[digital drifter]

At least in South India, I can make a pretty good guess where a person is from even before he speaks whether Mallu, Tamil or Telugu/Kannadiga; say to more 50% probability.  The moment he talks, I can almost be sure from the accent, the point where he gives his name, pretty much there at 99%.  Obviously, these are the people whom I frequently interact; so from the bulbous, the hawk nosed, the bushy moutache, the gait(sometimes)  I can be quite sure.

Those who visit India frequently, can you? Of course, not the obvious Sikh gentlemen....

& to reverse it, how do you know someone is Welsh, Scot, East German, woolmer(sp?)(Belgium) in your respective countries just by looking?  My brother in Germany says, they seem to know who's from the Eastern side even before they speak.  How?

Not to be seen as reverse racism, everybody looks the same to me, as in everyone looks English.  Yes, I do see the pronounced accent in some cases but people seem to know a mile away just by looking...

[Sudheer Poppa]

Having worked extensively with Germans, I think I can be about 80-90% sure about guessing a person to be german or not.

[torryquine]

I find that the Dutch have a certain look about them (and a pleasing one at that).  It's hard to describe - they are usually tall (but not always), fair haired (but not always), generally look very healthy and often wear glasses.  Beyond that, I can't put it into words, but I nearly always know one before I hear their distinctive accent.  Strange isn't it?

[Merchant]

I can tell the Upper East Siders from the Upper West Siders.

[rangss]

I can guess Russians out of a pack. Their fingers will always be tainted with nicotine...so are their lips

[Casey]

I can't tell anyone apart!  If someone has a Mountain Equipment Coop backpack I know they are Canadian.  It's a better indicator than the flag.

[Strawberry_Blonde]

I was in a petrol station in the UK last year and they guy service behind the counter was Indian, I could tell straight away he was from Kerala and spoke Mallayalam (Spelling police please patrol?!) and he was shocked when I asked him but that is as far as by detection skills go in identifying Indian folk by sound or by look.

As far as Brits go, I really don't think visually I would stand a change of telling Welsh, Scots, Irish apart at all without them speaking, yet can probably identify a scandinavian / other european  from them.. again I don't know what it is..I know it sounds odd but glasses are sometimes a give away

Another good one people have trouble differentiating is Australians and New Zealanders, having spent over a year in Oz, on accent alone I can tell these two apart.  I can also pick up on the regional Australian accents so would  be able know who was from say Victoria and who was from Queensland, had I have never lived in Oz I doubt that would have been possible!

Walking down Brigade road in Bangalore I would probably be 80% sure of identifying an American without them speaking, I don't know what it is but there is just something, perhaps in the type of colour or clothes , shoes, backpack they use, mmm just can't put my finger on it!

This is quite an interesting thread I was going to start a similar one by Identifying by region by name. I remember when I was at school we had many girls whose name ended in ...'inder' e.g roopinder, harpinder etc and lots of surnames Patel, Singh, Kaur. Most of these were of Sikh origin so are these names common with the Punjab?

Now having been in South Indian for some time I see very few names that are the same so see no common threads at all, other than perhaps Christian / Catholic names etc which stem from Goa, Kerala, Pondi etc??  Or am I missing something blindingly obvious?

SB

Edited by Strawberry_Blonde, 18 May 2006 - 08:24 AM.

[digital drifter]

Quote

Now having been in South Indian for some time I see very few names that are the same so see no common threads at all, other than perhaps Christian / Catholic names etc which stem from Goa, Kerala, Pondi etc?? Or am I missing something blindingly obvious?

There are places in TN like Tirunelveli, Nagerkovil, Tiruchi where you'll find names like

Michael Raj
Selvaraj David
Lourdes
Selvin(corruption of Selwyn?)


pretty much places them to Tirunelveli /Nagerkovil districts.  Not always but most probably.  The pentecostal, anglican crowd is pretty active out there.

[Hyderabadi]

Very interesting thread DD.

I can figure out what part of Andhra Pradesh the person is from once they utter the first couple of words..

Living here in the US 'Deep South' I've progressed all the way to Texas in recognizing accents, esp. being in the hotel/motel industry.

[beach]

If someone gives me a business card, and it reads like

Srinivas
House No: 2-347-27/8 (old No: 3-447-62/10)
1st cross (behind old market road)
JP Nagar , 2nd stage
.....
...

Without any doubt I can tell that he's from Hyderabad!!.(yep, almost all the Hyderabad addresses look like that )



If someone tells you their names that ends with Ambani,Advani,Jetwani .... do not confuse them for Italians (.. Berlusconi,..Casini,..Mussolini).They are Sindhi people of origin at Gujarath & Sindh(now in Pakistan)

[deathbydalbhat]

If someone is carrying an Invicta backpack, it's as good as an Italian flag.

For some reason when I am traveling people think I am German, despite the fact that I am short and brunette - maybe after studying Deutsch for so many years I have adopted certain German mannerisms?

I can tell the difference between Tongans and Samoans.

After someone talks for 10 seconds, doesn't matter how pasty white or blonde they are, I can tell if they grew up in Hawaii and went to public school.

[Hyderabadi]

beach, on May 18 2006, 02:00 AM, said:

If someone gives me a business card, and it reads like

Srinivas
House No: 2-347-27/8 (old No: 3-447-62/10)
1st cross (behind old market road)
JP Nagar , 2nd stage
.....
...

Without any doubt I can tell that he's from Hyderabad!!.(yep, almost all the Hyderabad addresses look like that )

..........

You are right!  There are other similar things, but that's for another thread.

[Yashodhara]

digital drifter, on May 17 2006, 06:21 PM, said:

My brother in Germany says, they seem to know who's from the Eastern side even before they speak.

I cannot confirm this. People keep asking each other about their regional provenance, in business as well as in private. There are those "typical looking guys", of course, and they might be the ones you recognize easily, but that is far from being the rule.

A corpulent lady in a "dirndl" with two chubby-faced boys can be recognized as a Bavarian alright, but then she might just be some American/Polish/Scandinavian... gal on her first visit to the "Oktoberfest". Then there are those blonde giants whose smell of sea air is perceived from miles away, and with a bit of luck you might have guessed right: they're from Hamburg or Lübeck.

The present generation of 20-year-olds consists of people deriving from mixed relationships in a lot of cases which of course makes it harder to track the cultural background. Their accent of course gives them away with the very first syllable they speak. Then it is often very easy to guess the correct town, especially with people from Eastern Germany.

However, I just realize that this whole topic makes me feel a little uneasy, and I guess that is where cultural mentality comes into play. Us Germans feel somewhat uncomfortable when it comes to tracking people's ethnicity by their physical features, I assume history did that. I think we have to lighten up a bit in this department.

Edited by Yashodhara, 18 May 2006 - 10:55 PM.

[Seventies'Neil]

Here in the UK, local accents change between north, south, east & west across the country. Even 50 miles away people talk with a different accent to me.
Theres a huge difference between the london & southern accents and the northern ones.
Then of course theres the scots, welsh & irish accents,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,