Flash, the old timey sounds that recall baseball from the '20s
were equal parts acting and technology.
Hey guys and dolls.
Trace here with the latest in vocal repartee.
One of my favorite things to do when I'm doing a fake accent
is an old timey newsreel announcer.
Just throw on a quick flash and then use normal sentences.
It sounds way better.
Flash, rebels take the planet of Endor.
So why did those guys talk like that?
Firstly, they didn't actually talk like that.
They announced like that.
And they acted like that.
Around the turn of the last century,
America was still proving itself as a nation.
At the time, parts of the Northeast
and mid-Atlantic regions had a certain affectation
in their accent.
It was like a blend of British and American,
but not entirely either.
It came from certain groups of the American aristocracy
and fell out of favor after World War II.
It was also taught as a manner of speech for Hollywood actors.
You might recognize the accent from someone like Cary Grant.
Well, I imagine you've had wide acquaintance amongst policemen.
I'll have to call one if you keep that up.
But when you electronically record the human voice,
things get even stranger.
It was recently discovered that French bookseller douard-Lon
Scott de Martinville was the first to record
the human voice.
In 1857, de Martinville patented the phonautograph,
a simple device that recorded the vibration of sound waves
onto soot-covered paper.
That invention eventually evolved
into Edison's phonograph, which could actually
play the sounds back.
But it sounded really tinny.
This had to do with the lack of technology
at the time for capturing bass.
And as recording and reproduction improved,
the sound got better, and reproduction, more
and more accurate.
Then we were presented with a new problem--
we hated the way our voices sound when
it was recorded, right?
What the hell is that?
In case, you're wondering, yes, that is what you sound like.
And a higher pitched version of yourself
is really what it is, with a lot more [ANNOYING SOUND] in there.
But when you speak, you can hear yourself.
So why does it sound different?
Your bones.
Sound vibrates everything around it, including our bones.
So when we speak our voice, goes out of our mouth,
through the air, and then into our ears.
But it also goes through our skull
and resonates into the backs of our ears,
making our voice sound deeper.
So why do we hate it so much?
Because mirrors lie.
They lie to you, and you lie to you.
We spend our hives looking in the mirror perfecting
how we think we look.
But that is not you.
That's a reverse image.
Your left side is you right.
Your right side is your left.
The whole world is upside down-- well, flipped anyway.
We spend our lives perfecting the sound of a voice
that only we hear.
So when we hear it as others do, it's
similar to the one we know and love.
But it's not quite right.
What is your favorite accent?
British?
Southern?
Jack Sparrow?
Throw your favorites, and why, in the comments
so we can talk all about it.
Thanks for tuning in to DNews everybody.
Find us on social media.
We are out there.
I'm Trace.
See you later.