How do I make her feel better?

Be nice to her, and ask her what she likes to do and what kind of music or TX shows she likes. Don’t bring up anything to do with where she is from or how she speaks, because that way she won;t be self conscious or homesick. But try to be her friend.

Invite her to whatever you are doing, and ask what she’s doing this summer. If she can hang out with you and maybe your friends, she’ll fit in when school starts in the fall.

Be her friend and tell her to enjoy her genuine voice right now. Tell your other peers to watch Blake Shelton on The Voice.
Down-home accents are the new “cool” and within 6 months everybody will be imitating her, not in a mocking way.

Correction: didn’t make her move.

Explain to her that a Southern Accent to men is as sexy as a European accent is to women.

Smile, talk with her, get to know her, invite her to talk with your friends. If the accent or other Southernisms come up, let her know you think that she’s just fine the way she is.

Introduce yourself and be friendly. Invite her to do something, lunch, day at the pool, whatever kids do now. Don’t bring up the whole north and south thing, but if she does, listen with interest the differences she has observed. She might share with you things she misses, and they might be very interesting to you. New and different. She feels like an outsider, and that is never very much fun. She also might come from a place that stereotypes northerners as rude and unfriendly. I hate to think her new classmates are living up to that.

@Blueroses, if she is very young, in 6 months she will have lost most of the accent.

Just be her friend and invite her to events so that others can get to know her. There is really nothing wrong with any of the “southern” stuff you described – the kids are just giving her a bad time about it because it’s easy. If you are different you can either turn that into your advantage (what makes you special), try to change yourself so that you are more like others or you can become bitter and angry about the situation.

I had a friend from Puerto Rico who ended up living in a very white area of the Midwest where people like conformity. She could have tried to make herself more like everyone else, but instead she always stayed true to herself and when she was doing something she knew was “different” she would poke fun at herself for being Puerto Rican and say things like “I can’t help it, I’m Puerto Rican!” People loved her! She was giving people permission to acknowledge that she was different, but was also guiding them towards the conclusion that not only was it ok, but it was what made her special.

@Gabby101 Interestingly, when I lived in the south that was one thing I used to comment that southerners never did, they never poked fun at themselves. Not about being southern, and they were not in touch with their family’s national background at all. Except, I had one friend who was Russian, and only had been in the country 7 years when I first met her. She would make fun about being Russian. I myself growing up in the northeast, we all joked like that. We Jewish girls joked when we were acting JAPpy, and the Italians talked with their hands, and the Irish drank, whatever the stereotype, they were brought up in a non-serious, we all laughed, way. The absence of that in the south was extremely strange to me. It felt like they were worried about being caught stereotyping, but a friend of mine from Oklahoma said in her part of the country it isn’t done, because no one even thinks about where their family came from. That when she moved to NYC and people would ask, “what are you?” Or, “what nationality are you?” Or, anything similar, she had no idea what they were talking about at first, she had never been asked before.

Anyway, in the south my experience isn’t that they laugh at themselves for their southern ways, rather they think they are right. They have senses of humor for many many things, but not that thing. I hope this girl and her family are the exception to the rule. Maybe when a southerner is out of their environment they are more likely to be the way you described.

@RockerChick14 Is she saying things like “Yes ma’am” to the teachers? It’s not just accent, it’s also word choice. Those things she will probably figure out and stop doing and it will help. Hopefully, her parents clued her in or will help her with those differences. I know southerners who are taught if ma’am doesn’t come at the end of a sentence when answering an adult it is reason to be disciplined.

I was in the reverse situation when my family moved to the south in the middle of 4th grade. I’m very shy and hated going to school. They eventually got tired of their own jokes and it stopped being a big deal.

@JLeslie I live in the south and we laugh at ourselves as much as anyone else. However it is mostly with each other because we ‘get it.’ Many people take a lot of pride in being a southerner and I believe that is because we are and have been heavily ridiculed by the ‘north’. There is a common stereotype that someone with a southern accent is stupid.

@RockerChick14 She should bring them some sweet tea. That will shut them up about that… it’s good stuff!

She is respectful but she only says things like yes ma’am or yes sir to her parents and family. Some of them probably don’t know what sweet tea is.

@Supacase Overall I agree with what you said. But, this girl is now not among her own so to speak. I am not assuming anything about her personally though, it is all generalizations. I don’t see a bit of problem with taking pride in being southern or whatever identifier someone relates to. When someone is in a different environment I tend to be a when in Rome do as the Romans do person. Not that anyone should completely lose themselves or their pride in where they are from, but they need to be open and even I dare say conform a little. Would you agree with that? North to south or south to north, the direction doesn’t matter. A lot of people above are saying the girl should stay southern and everyone will be fine with it, but I think people who adjust best keep what is important to them about where they came from, and also let go of some things that in the end aren’t that important in the end, and even find new things in the neppw culture that maybe are wonderful or better. Especially young people. Schoolage is pretty tough.

It is in an ironic manner funny to see that there are the same mechanism against ‘foreign’ people like centuries ago… although the US think it is a homogene Nation. We in the EU are struggling with the same problems with the north complaining to the south… Shit. We are all human beings. And so: Be her friend. Invite her. Accept her roots. Could be so easy.

@Imadethisupwithnoforethought: I am from Düsseldorf, DE and I speak english with a straaange german accent… by the way and: ;-)

@ml3269 hI. How are you doin?