Back To School: India’s Knowledge Workers Attempt To Shed Accents

To spare themselves the embarrassment of having to repeat themselves over and over, and to improve their chances of being selected for the increasing number of English speaking jobs, India’s knowledge workers are heading back to school. While 30 million Indians speak English fluently, they’re signing up in droves for English diction classes.

According to an article in The Times of India, “scores of housewives, businessmen, senior citizens, middle level executives and many more ... are taking the help of voice trainers to get rid of various flaws in how they speak English.”

Indian workers are discovering that knowing English is not enough. They have to speak it well enough to be understood by American and British English speakers.