That reminds me i was in London, something was 2.99 pounds which i assumed would just be three pounds and when i was putting the item in my bag they gave me one pence back. I assumed since we don't have one and two cent coins they wouldn't have 1 and 2 pence coins there.

This question is for those who do not use American English (the spelling and pronunciation) - are audiobooks read by narrators with an American accent unusual to listen to? Because I've now become accustomed to hearing an American accent in most media typically, for me, hearing an audiobook narrated by someone with an English or Australian accent would be rather unusual (and pretty awesome ). I was curious about this and thought I'd ask!

I love listening to British narrators. Australian ones are usual to me. How americans and i think the British to say vitamin is different from how Australians say it. We say it like vi-tamin and the other way is Vit-amin.

Ah, that's interesting. So, Americans & Britons say it with a short i (as in igloo), while Australians say it with a long i (as in mine)? I think there are many words that sound different because of different accents placed on words. I'm not sure of the specifics: I think British English usually places an accent on the second syllable, while American usually does on the first? Or is it the other way around? Unfortunately, I haven't heard Australian enough to determine where the accent is placed.
To be honest, I think that if I could have an accent different than the one I currently have, I'd pick Australian. BBC English is fancy and like music, of course, but Australian (I'm sure there must be different-sounding dialects, so I guess I'm talking about general Australian accents) has this pleasant polished-but-still-laid-back sound.

Ah, that's interesting. So, Americans & Britons say it with a short i (as in igloo), while Australians say it with a long i (as in mine)?

I, and all the other Americans I know, say "vitamin" with a long "I", like in "mine".

~Riella

I think it may be just the British than not sure. Unlike america the Australian accent doesn't vary too much from state to sate but i think western Australians have stronger accents, I noticed when i came and lived here one man asked if i was British.

The Australian accent does vary. In Queensland the accent is quite casual, in the other Eastern states it's about the same. South Australians are said to have rather British accents and I'm not sure about the other states.

I've always said Vi-tamins (like mine), to go with vi-tal, vi-tality, and vi-able, not vit-amins (as in bit), though I agree that would work if you take a word like vim . Just me, but I see a relationship between these words, philologically. But then before retiring I worked to a schedule (pronouncing it skedule, not shedule), the same way I went to school (skool, not shool) where I was a scholar (skolar, not sholar) etc. For some reason I have always pronounced the army/navy rank of lieutenant as lef-tenant, rather than loo-tenant, but don't know why. These are among the things about pronunciation that my Scottish-born husband and I do not argue about.

In Queensland they call a dressing table a duchess, say 'hey' a lot at the end of sentences, and tell us we live in Ostrayya - or so we have been led to understand. Whereas in South Australia they say a vase is a vayse not a vahse as we do in NSW, and a sort of luncheon German sausage we in NSW call devon they call fritz or poloney, I think. In Victoria they go swimming in cossies and carry their clothes in a port, not a suitcase.

I'd agree with W4J, except in Sydney there is a slight difference between Western Sydney (ie west of Strathfield) and the rest. Out West, we speak "Strine", more so than the rest of Sydney, and we might not be too sure whether the "a" in graph is pronounced with a short a as in as, or a long a like in "are".

I expect there are local idioms wherever you may go.

I lived in several states when i was young so my accent is probably mixed to some extent.

In Queensland i went for my first day at a new school. I was seven. The women said put your port on the port rack and go to the bubblers. I had no idea what she was talking about. I think if she said drink at the end of bubblers I may of understood. She ended up pointing to them. Later in the day she told everyone to remember their togs for tomorrow. I had to ask mum what she meant. She meant swimming tights.

I have started saying gr-a-ph instead of with the are. The word privacy is pronounced different around the world. In Australia people often say Priiiiiii-vacy. I must say priv-acy makes more sense with the spelling.

Haha, I enjoyed reading your posts! That is fascinating. I pronounce some things a bit differently because of the British English and influence in Kenya. My mom occasionally says shedule, and I use a hybrid of spellings. When we first came to the USA, chips and crisps was hard to adjust to. Then of course there's serviettes and all that fun stuff. ILF, you mentioned swimming equipment - that was another thing for me. What do y'all call swim wear? I grew up generally calling them swimming costumes. So when I heard "bathing suits" in Midwestern US, I was a bit confused. Now I say swimming costumes or swimsuits.

In South Australia we call swimming clothes 'bathers'.

When I go swimming I wear swimming trunks. If I were female I'd wear a swimming costume.
Schedule is pronounced "shedule" in England, but school is "skool", and scholar is "skollar". Dave Allen ('70s comedian from Ireland) used to tell a joke about that, but it's too rude for NarniaWeb.
In the south of England they pronounce a lot of words with longer vowels, so "bath" is pronounced "barth". Up here (or rather, oop 'ere) in the North (or rather, t'North) we use short vowels so bath rhymes with the American "math" - only we don't say "math", we say "maths".

Yes, we call the subject maths rather than math, and yes we take a barth, like you say, King Erlian, though we baythe when we wash.

Haha, I enjoyed reading your posts! That is fascinating. I pronounce some things a bit differently because of the British English and influence in Kenya. My mom occasionally says shedule, and I use a hybrid of spellings. When we first came to the USA, chips and crisps was hard to adjust to. Then of course there's serviettes and all that fun stuff. ILF, you mentioned swimming equipment - that was another thing for me. What do y'all call swim wear? I grew up generally calling them swimming costumes. So when I heard "bathing suits" in Midwestern US, I was a bit confused. Now I say swimming costumes or swimsuits.

Now that is a tricky question. A lot depends not only what state of Australia you are in but also which style of togs, er, swimmers, er, cossies? er bathers? you mean. (Oh dear! Swimming costumes will do. ) Then there are the manufacturers of such items. Back in my grandparents' time there were those neck-to-knee costumes for both men and women. By the 1940's or 1950's men wore little black swimming trunks set off with white belt like things around their hips. My Dad used to wear something like that. But the women had to wear one-piece swimmers with little skirts in strategic places. Little girls - well, I was one at the time - wore similar costumes, all ruching and bubbles, which when wet looked fantastic in a plain blue or green, but absolute rubbish in anything else like vaguely pink floral.

Back in the 1950's and 1960's we had beach inspectors checking out immodest attire even on on our internationally famous Bondi Beach - usually directed at women, of course. It was the era of hydrogen bomb testing on Bikini and Mururoa Atolls, in the Pacific Ocean, and a pop song hit the airwaves, called "She wore an itsy bitsy yellow polka dot bikini and in the water she wanted to stay"... In the end, such beach inspections got too hypocritical for such nosiness to continue.

By that time, men wore lycra Speedo's (Speedo was the firm which made them) which at beaches and public baths revealed more about the men than they would like to admit. Unlike the more favoured boxer short versions of male swimwear, these sorts of men's "swimming tights" or "swimming briefs" sort of cling to the male anatomy a bit too tightly, and a bit too briefly. Therefore they are nicknamed "budgie smugglers", a budgie being a short term for a budgerigar, a popular pet Australian bird. The term may be relevant in the next nine months or so, due to an Australian leader who wore a red one, publicly.

Of course bikinis have taken off somewhat around the world. But makers of swimwear fashion protects masculine modesty with board shorts, inspired by USA surfers, or those body suits like what Ian Thorpe wore at the Olympics. Whilst hijab-wearing women who want to bathe at the beach can preserve their dignity with a burqini, a sort of outfit which includes a tight-fitting headcap in the one-piece style of swimwear.

Fashion in swimwear no longer bothers me, one way or another. For a long time we have had a small backyard swimming pool, from the time when our youngest had grommets put in her ears due to glue ear. We didn't want her feeling embarrassed at having to wear at the public baths or the beach, the by-then outdated bathing caps to protect the grommets.

There are a few other points you mentioned. We generally call serviettes, table napkins, though as a child at boarding school I, too, had to call them serviettes. Americans, we know, call baby napkins, diapers, but we refer to them as nappies, in NSW, at any rate. And whereas Mother in USA gets called Mom or Mommy, here in Oz, we tend to call her Mum or Mummy. Just like Charles, Prince of Wales, it seems.

In Queensland i went for my first day at a new school. I was seven. The women said put your port on the port rack and go to the bubblers. I had no idea what she was talking about. I think if she said drink at the end of bubblers I may of understood. She ended up pointing to them. Later in the day she told everyone to remember their togs for tomorrow. I had to ask mum what she meant. She meant swimming tights.

I quite understand. School cases weren't called ports here in NSW. On the other hand, because most of our usually hard school cases were made by a firm called Globite, that is what we called our school bags - our Globite cases. The style of school bag fifteen years ago was more like an overnight or sports bag, or the sort used for airline cabins, sometimes with the school crest on it. These days everyone carries back-packs, like they are going on an expedition, since it is better for one's posture. I believe they are called haversacks elsewhere.

I don't really "get" what the teacher meant about the bubblers. I know they can also be called drinking fountains. But you either use bubblers to drink from or you don't.

I say both schedule and shedule, depends on what comes out of my mouth. I say barth. I say math or maths depends on who I am around, some teachers were so fussy about it. I Tasmania we called swimming clothes bathers, In Queensland togs and in Wa swimming tights.

I can't remember what accent is is but they cut the h off here and say ere.

@ww tony abbott i remember the chaser making fun of that photo all the time.

Yes it was a drinking fountain, I was so confused. My sister said she went to the store room to look for trays with bubbles in them because the teacher told her to go to the bubblier trays.