European Veteran Tommy End signs with WWE | Official

[Wrasslin]

Maybe he's not a MAJOR signing but some people seem to be talking about him like he's John O'Shea. 

 

He's at least Mark Noble. 

[PowerButchi]

I like how the title gets less and less glam by the day. By Friday it'll be "Clog wearing, windmill dwelling, porn loving, weed enthusiast might get tryout in WWE"

[Arch Stanton]

I hope they gimmick him up like that. He looks a bit bland as he is.

[Michael_3165]

Who? 

[The Cutting Edge]

Nah Neidhart isnt european,

 

read through the rest of the posts I'm it'll shed light on him

[moofasa]

Sideman signing

 

He's a Dutch, Satan worshipping badass.

 

Then he opens his mouth and out comes a phony American accent. Kills it for me.

[iPumaPants]

Is it a phony American accent or is it the way he learned to speak English? I work with a Dutch girl who has an American accent, because she learned English from an American.

Previously, I worked with a girl from Pakistan who had an American accent, and claimed it's because English is easier to learn that way.

[Ladiesman345]

I knew a French girl who sounded English because that's the way the person on the cassette spoke. She sounded like a posh English lady, without a hint of the French accent.

[Carbomb]

Is it a phony American accent or is it the way he learned to speak English? I work with a Dutch girl who has an American accent, because she learned English from an American.

Previously, I worked with a girl from Pakistan who had an American accent, and claimed it's because English is easier to learn that way.

 

It's a very subjective thing. I know plenty of people who say they found British English much easier to learn and understand.

 

It's a very minor peeve, but it irks me when continental Europeans learn American English. Anywhere else in the world, fine - the Americans are a huge influence in the world. But there's all this big hoo-ha about us being in the EU, etc., so at least make the fucking effort to learn our English! We wouldn't choose to learn Afrikaans instead of Dutch, or Québécois instead of French, or Medigan instead of Italian, so do us that courtesy. The only European language that even its own speakers insist we shouldn't learn is Portuguese - even people from Portugal say that Brazilian Portuguese is nicer.

[SuperBacon]

Fact since time began: ALL Europeans sound American when speaking English.

[Carbomb]

Fact since time began: ALL Europeans sound American when speaking English.

 

Not true.

 

Discounting anecdotal evidence (and I've met plenty of Europeans with accents closer to British than American), I can also point to Gérard Houllier - he has an excellent accent for a non-native speaker. At some points he almost sounds English.

[Teedy Kay]

Fact since time began: ALL Europeans sound American when speaking English.

There is a clause to that fact, it does not include the Danish.

 

They instead pick up strong traits of the dialect from where they are living. See Molby and Schmeichel.

[Carbomb]

 

They instead pick up strong traits of the dialect from where they are living. See Molby and Schmeichel.

 

Laudrup too.

[PunkStep]

Scandinavians usually just sound like northerners when they speak English, I think that could be telling as to how different accents came about over time.

 

With regards to Europeans, really depends how they learnt the language. Two Italian girls sit next to each other at work, both from northern Italy. One has an American accent, the other broken English.

[Carbomb]

Scandinavians usually just sound like northerners when they speak English, I think that could be telling as to how different accents came about over time.

 

You're pretty much there - a lot of the northern accents took their shape from when the northern half of England was ruled by the Vikings. A mate of mine from Hexham was telling me about a lot of old Geordie slang, a lot of which comes from old Norse, like "gan' oot fer some beit [food]". I wouldn't be surprised if the word "clart" comes from Norse too. The Yorkshire dialect also has a lot of similar expressions.