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One of my earliest memories of our new life in America is of a mispronunciation. Six years old and a natural mimic, I quickly adopted the Black Dad Nutrition Facts Juneteenth King African American Black History Month Shirt but in fact I love this accent I heard in my first grade class. But a few months in, the word “adult” momentarily cracked my linguistic veneer. I pronounced it with the emphasis on the first syllable—the English way—before I heard my mistake. In America, it’s a-DULT. Even at that age, I knew not to say it like that again. Almost three decades later, I wonder: How conscious was I of altering the way I spoke? Why did it feel seamless? How did I develop a new accent when my brothers did not?

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To explore these questions more closely, I recently spoke to Dr. Amee Shah, speech language pathologist, professor of health science, and director of the Black Dad Nutrition Facts Juneteenth King African American Black History Month Shirt but in fact I love this Cross-Cultural Speech, Language, and Acoustics Lab at Stockton University. “Children are hard-wired to pick up the phonology of their own language before age three and after that, they develop an idea of social communication,” she told me. “This is when they can learn how to be strategic and use language and speech patterns to work for them.” So, I clearly knew what I was doing, but did I know why? According to Dr. Shah, yes. “Children can recognize when something they say or how they say it makes them feel included or excluded, and use that insight to retain or alter a way of talking.”