Slavic accent correction

What is that?


And that?

The main thing I have failed to mention concerning accent is that I speak English with an accent and, despite this fact, I have never felt anybody's displeasure in this connection.

I would agree with you, and with the others, that there are some common Slavic accent peculiarities, one of them being, as already mentioned by **************, palatalization of consonants (Ukrainian translation: пом'ягшення приголосних звуків), as e.g. the word "tick" [tik] may be incorrectly pronounced as [t'ik] with palatalized [t'] as in the UKrainian word "тільки" [t'il'ky] ("only"). And vice versa, native English speakers here often pronounce the U-word "тільки" as [til'ky] or [tilky].

You would be wondered but in many parts of the Western world Poles became
more numerous than Russians or Ukrainians and therefore first of all local people will
ask you if you have Polish accent...

I don't know about "Western world" but in the US (except for Chicagoland) you are assumed to be Russian when speaking with Polish,Czech or other EE accent.

Are you sure about that? I've always thought that Poles pronounce sounds too sharp/tough (that is in extreme variant of the accent) not in a soft way. As I understand palatalization means softening of a sound.

Btw. whenever American actors make an Eastern-European accent they immitate in fact the Russian accent. How come I, Polish, can recognize what is the Russian accent while speaking English, when the natives can't?


Well, many Poles have the problem with pronouncing the word "feast", they pronounce it in the same manner as "fist". I, for one, have a problem with the word "beach" - I pronounce it "bycz" not "biicz".

For the same reasons for which you cannot differentiate between Southern and Northern accent or New York and Chicago accents.I cannot either but they can.

Southerners speak like Britney Spears. Piece of cake! :)

so why English people keep thinking I'm Austrian or German when I speak with my Polish accent?

Ha ha. For fellow Poles I sound German too when speaking English. I must check that with the natives someday :)

BTW, how can one fully define persons, nations who call themselves "Slavs/Slavic nations", only by the language they speak?
The question is in this connection that today I have read a WIKI article about the Kazan Tartars trying to revive their ancient name Bulgaria (Volgaria). So, the related question: Suppose they join the European Bulgarians (, build a sort of confederation with them) and accept a Slavic language as their native one as well, would they be a Slavic nation too?

Still another question: Why do we use the word "Slavic" in English, but not a word like "Slovian" (or Slovic)? According to the article (an abstract from which see below) + many others, the word Slav/Slavic is connected rather with the word "slovo" ("word"), and more to it: there are countries that have the root "slov" in their names: Slovakia, Slovenia. Could one introduce it into use in English?

Origin of the word Slav poland-claritaslux/blog/origin-word-slav/
What is the origin of the word Slav? The Slavs or Slavic people are obviously most of the people of Eastern Europe, the Poles, Czechs, Slovakians, Ukrainians, Russians, and Serbians etc. Their languages and cultures are very similar.

The word 'Slav' or 'Slowianin' comes from the Slavic term for word; 'Slowo'. 'Slowo' means 'word' (słowo in Polish letters but pronounced swovo). The Slavs identified themselves as those who could understand their word or language. Slavic could be interpreted as "someone who understands".

I don't know,I can only talk about Americans.


I would say YES as there is huge difference in physical appearance between e.g Poles and Bulgarians.Also we Poles mixed with other nationalities (mainly Jews and Germans but also Scotts,Dutch and God only knows who else) over the centuries so much that under different criteria we wouldn't qualify as Slavic.

Once they asked me if I`m German too.This is out of complete ignorance or sometimes accent of people from the same nation could sound differently.If some person speak harsh and rude he will be more likely mistaken for German.So do you think Polish accent sounds similar to German purely coincidently or those languages are somehow originally related?


According to mind of my Ukrainian friend some Poles indeed look somewhat similar to Austrians or Germans,
but still not all of them.Genetical researches show that Poles have no more then few percent more Germanic blood than their Eastern neighbours and defenetly could qualify as Slavic nation.

I have thought Poles (alongside Slovaks) to be the most "pure" Slavic nation.

It was not my qoute originally I just citated someone


Interesting.Could you explain what in her personality or political program could attract people?She was prime-minister in Ukraine couple of times.Was her primership any successful?

She's HOT.

Are you asking me if it's a coincidence that Poland has been boardering with Germany for long centuries?

I am greatly sorry, but I cannot. I stated only that she had been popular here and that people loved her, but nothing about her performance as the Prime Minister etc.


I would agree with that, partially :). She had been so persuasive, so energetic, contacted people, spoke to them not only through media but live, at numerous meetings, so that people were simply carried away by her speeches - and believed her (that she would try or was trying to change the life for the better), and the life seemed lighter, full of prospects, there were hopes - and that must be an important factor = leader contacting and positively influencing the nation. And that in contrast to the present situation when the leaders cannot even speak, and when they speak they are becoming the laughing stock not only in Europe but the whole world.

Pretty accurate.

She was what people wanted, pretty, articulate,.......ruthless, decisive.......

I remember seeing pictures of her in different homes, on student notebooks, always front page press, on TV a lot and her rallies were well-attended without quite as many of the paid protesters showing up.

Young and middle-aged people liked her, the hard-line Communists respected her strength and willingness to overcome obstacles.

My personal beliefs were that she was certainly as crooked as any other Ukrainian politician but she presented herself with a veneer of sincerity and poise to the people, giving them hope that the country was moving forward rather than staying mired in old-style power structures. Her popularity is what landed her in jail. Yushenko was also crooked but his popularity numbers make him an insignificant threat to the rulin elite. As long as he is content with his loot and sits in his dacha or goes skiing in Austria, they are perfectly happy to leave him alone.

And yeah, in her day she was pretty hot for a middle-aged politician on the world stage.

Vlad, you asked a very important question (and I was not ready to answer it at first). But the atmosphere in Ukraine (or at least here) is, I believe, that a very-very low percentage of voters elect based on parties’ programs or have familiarized themselves with them (some parties even did not have their election programs).

It is interesting how it is in Poland and other countries.

To stay a little bit on-top (accent, language): A part of voters in UA voted (as they confess) for Yanukovych only because he had promised to make Russian the second language. So here we have languages as a nation-dividing factor: not the accent, not the ethnicity, not the confession, sometimes even not the performance. But the language and connected with it culture, values etc. And ethnic Russians in Ukraine are very patriotic of their language, literature, culture etc. (here we can draw some comparison to Ukrainians in Canada in contrast to Ukrainians in the Russian Federation).

Coincidence,of course,but what?Poles borrowed German accent?Even in those areas which belonged to Russian Empire?

I must confess however, very often I'll momentarily mistake a Ukrainian speaking in English for a Pole (though NEVER for a Russian!!):-) As the appearance of Ukrainians can often bare a striking similarity to their Polish counterparts, I usually have to hear them start to speak in order to finally realize that they're Ukrainian and not PolishLOL

I guess they didn't want to pick borat sounding Russian accent, even in those areas of Russian empire...

So what is difference between Ukrainian and Polish accents?And which of them sounds more unpleasent to you?

Both sound equally pleasant, only Polish sounds more or less like birds chirping, excited and animated.

I prefer the sound of Polish to Russian or my own family's Bohemian Czech.
Though so far I hear a big difference on how my cousin Marya in CR says words compared to my grandparents.
Or my dearest dear of friends who came from Slovakia when she speaks to her mother on phone.

How a maid imported to my X inlaw spoke Rusian compared to the family speaking it was waaaay different.

Birds..hmm... : )
And there is a very discernible difference between my boyfriend's Polish and my rarely connected language buddy (soft,palatized, chirpy with high intonations)
compared to my weekly language buddy or the man in the chocolate shop I ordered the telegram from (sounded almost like total weird drunk Bohemian, more clipped though still has different raised intonations).

Can it be because of the region? the rougher speakers were in Ponzan and Wroclaw. Ana and my Honey are both from Bialystok area.

And yes in USA... least the largest portion of people in my circles would automatically assume hard slavic accent as Russian, softer ones as German/Austrian (most not even sure what other countries there are or ever were in that region <_<. And these were in college). But I haven't lived (short stay at Great Lakes Naval Station) nor know very few people north of the 40degree mark where large Polish communities are known to exist. May be different up there?

So are you ethnical Czech?Did you ever hear Ukrainian language?If yes,how do you find it?
On this forum some people believe that Ukrainian and Czech are somewhat similar in pronounciation.
Do you think so?

As far as the accents, Polish and Ukrainian, are pleasant, so there is no need to correct them, is there? Let the English native speakers enjoy them!!!

Polish accent in English is very different from German accent in English - and Polish way of speach in general is very little if at all influenced by the German language

So,avstrijaka.Go to you Austrians and live there.

Couldn't agree more! As a quasi-native German/English speaker who learned Polish in adulthood, Polish sounds COMPLETELY different from German. It's rather like saying that Hebrew "sounds like" French because of the uvular -r sound plus the tendency of Hebrew speakers to say "uuuwight" like a "w" instead of "rrrright" with a distinct "r" etc.. When you listen closely, they don't sound alike AT ALL!!!