What if your voice didn’t sound like your own?

About 60 people have Foreign Accent Syndrome, which has given their voice the semblance of a foreign accent. What causes it, and how has it affected their lives?

Linguist Daniel Midgley speaks with Dr Karen Croot on this episode of Talk the Talk.


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130: Foreign Accent Syndrome (featuring Karen Croot)

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I’ve always been curious about Foreign Accent Syndrome, so when a recent Australian case came up, I jumped at the chance to talk to Dr Karen Croot of the University of Sydney, who has studied this in depth. And that’s the current episode.

After taping, I started running across more and more cases, including a woman who had migraines so bad that she sounded Chinese. And I still don’t know what to make of George Michael’s episode. But if you want to find out more, check it out.


Show notes

Look — a Warlpiri dictionary.
http://ausil.org/Dictionary/Warlpiri/index-english/index.htm

Leanne Rowe has Foreign Accent Syndrome.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-06-16/tasmanian-woman-wakes-after-car-crash-speaks-with-a-french-accen/4757146

So does Tiffany Roberts Noell.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2RujUiV08jY

There’s quite a bit on it in the literature.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18714807
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8811940

Dr Croot’s webpage
http://www.psych.usyd.edu.au/staff/karenc/