Do Accents Make Workers Seem Less Credible?

I am a student of languages and cultures other than English. Unintelligible communication - whether in English or another language is a barrier. An accent by itself could be a huge issue because we are shaped by our human need to simplify in an effort to assimilate information. An accent unlike our own (whatever that may be) creates a natural filter. The greater issue isn't the accent itself but the knowledge behind the accent. When a speaker uses phrases that are awkward and non-native, when the tone is offensive or condescending, when the speaker uses inflection and tone that are inappropriate - this creates far greater problems than accents. People who do not study linguistics often mistake an "accent" issue with other issues. My principal issues with those with "accents" really has to do with the willingness of some to acquire a deep understand of me as a customer or consumer of information. I once had amazing exchange on a Spanish-only language queue. My Spanish non-native - I have an accent that is obviously foreign, the situation was tense and difficult, so the individual DEMANDED to speak with someone from his country. The call was from Chile. I told the guy in the next cube that the caller wanted to speak with a native speaker from Chile - he was frustrated with me. So I transferred the call to him. I asked him how the call went. He said, "well, he was furious, he wanted to speak with someone from his country." I laughed. My colleague in the adjacent cube WAS from his country - he was Chilean - he had lived in the states for about five years - and accent less English and was of course a native Spanish speaker. The speaker didn't have an issue with my Spanish - he had an issue with the way the business was implementing change in his country. Even if he could speak with a person in his native country he probably wouldn't have been happy. Accents are only part of the story.

Most of you fucking people can't understand a second language yet you feel the right to discriminate against people who are talking English as a second language. Fuck You!

First, not everyone from "Joisey" has that accent. As most people from NJ will tell you there are 3 distinct parts of NJ, North, Central, and South. Each part has there own accent, I suppose; however, it would seem to me that Central Jersey has the least distinct accent, which brings me to my next point. Having just moved down South (to Virginia), I find it incredibly difficult to understand the accents around me and the terrible grammar that I hear. This is not to say that I think the people are uneducated as they are not, just the manner of speaking. Yes, a lot of it is the North/South thing (you guys as opposed to the y'all) and the other variations that we hear. That said, as newcomer, I find just trying to decipher what is said is very difficult! The poor people I speak to probably think I am deaf. Oh well, here's to this Damn Yankee getting used to it.

Fluency and intelligibility are indispensable. Unfortunately most people - including English speakers - don't bother. I have enough trouble understanding American high school dropouts. Foreigners? Forget it ...

I am an American and was trained to read, write and speak Korean while I was in the Army. I probably had an accent but the Koreans accepted me with great relish. I was tread no differently than any other Korean. I experienced no descriminiation at restaurants, movie houses or any other public facilities. I was on 'civilian status' and lived among the Koreans for almost two years. I was interested in their history, culture and food! Great place, S. Korea!

As a professional speech coach, I would like to explain that accents have three parts: pronunciation, rate of speech, and intonation (how the voice goes up and down, which varies by language and dialect). When I teach classes in accent modification, our goal is to be clearly understood, not to speak perfect standard American English. That is much more realistic for many people. People who cannot come to a coaching session may be interested in a brand new economical alternative: a series of mp3 audio files plus pdf files that concentrate on specific sounds. The sounds chosen are those that are difficult for many non-native English speakers to pronounce. The series may be found at
www.BusinessSpeechImprovement.com.

English is a difficult language to learn, but people who improve their skills report feeling so much more confident when speaking.

everyone has an accent!if you don't understand mine, believe you me, I do not understand yours either. lets learn to be patient with each other.

As an American by choice and a long term resident of this great country I read this article with interest as I have a heavy accent and will die with it. I tried the Rosetta Stone English version which worked great to teach me French but failed to help me reduce my English pronunciation. Hard to teach and old dog new tricks is a truism.

My brothers and I were raised in Georgia, but my parents never allowed us to acquire a Southern accent - we would be corrected and reminded to speak "proper English". The net result was that I sounded like I had a (fairly slight) "foreign" accent. My teachers / classmates generally assumed I was "European" or British... In college, shortly after my wife (who is Singaporean and grew up speaking the Queen's English) and I had begun dating, she commented on my accent and asked where I was from... I said "the South", and for the next 6 months she thought I'd meant the south of England. For me, the bottom line has been that my accent has not been a problem, but when I tell people I am from the South they are a bit puzzled.

Well done to all of you!!! i just loved to read to all your comments about accents

An accent is a universal onomatopoeia and no matter where u were born or the number of languages u can speak, u'll always have one. If an american goes to africa or any where in the world, he/she will have an accent too.

GK.. I don't think its fair to blame some people for you lack of a job just because they are immigrants. Americans are all over the world and nobody bothers even to know their immigration status and they are accorded some of the best respects anywhere in the world. There are very many people in this country whose ego is so big they would rather do something stupid than be seen to be below someone with an accent. When you have an accent and you have gone even to graduate school, some people here still think you are a "fool" just because you don't talk like them and they keep on correcting your accent as if they can talk like the natives when they go to other lands... Its more an ego thing where many Americans think they are better than anybody else just because they were born here. Some people will even know what you are talking about but they want to make you aware that you are not talking proper like them. How do I for example understand how someone here is talking yet they don't understand anything I say?

I can guarantee that I can even write better English and speak better English (Accents aside) than many people who keep on "correcting" my English. Its high time that people accepted that there are many people from different walks of life and we can never sound the same regardless. Some people here even don't want to learn the necessary skills to get some jobs even when the government helps in training them. They think that just because they were born here, the government needs to give them jobs and fire the immigrants even when they are legal. I believe most people use the excuse of accents to group people so that they can apply uniform prejudices on them. While I believe that anybody coming here needs to learn English in order to communicate with the people here, I don't think it means you also have to try to sound funny while immitating accents.

It's very interesting how a person utters sounds can and is used against him. How he looks is used against him. What he believes in is used against him. It's a wonder when we say a person is honest what we load into that word and then go on to define others with it.
You could be born anywhere in the world and still sound strange to someone but does that make you a untrustworthy? We are humans looking for angels where they never existed...I say discrimination is a part of human nature, it requires people to think outside the box before they can get rid of it otherwise you will find that the way a person walks someday can be used against him, that's if it hasn't already. We are interesting.

Truly there is nothing more irritating, vulgar and vile than a New York (New'ah Yaw'uhk), New Jersey or New England type of accent Any person who pauses between syllables is just outright pathetic. I would have absolutely no problem if John Holdren wanted to start with these people in implementing the "Green" eugenics agenda.

People are less willing to communicate with people with strong accents because it takes more effort to understand them. I took classes taught by professors with strong accents and I often found myself not paying attention because I had to focus so much more because they were difficult to understand (the material was already hard enough). My lack of willingness to communicate was purely out of laziness, though.

In my experience, you are initially regarded as an amazement, as they try to size up whether you make sense. If American English speakers judge you to be intelligent, they actually begin to enjoy it. One of my colleagues inadvertently sent me an email message he meant to send to his mother about me. I did not let him know but it was very complementary. He made reference to my “subtle accent” which he said breaks “the monotony of hearing people who speak like me”.
Generally though, the less-educated or the less-exposed tend to be stuck in preconceived notions of a “stupid foreigner”.

i work in Customer Services and yes, have to speak Tech Support to INDIA. are you telling me that "pronunciation" is not important? accent be damned - how about just a mutual understanding of what words mean? my next career move will be to teach English as a First Language to Texans. Ahh jus luuuv all y'all, dahhlin... but could you please MOVE your mouths when you speak? it has oft been said that England and America are two countries separated by a common language. ASL anyone?

I wonder why some accents are more acceptable than others? I am the son of a WWI Veteran and a Scot War Bride from Aberdeen. When Father died (I was young, but born in Normal, IL), Mother and I moved to Scotland to be near her family and lived there about ten years, then moved to Chicagoland. My accent stuck, although somewhat tempered over the years. I graduated from high school and university, spent 20 years in the US Navy (fourth-generation career US military and proud of it, thank you), and now work for a large company (UPS). Everyone notices my accent, some make fun of it (I do get tired of the "beam me up" bit), and a lot of coworkers over the years have adopted my verbal tic of saying "och!" when faced with a problem. Nevertheless, everyone knows who I am and what I do because they remember the accent, so it actually helps. I long ago accepted being called Scotty but it's not my name, and I don't find it discriminatory. Maybe if not for the accent, I'd be "that guy over there, you know, whatsisname?" I'm always amazed at how many people whom I don't know, know me, and it's because of the accent. When I go to the local VA clinic for treatment, I am occasionally asked if I am a Veteran and it gives me a chance to produce my US Military (Retired) ID card - and to say, "Och, o corse I am." Maybe I should avoid Arizona, tho; I hear they dinna keen ta accents.

It doesn't seem to be a problem for illegals when I hire them to mow my yard or build a fence.

When I first moved to the US my ego was hurting a lot from this "accent = ignorance" bias. I could not stand native speakers trying to speak more slowly and to phrase things simply as soon as they heard my foreign accent. That was especially annoying when dealing with the folk who had substandard education and IQ levels below the 5th grade. But then I noticed that those were the only kind of people who made me feel conscious of my accent.
Anybody with meaningful education and travel experience understands how HARD it is to assimilate in a foreign culture and learn to speak a foreign language as an adult.
So, KUDOS to all of you, immigrants, you should be proud of your accomplishments, and never ever let other people make you feel inferior.

I think everyone is missing the point here. If a customer on the phone calling into a workplace cannot understand the representative on the other end, then there is a significant problem. The representative cannot help the customer with his/her needs. The call has to be re-routed and productivity goes down.

Recently, a newspaper here in the NW outsourced it's customer service department, and the people calling in who did not receive their newspaper were talking to people in another country!!? Not only did they not speak the language, but they had no idea of the location of the subscriber or how to help them get their newspaper. Many subscribers have canceled their subscriptions.

I think that we have to be very careful in discrimination but I think primarily the customer on the other end of the phone has to be seriously considered. My mother hangs up when she can't understand as she is elderly and has a hearing aid. A customer service rep must speak clearly, concisely, and slowly for everyone to understand.

Economy is bad so now accent is becoming a problem bur was not prior 2001. Prejudice with a P majuscule. Employer is not going to tell you he is prejudice. Another excuse to diminish immigrant.
Very bad and dihonest, guess it's 2010

By the way, for me, the most annoying American accents are those similar to Sarah Palin's. Also: some of the Upper Midwest and Great Lakes region is annoying where they don't distinguish between names like "Ann" and "Ian." Still, these are considered more acceptable than Southern ... where those two names are easily understood as different. Also you have: "boss" for "bus" and "byack" for "back" and so on ... in that region. In the South as mentioned before: "ass" for "ice" is hilarious. I like celebrating the differences but, when it comes to workplace, good communication and pronunciation matters.

I am from India. Now a US citizen and live in USA for about 24 years. I had my University education in USA. After my PhD and 6 years of employment now I am unemployed and unable to secure a job. Recently I applied for a job where I matched so well. The employer called, told me that it was a prescreening interview. She told me she likes everything about me, but she does not like my accent. She said, as a part of the job I need to do telephone interview (however, I did not see that on the job description that is still online). She also said she called me first, because she does not want to waste time. This happened last Wednesday (10/20/2010). My accent never was an issue if someone wants to sell something through phone to me. They always glad to talk to me (they need to sell something, you see). When corporate world wants to save on operating cost, they will outsource telephone customer service jobs to India. At that time accent of Indian telephone workers does not matter either. Well ...USA's different accents do not bother many people here. Even my Governor still has an accent but people love him as an actor and Governor. However, when it comes to hiring and promotion, my opportunity for advancement is clearly determined based on my accent.

I was married to a norwegian for many years. We lived in USA. He spoke excellent English with a norwegian accent. However some people could still not understand some words. I found that the norwegians are even less tolerant of accents. They are quick to correct mispronouncians when one is speaking their language. So I guess we are universal in accent tolerance

ME LLAMO ERNESTO(ernie jijiji) i have to say that after reading must of the comments i laughed so much i was practically in(on jiji) the flor(floor}.For a minute i thought i was in one of those comedy shows....ladies and gents remember one thing:ONLY LOVE IS REAL THE REST IS AN ILLUSION and that`s the name of that tune.......sayonara ciao adios a bientot bye bye

For their broadcast, BBC is now using more and more journalists who are not native English speakers. I watched a BBC news report broadcast on TV the other day and it was hard to follow what the journalist was saying because she had a strong foreign accent in her English. Apart from the news, some audiences also want to learn to speak English correctly and properly from listening to the BBC broadcast which has produced a kind of basic standard of how correct and proper English is spoken. Unfortunately, BBC seems to be unable to maintain such a standard from their journalists anymore. Whilst the world is moving along the pace of globalisation, the standard of spoken and written English should not need to drop as a result. If a journalist was required to report in French, Spanish, Swahili, Polish, Urdu, Mandarin, etc., it is reasonable to expect that s/he should equally speak without a foreign accent in those respective languages.

Albert Szent-Györ•gyi [sent-jur-jee] “Hungarian-born American biochemist who was the first to isolate vitamin C. He won a 1937 Nobel Prize for discoveries relating to biological combustion.” Wow – we cannot take anymore Vitamin C because he has a Hungarian accent. – That is ridicules.

Does anyone still use the true American Dictionary...Webster???

Accents become problematic when you're a minority. British accents and Aussie accents, even Eastern European accents are never a problem. Oh no... but when you're from Africa or Asia, suddenly no one can understand you. It's a ploy people use to discriminate against other.

I once had a "country southern" accent after living in rural Alabama and worked with a girl from the Midwest. At some point our desks were move near one another and we had the time to chat. She said "You are much smarter than you
sound!" LOL, I didn't know whether to feel complimented or insulted.

Evidently accents do skew perception. Working with the public in a very mult-cultural Canadian city now, I am adept at hearing past the accent, listening closely and asking pointed questions if I don't understand. I find immigrants appreciate this greatly. I have been offered free lessons in their native language and learned a lot about other countries in the course of our chats. Asking about thier homeland puts them at ease and facilitates your business communication.
Get past or at least try to stifle your inherent prejudice for a short time! It works for both parties to achieve maximum understanding.

I am the eldest of two daughters born into a solidly middle-class family and raised in Newark, NJ. I am a member of the National Honor Society, I was one of the top 25 students in my high-school graduating class and I am a college graduate with a BA in History. I do not look, behave nor speak like anyone on the "Real Housewives of New Jersey," "Jersey-licious," "The Sopranos," or that idiotic reality show with "Snooki" and "The Situation."

My sister is 10 years younger than I (or me, whichever you prefer). She, too, is a very intelligent woman - but when she opens her mouth, she's like the Scarecrow in "The Wizard of Oz" before he got a brain! She mangles the English language in ways that are beyond description! And my A+ high-school graduate, college sophomore nephew sounds like he comes straight from the 'hood! "He be," "She be," "Dey be" - if he thinks for one minute that potential employers are going to skip over the fact that he talks like he's a character out of "Shaft" and "Superfly," and hire him based solely on his resume, he's in for a nasty surprise! No hiring manager in a "white-collar" company is going to consider someone that can't/won't speak proper English for a position in that firm. It is not going to happen!

Should an accent matter? Again, it depends on the industry. There is nothing more frustrating than calling tech support and not being able to understand what the technician is saying because of a heavy accent or bad grammar. On one occasion, I got so tired of not being able to make out what the person on the other end was saying, I just hung up and, through trial and error, fixed the issue I was having with my computer myself!

Then again, our family's physicians have moderate South Asian accents but, since we're face-to-face most of the time and not conversing over the phone, it's easier to understand them.

Would I say that I question the trustworthiness/intelligence of a person based solely on their accent? No - but I will question their intelligence if it seems to me that, because of poor grammar, they don't know what they're talking about, even if they do!

Don't you notice all Californians speak English with an accent? I am very proud of being a Californian.

I know some people who speak English with an American accent, but, unfortunately, some of them do not possess a writing skill.

When I hear people speak English with an accent, I know that they know at least two languages. They should be proud of that.

I myself speak, read and write English, Mandarin, and Vietnamese at an acedemic level, all with an accent. I used to speak adequately French, German, Cantonese, a bit of Russian.

All the knee-jerk liberals who are berating those who support the study: you can like it or not, facts are facts. We are not talking about what you "wish" was the situation, it is what it is. Simple fact: when I have a problem with my new whatever, call the factory and get someone who can barely communicate or understand, I mistrust the factory's interest and capability to serve my needs. This has nothing to do with the individual - they may be a very nice person in their country and totally reliable, but if I cannot get what I need, I WILL go elsewhere.

This to me is the greater lesson to take away from this study - communication today is very intense, we are being called to "do more with less". I can't take all day for a single conversation to get across a single bit of information. So if I can't access the information, it is unreliable.

I hire IT consultants on a regular basis, and over half of the candidates are H1B's from India. I can honestly say that within the first few minutes of the interview I already know if I will be hiring the person or not. The number one complaint I get from our customers regarding H1B workers is their inability to understand them. And in my 20 years of experience, I have found that verbal skills are a good indicator of writing abilities. So candidates with heavy accents and poor English are automatically disqualified. And before you accuse me of racism, I have hired dozens of Indian candidates who happen to have excellent communication skills. Unforuntately they represent a small percentage of the H1B population.

Accent is just one more excuse for not hiring a person. I have had a lot less problems here in the Northern states than in the South and a lot less in private companies where the only interest is making money than in public companies where people has more time to think about crap like accents or skin colors. If you are good at what you do then smart people will hire you and there will be no problem. I always compare this issue with this analogy: "If you are playing tenis and you have a knee injure, then your opponent will make you play on that side". So the remedy is get education here in the US. By culture, the US people is egocentric so everything out of the borders is not good enough for many... many people (most of them without college education).

What it is the standard American English anyway?
Maybe a person with a stronger accent would not be so appropriate for customer service position in a call center, but many companies have outsourced their call centers to other countries in Asia, and that is even harder because they not only have a strong accent, but they also many times are not familiar with expressions, jargons and slangs; however, with patience, tolerance and respect any situation can be solved.

The question is not whether accents undermine credibility, rather it's whether accents trigger people's biases and prejudices against those they perceive as foreign, different, or uneducated. To associate people's accents to credibility is absurd and disingenuous.

I think,we just need to respect and accept each other regardless their accents.Yes, I do have an accent, but I can speak other languages. Can you? Why can you undestand your parent’s and grand parent’s accents and cannot understand all other people accents? I think it is just a personal cultural problem.I met here people who thought that English was the only language in the world. By the way, there are more than 6800 differnt languages in the world

I am from the West Indies. I have a MBA. I was told that I do not fit the profile for a job to advise Hedge Fund Managers for a leading Canadian Company. I was told I do not fit the profile for that job. I know it was because of my accent. Anyhow I got a job in a College in Accounting. I do not have to speak to many person now, and they are comfortable with my accent.