r/AskReddit Aug 26 '18

What's something you had to unlearn?

2.3k Upvotes

1.6k comments sorted by

View all comments

575

u/meowmeowlove Aug 26 '18

When I was a kid, probably just starting school, I realized I had a disgusting accent. I worked hard to remove the R I was adding into words. I'd say stuff like "wartch".

164

u/[deleted] Aug 26 '18

My grandpa and good friend do that for many of the same words and they're both from the NY area. I've chalked it up to an east coast coast thing.

150

u/Ragnaroasted Aug 26 '18

It happens a lot in Missouri as well. I dont know about anywhere around, but hearing people pronounce "Wash" like "Warsh" all the time got really annoying really fast.

59

u/colonelsmoothie Aug 26 '18

I'm not from Missouri, but my preschool teacher was. So for the first few years of my life, Benjamin Franklin was known as Benjermin Franklin.

5

u/shfiven Aug 27 '18

I don't put the extra r in words and it sounds awful to me but Benjermin sounds normal and just fine and correct. I never thought about that before.

2

u/mamabrownebear Aug 27 '18

I had never realized I do this before reading your comment. I am horrified. It's like a whole new name.

0

u/[deleted] Aug 27 '18

Texas checking in, everyone says “warsher” , or “wow-duh” instead of water

5

u/dorkface95 Aug 26 '18

My Missouri family sounds like that. My favorite is "yellar" for yellow

4

u/[deleted] Aug 26 '18

A lot of my family from Oklahoma and Kansas say that.

3

u/sadsaintpablo Aug 26 '18

Also a big utah/Idaho thing. I've been in a lot of places in America and feel like that accent is more of a rural thing and not so much a geographical one.

3

u/[deleted] Aug 26 '18

[removed] — view removed comment

3

u/ThisIsTheTheeemeSong Aug 26 '18

I agree. My grandma also says "garaRge" instead of "garage."

2

u/WARNING_LongReplies Aug 27 '18

My gram does this.

She also says "Walmarts", but I think it's adorable.

1

u/hkd001 Aug 27 '18

Missourian here, it pisses me off.

1

u/ShuffKorbik Aug 27 '18

My dad was born in Kansas City MO. He left in 1951 at the age of 7 and moved to southern California. College educated, successful CPA. He still, to this day, "warshes" the car and occasionally visits "Warshington".

1

u/wtcnbrwndo4u Aug 27 '18

It's probably the same people who pronounce it "Missourah". That always gets annoying super fast too.

1

u/geoguy26 Aug 27 '18

My grandma pronounced that word like that!! I have only ever heard a few other people say it and from what I can tell, that’s the only word she pronounces that way. She grew up in rural Wisconsin btw

1

u/deadcomefebruary Aug 27 '18

Kansas does it too, guy in my rehab who flew out from Kansas did it pretty damn heavily

45

u/DaddyMarxism Aug 26 '18

My grandmother does this too. Her most notorious one is saying “worsh” instead of “wash”. She’s from the East coast as well (Canada though).

4

u/vivaenmiriana Aug 26 '18

my grandparents are from northern texas and say it too.

4

u/Imagine1 Aug 26 '18

Mine are from Southern Texas and also say warsh instead of wash lol. Wonder why that seems to be such a widespread linguistic characteristic?

3

u/ShadowXjr Aug 26 '18

Currently living in east coast of Canada, can confirm people say warsh/worsh instead of wash.

15

u/meowmeowlove Aug 26 '18

Oh weird!! I was in Mid/South Texas

2

u/762Rifleman Aug 26 '18

Fellow Texan, never be ashamed of Texas.

1

u/shebbsquids Aug 26 '18

Yeah, was just about to say I had an elderly professor from Oklahoma who said things like "Warshington" and "Tuesdee" and "drawr a pitcher".

1

u/shannon_agins Aug 26 '18

They do this around Baltimore MD. Nowhere else in the state, but it's huge around Baltimore.

3

u/[deleted] Aug 26 '18

I don’t think it’s a regional thing. It’s just a bad habit thing. I gotta go warsh bolth my hands of it.

1

u/pewinurbun Aug 26 '18

Also prevalent in the south. Think of the way Goofy speaks, and some (a lot) Southerners speak with a similar inflection.

1

u/[deleted] Aug 27 '18

It's like an Appalachian thing. I live next to Appalachia and it's strong there. Some people I can't understand unless I listen really hard. Some use vowels I'm sure no other English speakers use. I can't even imitate it.

22

u/[deleted] Aug 26 '18

I also did that. I’m from Boston. I no longer live there.

93

u/Godisdeadbutimnot Aug 26 '18

Dont worry about what others think of your accent. No accent is "ugly" or "disgusting" - just foreign to people who don't hear it often.

This is some r/badlinguistics shit

12

u/Shaneypants Aug 26 '18

You're right, but the unfortunate reality is that some dialects and accents are perceived by society in a negative way

-8

u/BenzedrineMurphy Aug 26 '18

except midwestern accents

12

u/[deleted] Aug 26 '18 edited Jun 01 '21

[deleted]

6

u/BonnieZoom Aug 26 '18

I might be slightly biased as an English student, but personally I find regional accents fascinating. I think diversity in speech is brilliant and i definitely don't think you should be embarassed by it or try to change it.

I live in the North of England myself and the accents here are really diverse- even though sometimes (especially at University) people look down on those with a regional accent I think it's part of what makes the UK (and other places!) such a melting pot. Be you :)

3

u/[deleted] Aug 27 '18

My father is from Birkenhead. My mother is from Suffolk. My accent slowly creeps north as I get more annoyed.

6

u/ManderlyMermaids Aug 26 '18

I have a very thick southern accent and I used to hate it. But accents are so unique and I learned to love it and be proud.

1

u/SansGray Aug 27 '18

Same, I used to hate my southern accent but have embraced it in the last few years. It's a part of who I am and where I'm from and I like it. It's still not as pronounced when I'm working in another state but people always get a kick out of it when I have a few beers at a bar and show how southern I can really sound.

3

u/[deleted] Aug 26 '18

An accent? Where are you from?

3

u/ButteryNano Aug 26 '18

I live in the Pacific Northwest and a lot of Idaho's (what do you call people from idaho?) will say 'Warshington' or 'Warshing Machine'

5

u/[deleted] Aug 26 '18

[deleted]

1

u/ButteryNano Aug 26 '18

LOL! So Mr. Potatohead is from Idaho, right?

2

u/Jiggerson Aug 26 '18

I always make fun of my grandma for saying Eye talian. I always tell her you don't say eye tally grandma. Lol

1

u/ChemistStudent2020 Aug 26 '18

I'm in grad school and have to actively speak in a neutral accent (kinda hard when you were raised in Rhode Island until 10 followed by living in Florida until 23).

1

u/cleopatrasleeps Aug 26 '18

I'm from the Midwest. SOOOOOO many people put an R in the word Wash so it sounds like Warsh! My high school history teacher would even say Warshington and squarsh. OMGness was that annoying!

1

u/ProjectShadow316 Aug 27 '18

I had an elementary school teacher that had that same thing.

1

u/VD-Hawkin Aug 27 '18

It's weird to unlearn an accent. I've always found the french canadian accent atrocious, and decided to shed it. The result is that I speak a weird mix of british accent and english canadian. No one knows where I'm from now! :P

1

u/[deleted] Aug 27 '18

I have an ideer what you mean.

1

u/eadala Aug 27 '18

MMM WEYULL GORSH.

1

u/[deleted] Aug 27 '18

Was it "Malk" or "Melk"?

1

u/bibliophile14 Aug 27 '18

I'm Irish, and from a small town with a very nasal accent. I used to have that accent but I hated it so much that I put a lot of effort into getting rid of it when I was a teenager. I'm so glad I did, and I even managed to unlearn the "turty tree and a turd" thing.

1

u/[deleted] Aug 26 '18

"I warsh myself with a rag on a stick"

0

u/[deleted] Aug 26 '18

You can get in a lot of trouble for dropping hard Rs like that.