The Importance of Accent in American Politics
Over Labor Day weekend, Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris gave speeches in the two key swing states of Michigan and Pennsylvania. What she said in each was similar, but how she said it stirred controversy. The Californian Mrs. Harris sounded like her normal self in Pittsburgh, but in heavily-black Detroit, she seemed to put on a pretty different accent.
Politicians using any tool at their disposal to connect with crowds is nothing new, especially in a large, diverse country like the United States. She is not the first to tread the fine line between charisma and inauthenticity. Former president George W. Bush is the Yale-educated scion of an blue-blood New England family, but when he suddenly developed a Texas accent in public life, people were more or less willing to accept it as embracing the state where he grew up. Likewise, some people found it disingenuous when his Hawaii-bred, double-Ivy League successor Barack Obama occasionally used African-American slang (e.g., “we straight” when declining change from a cashier). But he did it judiciously and ended up scoring points for authenticity, rather than becoming a joke.
But a play for relatability can easily backfire if it crosses into pandering. On the other side of the campaign, many of Donald Trump’s supporters are in the South, but the dyed-in-the-wool New Yorker would never mimic them. When First Lady Jill Biden attempted to speak Spanish last year (“si say pwadway!”), she was widely mocked. Mrs. Harris is, of course, black, and her surrogates dismissed criticism as the product overactive Republican imaginations. But she should be careful, like Mr. Obama, to stay on the right side of the line.
Accent politics can be especially important for those who seek to represent a particular state, rather than the entire country. The trend is particularly prominent among Southerners and some black politicians, both of which groups often sound quite different on local TV ads than they do in Washington.
Texas Senator Ted Cruz had a decorated, well-documented career as a university debater and then as solicitor general, and always spoke impeccable standard American English. When he decided to run for office, things suddenly changed, only to switch back again for his speeches on the floor. Likewise, Raphael Warnock, his Democratic colleague from Georgia, affects quite a different style in the Senate than he did (and still does) as a Baptist preacher.
Part of why Americans generally do not have a problem with this is because, to a lot of them, code-switching is itself relatable. It is particularly important for the Spanish-speaking community, whose younger generations typically speak perfect American English, but can switch back and forth on a dime to the language they speak with older family members. For Florida Senator Marco Rubio, and politicians of all levels from Florida and border states, this is an important element for engaging with constituents. But, even more so than with accent, this can be dangerous territory, as Mrs. Biden and Mr. Cruz’s vanquished rival Robert Francis (alias Beto) O’Rourke can attest. (If you want an encapsulation of how bizarre modern US politics has gotten, look no further than the the 2018 Texas senate race, which pitted a white Democrat pretending to be Latino, against a Cuban Republican pretending not to be.)
Code-switching also occurs at the level of accent. I come from Boston, but generally you would not know it from my speech, except sometimes at Boston sports games. My Alabamian girlfriend, despite coming from a completely different part of the country, usually speaks exactly the same way I do, but can likewise switch over and sound quite otherwise.
In other countries, accent and language play a much bigger role in politics. In the UK, it is often the defining marker of one’s socioeconomic identity. It is a thorny issue, as any Oxbridge-educated Labour MP who strives to portray himself as upper-working class can attest. Being bilingual is basically a requirement for would-be Canadian prime ministers, while Belgium has, on multiple occasions, been plunged into national crises because local officials tried to speak French in areas reserved for Dutch. India’s opposition Congress party improved its vote share this year, which was attributed in part to its posh nepo baby leader finally actually speaking Hindi (i.e., not just English).
So, for all the awkwardness and prejudice to which regional accents can give rise, Americans are lucky that their country is basically linguistically united. Going forward, it will probably become ever more so. Across the country, it is less and less common for young people to speak with anything other than the standard accent.
This is the culmination of a decades-long shift catalysed by radio, then television, then the internet, which has also homogenised language in most other parts of the world. However, regional accents still do have a strong hold on the American imagination, even if fewer people actually use them. Actors like Matt Damon and Mark Wahlberg, who grew up in Boston, have a monopoly on movies set in that city because they can do an accent that most Hollywood celebrities struggle with. Meanwhile, younger country music artists give interviews in standard American English about songs they sing in a traditional Southern accent. Saturday Night Live’s early ’90s classic on “Da Bears,” starring corpulent Chicago superfans, remains widely-known in a city where fewer and fewer people still speak like them.
Ultimately, language is as much about connecting with people as it is about rote communication. And when it comes to politics, where there is pandering to be done, we will see it. As much as political experts wish they were not, regional accents will probably remain a significant tool, or stumbling block, long after this election.
