This is Lisa Alamia. She's a Texas woman who went into jaw surgery to correct an overbite, and while she got her new smile, she got something she didn't plan for...A British accent! When Alamia underwent lower-jaw surgery back in December and returned home with a British accent, her three children thought she was kidding. She told ABC News, "I was very shocked! I didn't know how to take it. I was very confused. I said 'Y'all' all the time before I got this accent. Once I got it, I started noticing I'd say, 'You all.'"
Alamia was diagnosed with foreign accent syndrome, an extremely rare speech disorder that alters a person's speech so that he or she seems to speak with a foreign accent. Doctors estimate that the speech disorder has affected fewer than 100 people in 100 years worldwide. The condition is most often caused by a brain injury, but Alamia's neurologist said everything came back normal after a full range of tests.
Alamia said, "I've never been outside of the country, except for a mission trip to Mexico. That's not where my accent came from." There is no known cure for the condition. Although, the accent can diminish over time, it can be permanent. Alamia, who feared people wouldn't believe her, is planning to start speech therapy and says she has come to realize the accent doesn't define her.
Am I the only one dying here? How can this happen? I will say, however, that my mother-in-law has broken out into a British or an Australian accent out of nowhere, but could never understand why. My wife's cousin's husband broke out into an amazing Indian accent this weekend and sometimes breaks out into this horrific New England accent. I have to say that if either of these two ever got stuck with these accents permanently, I may have to move far away from them.
No comments:
Post a Comment