# Are Accents Offensive?



## Kyle R (May 16, 2012)

I have some characters in my current story who live in Botswana, and speak English, but with a heavy accent.

For example:

*He tilted his head, his hands still waving in the fly-less air, and asked, "Ubaba, weah we go?"*

and

*Nesibindi's father cleared his throat and said, "Many yeah ago, I walk dees path weet my fahda, as you walk weet me now."

*I have yet to meet any individuals from Botswana, so I don't have the luxury of conversing with them directly. My accents are based on documentaries I've watched and I've tried to replicate their style of English as best I can, while taking a few creative liberties to morph it to fit each character individually (education level, life experience, etc...) In the end I know the accents are not completely accurate.

My question is, should I even do so, or write simply without the accent? Do you think any readers would find accents (of any region) offensive?

Cheers!


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## Tiamat (May 16, 2012)

If it's done accurately, then no, I shouldn't think so.  I suppose it's possible--people get offended over just about anything these days.  But if you do it well, then you add that much more dimension to your piece.  

Granted, if you do it poorly, then you'll certainly offend, not just the locals of Botswana, but any reader that glances over your story.


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## Potty (May 16, 2012)

This is a tricky one. I've found accents difficult to add to a story, I've only seen it successful with scottish (Terry prattchett and the wee free men: Ach! Ya wee bigjob!) and cockney English ('Oi 'ave me a new 'orse!). the problem with the examples you've given is that the words would be spelt to mean actual english words, such as "yeah" for "year."

I think in this case it might be good to only inflect a select few words, something that people from botswana would have difficulty saying 99% of the time (Like someone from Germany trying to pronounce a word with a 'W' in it). Other than that I would just let the reader fill in the accent for themselves. When reading Hagrids dialogue (harry potter), he could use a sentence with no inflection in it at all, but I would still fill in the accent in my own head.

With regard to being offensive, you do run the risk of sterio typing a little... but as Tia says, do it well and you should be OK. I think the key is moderation.


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## Jon M (May 16, 2012)

I think you have to worry about the cheese-factor more than offending anyone. For stories where the character is not the narrator, I'd use only the minimum amount necessary to give the reader an idea. For First Person narratives, it's all or nothing.


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## Rustgold (May 17, 2012)

KyleColorado said:


> I have some characters in my current story who live in Botswana, and speak English, but with a heavy accent.
> 
> *Nesibindi's father cleared his throat and said, "Many yeah ago, I walk dees path weet my fahda, as you walk weet me now."*


*
*
Does people from Botswana have English as their first language.  You want the best English speakers, get someone from Nigeria; I've never heard anybody speak English as clearly as a Nigerian.

My general opinion is a tell PCers to take a hike.  Seriously, people complain if you don't have a black &/or Chinese lead in your books these days, or if there's a imperfect character who's non-white.  And on the PC garbage goes.  I'm actually not intending to identity non-white characters as such in my writings, and people can decide for themselves what these character are.

But anyway, it's not offending PCs I'd worry about; I'd worry about the quality based on your examples.  I simply found it to be poor quality, and I found it different to tolerate reading just those two lines.


Maybe you'll do better to write it all up normally, and then worry about accents.


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## Trilby (May 17, 2012)

Use accent sparingly; it is difficult to read and can become tedious. Give an essence of the accent or dialect rather than a full depicted piece.


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## Kyle R (May 17, 2012)

Hey, thanks for the insights, guys (and gal).

From what I gather, I should:

- Do it accurately and do it well
- Inflect only key words and keep it in moderation, let the reader's mind apply the accent
- Don't be cheesy. Keep it to a minimum. In first person, keep it simple or go all in.
- Don't worry about being politically correct. Instead, focus on quality. Go for normal speaking then look to touch it up.
- Use the accent sparingly, focus on the essence of the accent and not the depiction of it.

So, with those awesome tips in mind (truly great, I mean that, thank you), I've decided to approach it in this manner:

*He tilted his head, his hands still waving in the fly-less air, and asked, "Ubaba, where we go?"

*and

*Nesibindi's father cleared his throat and said, "Many year ago, I walk this path with my father, as you walk with me now."

*Better? *hopes with fingers crossed* I'm still:

- Dropping words, adjusting plurality, and attempting to focus on rhythm

Still too much?

I think the problem is I really want to get it _right_, trying to duplicate it phonetically from what I've heard.. But because of that I may be going overboard. Perhaps I need to trust the reader's intuition more.

Thanks again for the feedback. I've sent you all a check in the mail. *looks around and whistles innocently*


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## Potty (May 17, 2012)

Out of interest... is he speaking to another botswan...ian in their native language, which you are then translating to English for the reader?

But another thought might be to use actual botswan...ies words if its a botswaniesian speaking to an englishian. I.E (I couldn't find a botswana online translator so I used african): Many jaar ago, I walk this path with my pa, as you walk with me now.


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## Kyle R (May 17, 2012)

Well, they speak Zulu (Ubaba is "father" in that dialect).. but just from your question alone (posing another alternative), I assume it still isn't working for you.

Perhaps, to keep it simple, I'll just avoid an accent (or word dropping) altogether.

The last thing I want is to irritate or annoy the reader, so that after my book is published I come home one day and there's a crazed fan at my door saying, "Now, I killeeng you, fo' typeeng in dee bahd ox'ent, hwah!"

An' den, he stah-beeng me weet dee nayeef!

:grief:


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## Sam (May 17, 2012)

You can use them, but you need to do your research. You have to find out the colloquialisms and make sure you don't stereotype the accent. One of my all-time pet peeves is the so-called 'Irish' accent they use for TV shows and movies. That stupid "top of the morning to ya" accent that they think is the way every Irish person speaks. In thirty years of living on this little island, I have never heard someone say "top of the morning to ya". If I did, I'd probably punch them. 

If you can describe in your prose how the character talks -- use all those weird spellings above -- you might get away with having the dialogue as normal and trusting that your reader will attribute the accent to each word. I'm thinking along the lines of gerunds. Authors have a habit of doing this: "That's what I'm talkin' about!" When readers come to words ending in '-ing', they normally remove the 'g' in their minds anyway. So, just write the dialogue as normal and trust that the reader's imagination will do the rest.


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## Bloggsworth (May 17, 2012)

The risk is making it sound both inaccurate and patronising, but particularly patronising. Off the wall suggestion; see if you can find some Botswanan/Zimbabwean/Zambian poetry or fiction written in dialect by natives, it should give you a guide - Unfortunately my neighbour from Botswana is white and speaks with a polite version of the South African accent, so no help there then!


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## Potty (May 17, 2012)

KyleColorado said:


> but just from your question alone (posing another alternative), I assume it still isn't working for you.




I wouldn't say that, I haven't got enough of the story to put it into context. I just wondered if it was a bots person speaking to an eng person or a bots to bots. Becuase if it was bots to bots... as far as they are aware there is no real accent to notice. It would be like if I spoke to my pub landlord. He will speak and the only thing I notice in the conversation is the price per pint. So maybe focusing on an accent if it's bots to bots will take away from the story itself. 

If it's bots to eng then I can see the need for an accent... am I making sense?


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## squidtender (May 17, 2012)

KyleColorado said:


> So, with those awesome tips in mind (truly great, I mean that, thank you), I've decided to approach it in this manner:
> 
> *He tilted his head, his hands still waving in the fly-less air, and asked, "Ubaba, where we go?"
> 
> ...



Much, MUCH, better, KC. I don't think your previous attempt was as much offensive as it was cheesy (avoid the cheese!). I've got a Russian character in my WIP, and while I drop words, I leave the accent to the readers mind. I've always thought of accents like I do of descriptions: I don't need to tell the reader every detail of a lamp, they already know what it looks like. Likewise, they know what an accent sounds like and will naturally insert their own version. 
In fact, when I've seen a writer try to _show_​ me the accent, it usually pulls me out of the story, because I'm fighting their version with what I hear in my own mind.


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## SeaBee1 (May 17, 2012)

Hello Kyle,

For me personally, as a reader, I don't mind an author inserting a little accent into the dialog, but only a small amount. VERY SMALL amount. In life, I work with several African immigrants, some from Kenya, a lady from Nigeria, and one from Rwanda. I also work with a Russian transplant. Oi! Unless you have experienced this in real life, you can't begin to know how difficult it is to follow the broken English. To write it would be a nightmare in my opinion and difficult to capture accurately. I think I would keep it REALLY simple to give the essence, you know, just a slight hint of fragrance, not the entire bouquet. Your second attempt above will probably do. Otherwise, do as others have suggested, leave it out and let the reader use his imagination.

Best regards and good luck!


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## WriterJohnB (May 17, 2012)

I would suggest you read the Alexander McCall Smith books in the No. 1 Ladies' Dectective Agency.  He gives the reader a treat by using "flavor" rather then accent to portray the culture of his characters. For example, even close friends and married couples use formal names, she is alway Mma Ramotswe and her partener is Maa Makutsi. When speaking to her husband he's Mr. J.L.B. Matakoni.

Accents or "Eye Dialect" has often been a discussion in our writers group (nearly all published writers.) If your characters are all Botswana English speakers, they would detect no accent, just as you don't notice accents when speaking with people in your own home town. We all have accents, but they should be used sparingly. For instance, in one of my historical novels, set in early 1800's North Carolina, I don't use accents to differentiate between blacks and whites. I DO however, use an accent for a slave who was born in Africa and speaks with a different accent, and I use Irish and Yankee accents when my character travels north, because my MC would notice them. I also slur the speech of a low-life slave catcher as an indication of character.

During my research, narrators of the period used super-heavy accents for blacks in a patent attempt to make them appear too stupid to speak correctly. I found it patronising and offensive. These people came from a foreign land and nobody taught them to speak proper english. And since slaves were interned in a "slave quarter" the children learned to speak from their parents, and their accent was passed down over the decades. Because of this writing "black" has a stigma and I would advise against it. But you know who your readers might be, so never say never.

Hope that helps,

JohnB


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## shadowwalker (May 17, 2012)

I, too, think the second attempt was much better than the first. I don't really care for accents - much as I love Mark Twain, and as many times as I've read Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer, it's still a huge pain the butt to do so. This is one of those cases where telling is much better than showing, IMO. As a reader, I want to understand the conversation, first and foremost. So somewhere in the narrative, tell me the language they're speaking and let it go.


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## CFFTB (May 17, 2012)

I'm not offended at all, nor should anyone else be. The only thing is that it takes me longer to read and understand what they're saying, so if it's used sparingly it's not really that much of a distraction.

Steinbeck did it perfectly in 'Grapes of Wrath'.


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## starseed (May 17, 2012)

I don't like it at all, it actually drives me insane when authors do this and I usually end up skipping over those parts of dialogue. I'd much rather they just write the words the way a person would say them, spelled clearly, and let me hear the accent in my imagination.


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## Kevin (May 17, 2012)

CFFTB said:


> I'm not offended at all, nor should anyone else be. The only thing is that it takes me longer to read and understand what they're saying, so if it's used sparingly it's not really that much of a distraction.
> 
> Steinbeck did it perfectly in 'Grapes of Wrath'.


Faulkner, too (thx garza , for the heads up...) I consider it a part of the setting. I read fast, but I enjoy the chance to savor the words. When reading a good book, it's often over too quickly.


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## starseed (May 18, 2012)

Kevin said:


> Faulkner, too (thx garza , for the heads up...) I consider it a part of the setting. I read fast, but I enjoy the chance to savor the words. When reading a good book, it's often over too quickly.



See, a perfect example of "to each their own" and why every writer should just write whatever they like the best. There will be people out there who love/hate it either way.


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## JosephB (May 18, 2012)

Most of my stories happen in the south. Rather than try to simulate the accent, it's mostly about phrasing, speech patterns and appropriate colloquialisms. It's something I've heard my whole life -- and I know it really well. I recently wrote a story featuring an old couple from New Jersey -- and I patterned their speech after my neighbors'. I've known them for years -- they mind our children etc. -- and I could practically hear them reading the dialog. I probably wouldn't have the nerve to try something outside my experience, something that didn't come naturally. But maybe that's just me.


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## Kyle R (May 18, 2012)

Thanks everyone. I've decided to avoid the use of an accent, at least for now. I see no reason to make things harder on myself than they need to be. Later on, when I'm more capable, I may give nuanced dialogue another shot. 

Cheers!


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