Specifically I’m wondering how the typical English accent became the typical western accent (Which sounds relatively country), and how did that become the modern accents on the West Coast? What factor was added in that made cowboys start sounding like the modern day Californian.
I’m assuming the typical NY accent comes from Italians coming over.
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Bonus question: Why are there no places in the US at all that kept the English accents????
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If you’re talking about the Received Pronunciation as “English accents”, that didn’t start to appear in the form we know today until the late 19th century, about a hundred years after the US had broken away. A lot can change about an accent in 100 years. And that’s important, because even when the US first broke away, the colonies had been around for some 200 years. Especially without mass telecommunications to keep people closely connected even when they were geographically isolated, the cultures diverged, and with them, the accents.
[Though in more recent research, some have theorized the accents never actually left](https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20180207-how-americans-preserved-british-english).
Your underlying premise that the “English accent” went somewhere is false. The modern British accent has something which is called “non-rhoticity”; basically they lost most of their R’s and don’t pronounce them. “Water” for example would be pronounced “wah-uh” in a modern British accent, but Americans did not take on this change to the British pronunciation in the 18th century.
Because of this and other factors the modern American English is actually closer to the 18th century English pronunciation than modern British English!
Now as for how every aspect of how modern American accents got to how they are these days, that is an entire field in itself.
So I don’t know for all of this, but I will say there are a surprising amount. Of Mexican origins to some western/midwestern slang/words and even some styles or customs. From there we can devolve into Spanish origin and native origin… but it’s in truth a huge combination of a lot of things. For example, the western US was owned by Mexico for a long time. Naturally there is some cultural mashup. Today on both sides of the boarder we get some combination of the two languages, and accents are likely meshed in similar ways.
As far as how standard “American” separated from “queens English” if you will… we’ll Im sure it has similar origins, but I don’t know specifics.
Now I’ll say this is not me as a professional linguist or anything, just what I’ve observed. I speak Spanish and English and have spoken with and encountered people mostly from Mexico and been able to compare how Spanish is used in Texas and California as well as in the boarder area of mexico. So take this for what it is, but I’m sure the. Culmination of those two cultures, separated from cultural centers at the time of their mashup, was much of the cause for western English.
Others have partially answered. Here is a bit more in depth
The American accent, during the colonies and early US was very similar to posh, or proper, more upper class English accents at the time. During this period, accents in England were highly variable by geography and class, even English people often sounded nothing like each other despite living close by to each other.
The American accent, again still extremely recognizable as a posh English accent was considered pretty high class, and even more so, it was uniform across the US, which threw English people for a spin that a single accent was so universal across the country, no matter class or location. American accent was an anomaly in a good way
The nearly uniform American accent, based again off a higher class English accent at the time, stayed fairly consistent, while in England, accents continued to have significant difference and changes.
The New England accent is partly influenced by these “new” English accents that came about later, but most of the US did not get inflicted by the changes in style in England.
It’s not that the Americans lost the “English” accent, it is that the English lost the original rhotic English accent. In other words, the “hard R.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhoticity_in_English
American English and British English diverged a good while ago, and have since gone their separate ways. Different American dialects (including General American) show features that were unique to where in the British Isles they came from; these may have been lost or overwritten since in the UK. Modern mainstream British English is much more innovative than modern General American English, actually.
Appalachian English is one of the most conservative dialects of English still spoken, and sounds much more like English on both sides of the pond during the 1700s than either General American or your average modern Southern England English.
> I’m assuming the typical NY accent comes from Italians coming over.
There is a bit of Italian influence, but almost all of it is a mix of changes that had already happened in England when it was brought over (e.g. the r-loss) and natural language change.
> Why are there no places in the US at all that kept the English accents????
There are places that brought over innovations we associate with England. Parts of the US South and New England have the same r-loss change as much of England and Oceania, though in the US this is a stigmatised pronunciation and has been receding as people try to sound more like more educated and wealthier Americans. The same change is expanding in the UK as people try to sound more like more educated and wealthier Englishmen.
(Fun fact, pronunciations like *warsh* for *wash* are hypercorrections due to speakers who have this change not knowing where to revert it and where it was never there at all!)
>I’m assuming the typical NY accent comes from Italians coming over.
You’re probably thinking of the influence of Yiddish and related dialects.
You can hear more Italian influence over in Jersey. I suppose it might sound similar to someone that doesn’t live in the area. But compare Seinfeld vs Sopranos
Then you have central pa and the Amish influence… I think that most regional accents are due to immigrants and where they settled.
As for standardized American, wasn’t it due to the entertainment industry? In particular the first newscasters settled on a “voice” to be used when broadcasting. I would bet that voice was also influenced by the radio fidelity (or lack of it) back in the day… You had to speak very clear and precise to be understood over the cracks, fades and pops…..
I find it amazing well how accents pretty much disappear in singing.
Accents/dialects evolved in both countries, and both sound a lot different than the original English of the 1600s. Actually, there are some communities in the U.S. that have remained fairly isolated over the centuries and possibly have the most similarity to what English used to sound like – e.g. some pockets of Boston and Virginia. Check out this [“tour” of the U.S. dialects](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H1KP4ztKK0A&t=688s&ab_channel=WIRED), it’s amazing how varied American accents actually are.
I am of Italian decent and live in NYC. If I travel out of the metro area I am told how I have a heavy accent. Of course, my friends and family dont notice it cause they have it them selves. If I get a lil tipsy it comes out more to boot.
Its a product of environment. We are not born with any specific accent. If I was born in lets say Kansas, I am sure my accent would be different.
I also noticed that my friends who moved further away started picking up the accent of their new location. I like to tease them for it…lol
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