

My point exactly! You don't have to listen to them "properly" to get turned off by their phony affected half baked British accent!

nigerians only like trends. they are hipsters that can speak australian english fluently but not yoruba or igbo. they claim to know foreing accent but they'll never be able to tell you squat about the country that they're speaking their accent cuz they don't know anything.

levos2007:
99.9% Nigerians are suffering from colo-mentality. If you like speak like a British, you can never be a British.

ah ah ah! right on point, levos.

Insult upon Insult

I think it is time Nigerians start thinking if doing away with English or at least minimizing its usage. What is wrong in communicating in ur mother tongue. Why can't children in the east be taught in Igbo, the west in Yoruba and the north in Hausa from primary to university level.
I was in Japan last month, and to my surprise those guys do almost everything in their language, and see how technologically advanced they are.
Look at china, Iran, and the Arab countries that use their languages as medium of instruction yet most of them are technologically advanced than Nigeria.

Richiy:
The thing is now too much. You cant even have your normal accent and dream of working in a radio station.

They want to hear the one you will actually work harder to hear.

That is why I listen to Wazobia fm more often than others because I have no difficulty whatsoever associating with them.

They should leave matter for mathias abeg.

Lmao!

Creamish:


Couldn't have said it better. I appreciate the OP's concern tho but its a matter of choice. I don't see anything wrong with it..as long as the message is passed and understood.

Its a matter of choice on one side na, we all choose theirs while they cling to their own.
These little things have bad long term effects, things like our little girls playing with white dolls, our lack of patriotism and the accent issue.

majekdom2:
re read the ops post again and comprehend like you understand english.

You also have a problem I guess. OP's piece is totally racist. I am even surprised he studied abroad and do not know why people's accent change.

He needs to return to the classroom.

Calculux95:
Hmmm its not too easy to school abroad with a nigerian accent, especially high school, with the new trend of nigerian actors in hollywood and nigerian music getting world wide acknowledgment, you end up being picked on and having your accent mimicked in an effort to embarrass you, so gradually... You unconsciously start to emulate the accents of those around you in an attempt to fit in, I remember once when I was in high school I was asked to read an excerpt from a biology textbook something about animal lifestyle, I pronounced leopard... Instead of the american sounding "lepard", I said it the nigerian way with emphasis on the "eo", I was ridiculed and embarrassed so badly, up to date some of my friends still refer to it, we adapt to survive its natural, if emulating a british accent helps make life easier why not

An imbe..cile is a understatement of who you are. Total dunderheady opinion just like almost every posts of this thread. Did i hear u even saying Nigerian actors in '' Hollywood''? I guess there is now a different Hollywood, and also Nigerian music is getting ''worldwide'' acknowledgement becaus few people in UK knows about it? Are few people in the UK now ''worldwide''? You are a mistake, a hopeless bastard!

abubello:
I think it is time Nigerians start thinking if doing away with English or at least minimizing its usage. What is wrong in communicating in iur mother tongue. Why can't children in the east be taught in Igbo, the west in Yoruba and the north in Hausa from primary to university level.
I was in Japan last month, and to my surprise those guys do almost everything in their language, and see how technologically advanced they are.
Look at china, Iran, and the Arab countries that use their languages as medium of instruction yet most of them are technologically advanced than Nigeria.

Your ignorance reeks to the high heavens! You are a terrible mistake for being this hopelessly dumb. What an irritating fvcktard you are!

MsNas:
A lot can be said about the accent thing, but it is what is it. If you live outside Nigeria for a couple of years, your accent and pronunciation are bound to change but I won't change completely except you migrated at an earlier age (sage 16years), anything after that, your vocal cords are fully developed and you can't change your accent completely.

At least that's understandable. What about OAPs in Nigeria who haven't stepped out of Nigeria yet they speak through their noses??! Whenever I listen to any Nigerian radio station online I get so annoyed. Because they sound so ridiculous and stupid! If only they could know what they sound like. The actors and actresses are not spared too. Only God knows which country Tonto Dike's accent is from

But cut people who have lived outside of Nigeria some slack OP. The accent is bound to change definitely. If not completely but partially. I for one can switch between the Nigerian Accent and the American Accent easily. My American accent isn't flawless but it is definetely different from the Nigerian. Why do I have two accents? Well try speaking on the phone to an American with your Nigerian accent and goodluck trying to get him to understand you. Or you could try instructing a room full of undergrads in school with your Nigerian accent. You can't even get them to stop telling you to repeat yourself despite the fact that you're speaking as clearly and as slowly as possible. Some of those kids are still brats.

So Mr OP, there's absolutely nothing wrong in having two accents. Your sounding insecure or even resenting of the accent. Your wife and relatives probably lived among fellow Nigerians which is why they retained their accents. If they had lived in a white dominated state or community or even Akata dominated they will speak like them too. I chose to speak like an American but that doesn't mean I can blow your head off in Yoruba, typical of the Ibadan girl that I am

msnas. Na me go marry you last i swear.. Proudly ibadan all the way.

Pamcrest:
Actually it is ideal to speak a language with d accent of d owners if u can achieve it. I mean think about how yr language sounds when a non indigene speaks it with his own native accent...imagine that thick Igbo accent and d Ekiti flavour in spoken English or when some Yorubas speak Hausa ....not nice on d ears!
My grouse is when u are forcing d accent....arrrrggghhh. If u can't do it well, then quit trying n stop making a fool of yourself
My humble submission

Don't try to normalize an abnormality, when the CNN ranked our accent the fifth sexiest, were they not ranking it with our spoken English?
Longing for a foreign accent to speak a language that is spoken locally in your country is pure inferiority complex, English has been with for more than a century and its our official language, no one is going to punish you for an accent but the long term psychological effect on the population won't be cute.
But speaking a foreign language with any accent is OK.

OmoUSH:

Your ignorance reeks to the high heavens! You are a terrible mistake for being this hopelessly dumb. What an irritating fvcktard you are!

Why the venom?

Especially our naija babes...dem own too much....all those ajebo babes the rich men daughters...I get so annoyed..wit them when ever they speak

.

OmoUSH:

An imbe..cile is a understatement of who you are. Total dunderheady opinion just like almost every posts of this thread. Did i hear u even saying Nigerian actors in '' Hollywood''? I guess there is now a different Hollywood, and also Nigerian music is getting ''worldwide'' acknowledgement becaus few people in UK knows about it? Are few people in the UK now ''worldwide''? You are a mistake, a hopeless bastard!

. You r+tarded sob, to belittle myself and come down to your level of stupidity would be an embarrassment, every one has a right to their opinion if you don't like it do me a favor jump of a bridge, it seems you have been living under a rock for the last decade.... All the collabo's by nigerian artists with famous others t.I, akon, rick ross, rihanna to mention a few.... But a d•ck head like u won't know that...

GolfingDiva:
You also have a problem I guess. OP's piece is totally racist. I am even surprised he studied abroad and do not know why people's accent change.

He needs to return to the classroom.

you should read again , he talked about those that have never been abroad and those that were just there briefly say one month.

abubello:
I think it is time Nigerians start thinking if doing away with English or at least minimizing its usage. What is wrong in communicating in iur mother tongue. Why can't children in the east be taught in Igbo, the west in Yoruba and the north in Hausa from primary to university level.
I was in Japan last month, and to my surprise those guys do almost everything in their language, and see how technologically advanced they are.
Look at china, Iran, and the Arab countries that use their languages as medium of instruction yet most of them are technologically advanced than Nigeria.

when there is a common language , you will sure find development ... if you are a christain , you will remember the tower of babel .

Creamish:


Couldn't have said it better. I appreciate the OP's concern tho but its a matter of choice. I don't see anything wrong with it..as long as the message is passed and understood.

Please, call a spade a spade. It is very annoying when you take a listen at how folks struggle to maintain their fake accents. Sometimes, one can't but keep wondering about the nativity of such people. They pronounce your own very name and you wont even hear what was being mentioned. For same reason, i stopped listening to most radio stations in Lagos. When on the road, my car stereo is locked on either naija fm, wazobia fm or fajj 106.5 fm.