x y z

imperialbari · Post by **imperialbari** » Thu Dec 07, 2006 2:50 am

x y z

tubafatness · Post by **tubafatness** » Thu Dec 07, 2006 7:51 am

As far as discernable accents go, there is not much to work with in Mr. Baker's case. I guess the closest you could get is near-Southern or maybe southern Midwest, but there really is no set accent in his voice. It's just a catch-all "American" accent, if you can say that.
Aaron Hynds, (who has a whole lot of the Midwest accent.)

ZNC Dandy · Post by **ZNC Dandy** » Thu Dec 07, 2006 9:45 am

James Baker is from Texas.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Baker

Hope this helps...

LoyalTubist · Post by **LoyalTubist** » Fri Dec 08, 2006 12:56 am

We have another problem here in Vietnam. We have schools that teach British English, American English, and Australian English. I work for an institution that supposedly teaches American English. But when they write a date, they do it in the Vietnamese way (such as 7/12/06). I try telling the students that this isn't the way to write dates in the American way. We also use textbooks which use British spellings and phrases.

TV here is football crazy, only what they call football is what I call soccer. I would love to see a football game--American style.

iiipopes · Post by **iiipopes** » Sun Dec 17, 2006 8:14 am

Poor bloke!

UDELBR · Post by **UDELBR** » Sun Dec 17, 2006 12:56 pm

the elephant wrote:So you get those random word generated SPAM emails too, huh? That is funnier than most, I must say.

I thought he was making fun of Klaus' writing style!

Mike Finn · Post by **Mike Finn** » Sun Dec 17, 2006 3:49 pm

Bloke Wrote:

It should be extrusively notated (and annotated) that my imago has been ensnared in the viscosity of time. That is why my transcendent self has been importuned (but not without resisting) despite the hydraulic pressure to limitate and delineate those theotons (the untimely microscopic, particulate hydrole) whose essential god-like characteristics have been laminated into an irreducibly minisculate, atomized, and indeed lionized cannister. Such is the enraptured entrapment of my condition.

The Elephant wrote:

I thought he was making fun of Klaus' writing style!

I thought he was quoting Don King!

MF

Mike Finn · Post by **Mike Finn** » Sun Dec 17, 2006 5:25 pm

Oops, my apologies to Uncle Beer... I know I'm not doing the quote thing right... should I hit the "quote" button on the page I want to quote before (or instead of) hitting the "reply" button? Is that how you get the author's name in bold letters? Now that I've got my post count over 100 I guess I should learn some of this stuff.
Thanks!
MF

Rick Denney · Post by **Rick Denney** » Mon Dec 18, 2006 9:39 am

ZNC Dandy wrote:James Baker is from Texas.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Baker

Hope this helps...

Of course, it doesn't help much. Texas has markedly different regional accents and defies characterization by outsiders.

More to the issue: Mr. Baker grew up in privelege, and attended school among the elite of the Northeast. An old friend of mine, also a native Houstonian (as I am), and of the same age as Baker, attended Philips Exeter Academy and Princeton, while Baker attended the Hill School and Princeton. He also vacationed every summer in upstate New York, which was common for wealthy people of his age, before even the oil magnates had air conditioning to escape the summer Houston heat. My friend pronounces several words in a manner that would be unimaginable in the working classes of Southeast Texas. I suspect Mr. Baker's accent is a also blend of his diverse schooling and upbringing.

But I did not grow up in such circumstances, and went to public school in Houston, Texas A&M, and the University of Texas. Even so, few detect anything distinctly Texas in my accent. For some reason, that part of Texas can produce a blend which isn't characteristically regional. It isn't always so, however. John Travolta actually portrayed the southeast working-class Houston accent pretty accurately in Urban Cowbowy.

President Bush also grew up in Texas, but as with Baker and my friend was schooled all over the place, and spend his summers in Maine. I believe that his accent is more of an adult decision than a childhood relic, but then that's true of most politicians, who seem to me to affect their local accents to dramatic extremes.

Rick "who can usually mimic most any accent with a day's local practice" Denney

LoyalTubist · Post by **LoyalTubist** » Wed Dec 20, 2006 6:49 am

I was amused when I arrived here in Vietnam to see that the way most Vietnamese are taught to pronounce English vowels more resembles Atlanta, Georgia, than anywhere else. There seems to be a slight drawl. And long Es get two syllables!