The West Midlands boasts a broad range of accents. Often challenging for outsiders to distinguish - much to the chagrin of many of us. Birmingham and the Black Country often take pride in not sounding too much like the other side. I'm here in Birmingham to see what differences people notice.
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00:00 So, I first moved to the West Midlands maybe about 15 years old and it took me a while
00:06 to adjust to the black country and even Birmingham accent, but there are significant differences.
00:11 Now in terms of specific words you hear the term "Babble-lot" especially in small independent
00:15 shops here in Bram, but there's a particular twang about the black country that just makes
00:20 it distinct.
00:21 Definitely not the same.
00:24 I am from Spain, I can't really tell the difference between the various sort of northern accents
00:29 in the UK.
00:30 Northern?
00:31 Northern, sort of north of London.
00:34 But I don't find it difficult to understand.
00:37 I've been among worse places for accent for sure.
00:42 I'm from Leicester so I think the Brummie accent kind of sounds a bit like home to me,
00:45 especially when I'm outside of the Midlands.
00:47 I think the West Country accent, I mean sorry the black country accent is a bit less droney
00:52 than the Birmingham accent.
00:54 I think the Brummie accent is very sort of elongated, but I kind of, you know, unpopular
00:59 opinion I kind of like it, so yeah that's probably my take.
01:06 I don't know.
01:08 From the black country accent they talk like a lot faster and stuff and like here it's
01:13 just like, I don't, like slower a bit, but like there's not much of a difference, but
01:19 like there is, it's hard to explain, yeah.
01:23 I mean personally I'd say the same, but like I feel with one thing that I do tend to see
01:27 a lot more has to be probably in, not really speed, but like how, it's like they're kind
01:33 of a bit more posher if you think about it, it's like they have more of a kind of uptight
01:38 accent, if that's what I'd say.
01:40 Well yeah, I'd be the same.
01:42 Yeah.
01:43 Oh god, I don't know.
01:46 I feel like you notice a stronger black country accent, whereas Birmingham's more like...
01:54 You just accentuate it.
01:55 Yeah.
01:56 That's what I'd say.
01:57 Yeah.
01:58 And people think like Birmingham is like Birmingham, but that's more like black country, and it's
02:02 like, yeah.
02:03 Birmingham.
02:04 Like, yeah.
02:05 That's all, really.
02:06 That's all.
02:07 And generally now I notice there's quite a few similarities between them, so I wouldn't
02:14 be able to tell exactly what area that person is coming from, but to be honest, I notice
02:19 some differences in the way the person are speaking, and also the terms they use, so
02:27 based off of that, I may be able to tell the difference, but not exactly from the way of
02:31 speaking so to speak.
02:34 I don't think I've noticed any difference at all, really.
02:36 I don't think I'm familiar with any of the accents here in Birmingham.
02:40 Sorry.
02:42 I can't really tell the difference between the accents.
02:44 They're very similar to me.
02:47 They sound quite funny, because where we come from it sounds quite strange, but I can't
02:51 really define the difference between Birmingham, Walsall, Wolverhampton.
02:55 They all sound the same.
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