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I still insist that England's accents are a lot more distinct from each other. The only difference I can tell between Edinburgh and the Hebrides is that the people in the Hebrides are almost incomprehensible..
The Hebridian accent is much more 'lilting' than the Edinburgh one. Personally, I find it far more pleasant to listen to.
I still insist that England's accents are a lot more distinct from each other. The only difference I can tell between Edinburgh and the Hebrides is that the people in the Hebrides are almost incomprehensible..
I disagree. To a Scot, there are just 4 English accents. Northern, Southern, Midlands and south-west.
I think they are native accents - most Irish, Scottish and Welsh people grew up with English as their mother tongue and speak no other language!
The exception to this may be those whose mother tongue is Irish, Welsh or Scottish Gaelic and their English is not quite as good as their first language. Bear in mind though that almost nobody who speaks one of these languages as their mother tongue does not also speak English fluently as well. So even here their accent don't tend to sound "foreign".
It is probably only in Wales where large numbers of native speakers of a Celtic language still exist and the language is healthy. Once I stopped in a Welsh-speaking village in Snowdonia and asked for directions. The old man who helped me out had a very strong Welsh accent which was quite foreign sounding - he made a few grammar mistakes and was obviously not 100% comfortable in English. Maybe 90% - like a Dutchman or Swede with good English - but not native proficiency.
Also there's a debate about whether Scots (i.e. the Germanic variety spoken natively in lowland, southern and eastern Scotland (i.e. NOT Scottish Gaelic) is a seperate albeit very closely related language to English or whether it is simply a very broad dialect of English. But either way, as it operates within a dialect continuum with English - with very broad Scots at one end and standard cultivated Scottish-English (the "Ediburgh lilt") at the other. I think it would be difficult to argue that a Scottish accent (which is what most people would use to describe the latter part of that continuum) could be considered foreign.
Rolling the Rs and naining the 9s (Nines) suuuuuring the Sure is only one aspect of this accent for Scotland, and if you want to get introduced to one of them speaking start with the man of Dandy (George Galloway)
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