Galactic accents

A lot of Star Wars novels make reference to various planetary accents. For example, I'm reading Betrayal right now, and the mention a Correlian accent.

This got me thinking of other named accents, and real world accents to compare them to for frame of reference. Here's what I've come up with so far:

Coruscanti - British. Mostly due to the movies.

Kuati - Parisian French. The driveyards always remind me of a futuristic version of the ports in the Count of Monte Cristo movie. Also, the Narsacc Habitat area mentioned in Betrayal reminded me of a French Riviera-type area.

Corellian - This one's kind of hard. I picture an almost American accent with an attitude.

Thoughts, and any other accents?

 

Corellian is tough, since both Han and Wedge are described as having a Corellian accent.

I imagine Hapan as sounding Russian.

 

The use of accents has always interested me. A "Corellian" accent is widely referred to, but never clearly defined. Given the Corellians we've heard, it would seem to be an American accent; the amount of people speaking with an American accent outside Corellia could easily be chalked up to the prominence of Corellians in early spacefaring; I wouldn't be surprised if a great amount of the Rimmers out there are descended from Corellians. There's also frequent references to a Core accent, which seems to be generically British, with some Core Worlds having individual accents. A specifically Coruscanti accent is also mentioned; this may have spread to become the Core accent, or it may be a specific British accent. We also have cases of "lower-level" Coruscanti accents, which seem to be the Cockney to your more generic upper-class Coruscanti's RP. Amidala and Leia also show use of this accent in diplomatic situations while abandoning it in private, suggesting that it's a preferred accent for proper diplomatic relations. I'm not sure how much else we have on accents.

 

Corellian is (American) Southern.

 

I believe it mentions somewhere in Legacy of the Force that Luke developed a Coruscanti accent. I believe Ben also has one.

 

Do Chiss have something of a German accent (Thrawn not included)?

 

When I think Chiss, icy and clipped are key words.

I also find it humorous that we're comparing galactic accents to a single planet's accents.

 

I thought it just said that Ben spoke with a Coruscanti accent... I never saw anything about Luke.

 

Concord Dawn = New Zealand
Zaloriis = Australian

 

You may be thinking of Han --- Ben muses in Sacrifice that Han's developed quite the Coruscanti accent over the years. Hey, I added that to Han's Wookieepedia article back in June!

 

Han, Luke and Leia are probably all sporting very mid-Atlantic accents by LOTF. Lando probably isn't, since he's been living away from Coruscant.

But Jacen, Jaina and Ben are all likely very clipped in their intonation.

 

I think you're right. Wow. Han of all people.

 

Zaloriis being colonized by Fondorians, that would suggest the Fondorian accent is an Australian one as well.

 

Personally, I've always wondered about the Hapan accent. In my head, I've always imagined it as a heavy French sounding accent.

 

Ah, I know another: Toydaria = Italian

That's what I imagine when I read the books, but for some reason they're described as having a very gutteral language that's sometimes difficult for humans to pronounce (no offense to the Germans, but they don't have the smoothest language). Of course, Russian's like that, too.

So... Zsinj has an Australian accent?

 

Chiss have a redneck accent.

 

Yes. His uncle is actually Hssiss Dundee.

 

I thought Padme/the Handmaidens' accents were a neat touch in Episode I. Definetly a planetary accent, just not one that is readily placable to something in the real world.

 

Evidently Mandalorians have a Scottish accent, if the old Marvel comics are any indication (i.e. Fenn Shysa).

 

Shysa sounds more Cornish....

 

Well, Han's been living on Coruscant for... decades? Well, on and off, given that he always had to help save the galaxy. Actually, Han's probably spent more time on Coruscant than he has on Corellia. He grew up a slave on that ship, then after he got out, he worked as a pilot, then entered the Imperial Academy, got kicked out for being too decent and honorable, then became a smuggler and travelled the galaxy. Han's been to Corellia quite a few times, but I can't remember off-hand if he lived there.

After the movies, he spent lots of time with Leia, raised his kids on Coruscant, and the Solos' house has been on Coruscant for decades (at least before LotF, by that point they just live on the Falcon). Although Han's retained enough of an accent for his kids to pick up on it.

I think it was mentioned in the RotS novelization that Obi-wan had that high Coruscanti-cultured accent too, after he stopped pretending to be a Corucsant undercity dweller, to fool the clones.

Anyway, Corellia has far above the norm for inhabitable planets (being artifically arranged), and just Corellia by itself has a lot of different environments (cities like Coronet where Corran crew up, that gas station where Wedge grew up, and the farms where Baron Fel grew up). Any large developed planet (or city for that matter) will have a lot of accents and cultures. Although given how the Galactic Civil War went, there were a lot of Corellians just travelling around too (Corran, Mirax, etc.).

 

In a cut scene on the ROTS DVD, you can hear Senator Fang Zar's extreme down under accent. Can't remember what planet he was from though.

EDIT: I recall Sen. Gideon Danu from Kuat speaking during one of those scenes too, so there you go for a Kuati accent. Can't remember what he sounded like though, something American.

 

Or Irish, or any Gaelic-influenced accent for that matter. But that'd only count for Mandalore-born Mandos, and maybe those in Mandalore Sector, too. Concord Dawn is far away from Mandalore, they don't speak Scottish but New Zealand accent, altho that's been noted before.

The LotF audiobooks are probably nothing to go by, either... the narrator isn't bad, but his accent imitations don't really sound good enough. While as a German, I'm not so good at identifying English accents (apart from Scottish, German, French and Russian, perhaps ), Boba Fett is supposed to have a New Zealand accent there, but I've heard it doesn't really sound proper.

As for Chiss... I don't see the (sadly) all-too-often-seen mispronounced "th" ("ze Germans"^^) fit for Chiss, but an eastern European accent would definitely fit their remote and exotic nature. Maybe Russian or Ukrainian.

 

Fair enough, and thanks for the clarification. By "Mandalorians" I was thinking literally "people from Mandalore", rather than in the other sense of "Mandalorian warriors" which probably comes to mind first for most people ... and which, now that I think about it, is oddly simultaneously a narrower (because not all people from Mandalore are "Mandos") and broader (because not all Mandos are from Mandalore) definition.

 

I definately can see the Chiss as having an Eastern European/Slavik accent. Mostly because in NJO, I pictured Soontir and Jag that way too.