Profs & Pints Denver: An Introduction to Accent Acquisition

Profs and Pints Denver presents: “An Introduction to Accent Acquisition,” on the science of learning to speak like others, with Miranda Guettlein, linguist, dialect coach, former instructor of voice, speech, and accents to theater students at the University of Northern Colorado in Greeley, and editor-in-chief of Voice and Speech Review.

[Doors open at 5 pm and the talk begins at 6:30. Advance tickets $13.50 plus processing fees. Available at https://events.ticketleap.com/tickets/profsandpints/denver-accent-acquisition ]

The ability to speak in different accents can seem like magic, but it’s accomplished with predictable rules and practicable skills that anyone can learn.

Join Miranda Guettlein, who has coached actors for Brigadoon, Sweeney Todd, Cabaret, and dozens of other theatrical performances, for a talk that will demystify the process of learning any accent and give you a rich understanding of what accents convey and how they’re acquired.

Drawing from research in linguistics, performance, and psychology, she’ll discuss the social and cultural implications of specific accents and what an accent tells us about the speaker.

You’ll learn how, historically, “standard” accents were taught as a way to grant prestige to “educated” professional voice users. However, under the Knight-Thompson Speechwork methodology, all accents and their features have equal value, and what is “good” or “correct” is context dependent.

We’ll explore all of the possible ways in which accents can vary and how these components are combined to form different speech patterns. We’ll look at how to manipulate the vocal tract to achieve ease and efficiency in different accents and how these physiological components interplay with pronunciation and resonance.

You’ll gain a sense of the musicality of accents in terms of their pitch, length, duration, and timbre, and you’ll learn how the combination of these features creates meaning in discourse.
It’s a lecture that will leave you talking—in many different ways. (Doors: $17, or $15 with student ID.)

Image: Audrey Hepburn in a publicity shot for the 1964 film My Fair Lady (public domain photo).