Tom

>Terry;
>
>I have relatives from Galway, Cork and friends from Dublin. Naas, Belfast and other areas of Ireland. The Belfast accent is easily recognizable, and the others are no problem for me.

How about the 'Derry accent? It's not just the accent but the words. "Whenever" means "when" and "to join" means "to admonish". Back in "the Troubles" a women was interviewed on telly and the reporter said, like, "Madam, what would you do if you saw your children throwing stones at the soldiers?", to which she replied, "Sure I'd go out and join them!". The reporter's jaw dropped. :-)

My paternal grandfathers are from Galway! My surname is quite rare (all my life it's been mistaken for those burger-wallahs) and I have to annunciate and spell it to people - even then they've written down Mcdonald before I've finished. Even as a kid, in the Xmas party for my dad's Territorial Army (Reservist) unit, my place mark had Macdonald on it! My uncle went to Galway a few years ago, asked in some town if there was a McDonnell around - it was like "Well now, would that be M. the milk, or M. the grocer, or M. the postman ..."

>
>English accents tend to type cast a person perhaps unfairly. It seems to be a class distinction to some degree.

True. A British army officer is depicted as having a plummy posh accent, which would stereotype him, but a US officer is always depicted as being rather course, hard-assed and cussing all the time (like Patton), which would stereotype HIM. A "Noo Joisey" accent stereotypes someone as being rather dumb and down-to-earth, then there's the "Clevis" accent from the Simpsons, etc. etc.

We've both got type-casting accents.
>
>I wish I could spell this so it would sound like a Bostonian said it. They like to drop r’s and double t’s are butchered.
>
>I am going to park my car and get a bottle of beer becomes - I am going to pak my ca and get a ba-el of bee-a.

Yeah, like I said, I spent some time in "Bastan", and the announcer voice on the Green Line always sounded like he had a clothes-peg over his nose: "Paaak Street. This is Paak Street" - a bit like Cliff off "Cheers".

Terry