Health

English woman with French accent?!
by Barbora Misakova

For those of us who try to learn foreign languages the worst thing to learn is accent. And even though we tried to live for some time abroad, accent is something we will never learn actually. In this way we – the strangers – are always revealed. Now imagine your accent can be changed from one day to another, but it cannot be done by learning. It is called “foreign accent syndrome”. It is a very rare medical condition which involves speech production that usually occurs as a side effect of severe brain injury such as stroke or head trauma. Kay Russell, a woman living in southwestern England suffered a severe migraine attack which left her speaking wit! h a French accent. But if you think this change brought her luck, you are wrong. Professor Nick Miller, one of the few experts in the world on foreign accent syndrome says there is no known cure and the effects can be devastating. In Kay’s life that meant loss of job, loss of confidence in public, and also loss of part of her identity. “It is not my voice I miss. I would love to have my own voice back, but it goes way, way, way beyond my voice.” she said. It wasn’t exactly clear what happened to Russell in January when the migraine attack struck and it was BBC who identified her condition as Foreign Accent Syndrome. There are only a few dozen cases across the world and these include people whose newly found accents sounded German, Spanish, Welsh, Italian or Irish. “It is not only that you don’t sound like who you are. You don’t sound like the others around you either.” added Kay.

related story (sgx18208)! : http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100915/ap_on_he_me/eu_britain_s...

by Barbora Misakova for Cantell TV (http://cantell.tv)

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posted by Blog TechSource @ 1:20 PM