It’s About the Way I Speak

Josh Kinnal [sic] has the peculiar (but spreading?) habit of pronouncing his ‘r’s American style, even though he is not American. Is this the Australian International accent?

(From the Lorraine Crescent blog)

Look. I know I over pronounce the letter ‘R’ in some words, American-style. I also know that I say the word ‘idea’ in a way that is different to other people.

The thing about the letter ‘R’ started, I think, when I first went to New York in 1992. I was 18, impressionable, and picked up the accent in about 3 days. It took me 2 months of being back home to shake most of it. The thing that stuck was the way I say ‘beer’, ‘here’, ‘their’, and other words that rhyme.

It’s probably never going away now. That’s just the way I speak. I’m used to it and it helps me be better understood than other Australians when I’m in the USA, so maybe it’s a good thing.

Whatever it is, it’s a part of me. I don’t force it and I don’t apologise for it.