#communitytakeover

"Is there such a thing as an Elvish accent?"

CreativeRogues says:

Well, is there such a thing as a human accent?

Elvish accents work kinda like human accents, in that it depends on the region in which they live and taught pronunciations. High Elves may pronounce a word one way, and Wood Elves pronounce it another. Distinctions like this give them differing accents.

maybeinvisibleoceans says:

If I can speak french without having a accent (because I was taught it...duh!), then a human, dwarf etc. can speak elvish without an accent.

vampirestookourscience says:

“If we're to assume elves were a product of their environment and not magically created, what reasons would there be for them to have their distinctive ears? In what ways would they be beneficial for natural selection?”

CreativeRogues says:

First of all, natural selection doesn't work like that. Natural Selection isn't as much "survival of the fittest" as "survival of the meh, good enough".

The most notable things big ears could help with are better hearing, or a for helping the body lose heat.

These are purely physical advantages, though. 

Ears can also be used for portraying emotion or moods, which is beneficial for social creatures.

Their purpose can also be as simple as being an biological ornament for attracting a mate of the opposite gender.

ProbablyBadBlogs says:

Also, the genetic markers that cause pointy ears could have been selected due to a completely unrelated effect, and pointy ears were an after-effect.

For example, maybe quicker muscle movement also causes pointy ears...

Myluckywords says:

I like the answer and I'd like to add that Elves live in fairly tempered if not warm climate. Allen's rule says that e.g. ears grow smaller in cold climate to avoid heat loss and bigger in hot climate to promote heat loss.

maybeinvisibleoceans says:

Once upon a time, some prehistoric elf found slightly pointy ears attractive and it just carried on from there.

vampirestookourscience says:

Bekamercury says:

Magic can do anything you want it to :P