The British accent

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workinforwood

workinforwood

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I thought this was interesting, heard it listening to the BBC. The British accent is only 200 yrs old. When we watch civil war movies and here the British talking with the accent, it is not true. Some of the very high up nobels spoke with the accent, but it was really just to distiguish themselves as better than everyone else..basically be Hoitee toits. They would over pronounce words and such, or pronounce them a bit different, to be different. The commoners would make fun of it and over not too much time, they had so much fun joking on the nobels and kings that it became habit, and people forgot how to actually speak english!

This is just an interesting humorous thing I heard on the Radio. I'm not a history major and am not making fun of the Brits. Just wanted to share something interesting and have some fun. We love ya Steve and all the rest!
 
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I'd be surprised if that was accurate - there's a very pronounced difference in British Cockney and Queen's English...and regional dialects abound...

I don't think that the British were speaking 'American English', and then changed their language...I think all accents are a product of isolation from other speakers...hence, Texas accents and Newfoundland accents are very different, yet both originally derive from the same English colonists...

I don't know the truth of this - just theorizing...
 
Civil War was 1865ish (obviously lasted for a few years). That's only 144 years ago. So that seems right.

But interesting non-the-less.
 
I have a very strong Glasgow accent, I have to speak slower and not use as much Scottish slang when talking to English friends, or they do not understand me.

A haye a very stong Glesga mooth, ah hiv tae slow doon ma mooth fur the English tae unerstaun me, ken!
 
maxwell_smart007 said:
I'd be surprised if that was accurate - there's a very pronounced difference in British Cockney and Queen's English...and regional dialects abound...

I don't think that the British were speaking 'American English', and then changed their language...I think all accents are a product of isolation from other speakers...hence, Texas accents and Newfoundland accents are very different, yet both originally derive from the same English colonists...

I don't know the truth of this - just theorizing...
Click to expand...

Similar to how Scottish and Irish accents are dirived from the Gaelic languages that were once spoken by the Gaels.
 
I'm not aware of a lot of british accent used in the civil war movies, them Yanks talk funny. Now if you watch movies about the revolutionary war, that's another story.
 
Accents in the UK can and do change incredibly from city to city and even from town to town.
Of course, I've got a very posh educated accent:cool::biggrin: but a few miles away you get the Liverpudlian Scouse accent. Google Scouse and Gordie accents and see if you can understand them.
I don't think there are many 'true' Cockneys any more. Any fool from within a hundred miles of London claims to be one. Idiots!!!:biggrin:

I think the most pleasant accent is the Scots from the highlands, not the cities. :biggrin:
 
eh? come again there Ligget?
the US has regional accents. some so rich that they also are almost non understandable buy the rest of the country.
The only people that speak real pure English are Californians. But we had to leave something for them to get right.
I have what I would call a hill billy accent.(mid west)
New Yorkers have an accent that is so faint it is not worth the trouble to actually use.
Tennessee has probably the best accent in the US in my Opinion. but Australians rule the world. Funny thing is, having a waiter with an English accent is like having a small gold mine. If you are a caterer. been there done that.

of course it needs to be the right English accent. Sorry Ligget but you aren't it.
we want visions of Mary Poppins with her urchins in tow, not the farmer pitching hay to his cattle.
 
I think that the most neutral accent is the Canadian accent (West of Quebec)...mind you, I speak it, so maybe it just sounds neutral to me! :)

Many announcers in the states, however, have Canadian 'accents', likely chosen for their neutrality...Alex Trebek, Peter Jennings come to mind off the top of my head...
 
I want to know if anyone who speaks with an accent, can hear it? In my case I cannot. I couldn't hear it when others spoke with it until I had lived outside that part of the country for several years. others would say something about it but I had no idea what they where talking about until one time I called back home and was talking to my brother. during the entire conversation I kept saying to myself. We sound like hill billies. I wanted a cool accent.
I like the Canadian accent also, you all get all the emphasis' in the wrong places.
Watch Ice Road Truckers. there is a young kid driving on that show that has a beautiful Canadian accent. There is an older guy also but he has gotten lazy. the kid still puts his heart and soul into it.
 
He may be Irish but he is speakin Canadian. you all ruined him! Ah why am I trying to convince you. you are Canadian you can't hear it anyway. ;)
 
I have a very neutral accent. Not that I say that, but when I tell people where I'm from, they say "I'd have never guessed that, the accent isn't there" Comes with training in 3 languages and not being home very often anymore. When I do go home to visit, my accent does come back out to an extent.

When I switch to French or Russian, and I'm with a group of native speakers, my accent conforms to theirs in a matter of minutes. Hey, its what I was paid to do in the Navy.
 
Mike, where I come from they call that multiple personalities and try to cure you of it. lol
I will take on a southern accent in a heart beat.
 
Ligget said:
I have a very strong Glasgow accent, I have to speak slower and not use as much Scottish slang when talking to English friends, or they do not understand me.

A haye a very stong Glesga mooth, ah hiv tae slow doon ma mooth fur the English tae unerstaun me, ken!
Click to expand...

Thanks for the translation, Mark. :laugh:
 
maxwell_smart007 said:
I think that the most neutral accent is the Canadian accent (West of Quebec)...mind you, I speak it, so maybe it just sounds neutral to me! :)

Many announcers in the states, however, have Canadian 'accents', likely chosen for their neutrality...Alex Trebek, Peter Jennings come to mind off the top of my head...
Click to expand...


Alex Trebek and Petter Jennings are Canadian. They did not chose the accent, the accent choose them (so to speak). :biggrin:

I agree. The Canadian accent is the most neutral of all English speaking accents. Except for some of the local slangs, it blends nicely almost anywhere.
 
workinforwood said:
I thought this was interesting, heard it listening to the BBC. The British accent is only 200 yrs old. When we watch civil war movies and here the British talking with the accent, it is not true. Some of the very high up nobels spoke with the accent, but it was really just to distiguish themselves as better than everyone else..basically be Hoitee toits. They would over pronounce words and such, or pronounce them a bit different, to be different. The commoners would make fun of it and over not too much time, they had so much fun joking on the nobels and kings that it became habit, and people forgot how to actually speak english!

This is just an interesting humorous thing I heard on the Radio. I'm not a history major and am not making fun of the Brits. Just wanted to share something interesting and have some fun. We love ya Steve and all the rest!
Click to expand...

Wheaties said:
Civil War was 1865ish (obviously lasted for a few years). That's only 144 years ago. So that seems right.

But interesting non-the-less.
Click to expand...


Since the United States were originally British colonies, the war that we know as the Revolutionary War, could also be called England's Civil War.

It was a BBC broadcast.
 
I thought that might be the case, but since workingforwood is from the US I assumed that's what he was talking about. Now that I re-read it, I get it. Thanks for straightening me out!
 
THarvey said:
Alex Trebek and Petter Jennings are Canadian. They did not chose the accent, the accent choose them (so to speak). :biggrin:

I agree. The Canadian accent is the most neutral of all English speaking accents. Except for some of the local slangs, it blends nicely almost anywhere.
Click to expand...

(I meant that they were chosen to be announcers because of their accents!) :)
 
My father in law was a true Cockney (born within the sound of Bow Bells), and my brother in law is such a Brummy that I can't understand a word he says. My wife, however, who moved around the UK quite a bit and has since lived in the US for 30 years, has just a little bit left. As for me, a native Fillelfiun, the phrase "meetcha at da Iggle" sounds perfectly comprehensible.
Doug (missing scrapple)
 
Well you folks just need to come over here and deal with some of those that speak their own language ... a made up one at best.

Things like, "Let me axe yo mama a question ...", or, "Come on in da do and set yo selves down in dat dare chare ...", or, "Look out he gawin to pop a cap in yo as_", or, "Man, I gots to git me one of dem ...", etc.

I often would ask for a written statement from them just so I would have a record of the interview as no one would believe me when I tried to tell them what the 'perk' was saying, or trying to say.

And to hear them repeat themselves in court was a true blast!

Dang, I miss law enforcement in the US.
 
It is nice to know that I speak with no accent. My mother came from Long Island and never had an accent until she was mad and then it was like listening to another person who put the emphasis on their G's and dropped other letters like they didn't.
Th only thing I have ever been told about my speech came from the Long Island relatives who informed me I spoke sooooo slow and I said my R's. Guess it will have to do.
 
Actually, I am Canadian. I immigrated to the USA, legally of course. I am told often that I speak my o's different, and some find it to be humorous. I'm not any type of language expert, I'm just a trucker that has a lot of time to listen to the radio. They were speaking to a so called language expert and I thought it was interesting. Of course, accents are going to differ everywhere you go. It can be an urban situation or a secluded situation. She was just saying that most accents are born out of laziness. The British one began as a joke on the upper class. It made sense to me. If you think about it, if in one city they are joking about some upper class city enough that it just catches on..then some visitors pick up on it and take it back to their town, and it catches on, but it will catch on differently, just like if you say something to the kid next to you in school, what you said is not the same when it hits the last kid at the end of the room. I love the British accent..and the women that speak it :wink:
 
workinforwood said:
Actually, I am Canadian. I immigrated to the USA, illegally of course. . ............................ I love the British accent..and the women that speak it :wink:
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Leave our women alone!!!!!! :mad:Mind you, on second thoughts there are plenty you are welcome to:eek::biggrin:

Hey guys, here's your chance to get rid of the intruder, but I thought all the border jumpers came from the south:biggrin:
 
Ligget said:
I have a very strong Glasgow accent, I have to speak slower and not use as much Scottish slang when talking to English friends, or they do not understand me.

A haye a very stong Glesga mooth, ah hiv tae slow doon ma mooth fur the English tae unerstaun me, ken!
Click to expand...


Mark, I had a Scottish friend when I was living in Hokkaido about 10 or so years back. Whenever we would go out drinkin and after a few bevvies I had to tell him to speak Japanese as I couldn't understand a damn word he was saying. Ironic, considering we were both English teachers...haha..
 
It was hard for me to understand the different accents of Japanese when I was in Osaka but once I moved to Nagoya, I could tell an Osaka dialect (actually accent) quickly.

Being from the Southern US, (MS but on the outskirts of Memphis, TN) of course I had a strong accent. Gradually, with the speaking of Japanese and mixing in the international community a good bit, I started to loose some of my accent. Now, my USA family all say that I sound like a Yankee, but my Yankee and CA friends say I still have the strong southern accent. Depends on the perspective. :wink:

Something that I have noticed though, there is a distinct Aussie sound as compared to British. If I listen for a couple of minutes, NZ becomes fairly easy distinguish from Aussie.

The STRONGEST US accent that I heard was a lady from Boston. She lived in our neighborhood in Tokyo. I could have sworn that she was from Ireland the first time I heard her.
 
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Accents

The subject of accents, dialects and idiomatic expressions is fascinating.

The UK has always had a huge range of accents, whether any of the various regions could be considered to have distinct dialects is a moot point.
I was lucky enough to grow up in Australia in a small town where there were several families or people from the UK - mostly Yorkshire and Scotland with the odd Irish person thrown in. As kids we went to the local picture theatre nearly every week and were subjected to more UK accents as well as American accents.

I still mix with a great many people from different parts of the UK and love to hear the various brogues. The lilt of th e Welsh, the Glaswegians, the people of Devonshire and Cornwall, The various Yorkshire accents and the people of the Midlands. It was great to be on a cruise ship last year and hear all of these accents every day!

What is striking is that much of how people from the UK pronounce their words can be picked up in American accents. In someways the various American accents are a repository of UK accents, and yet they, the American accents, do not sound British.

The Americans tend to have a more active tongue when speaking whereas Australians tend to be more relaxed with the tongue position and hence our accent is easy to drop, or influence, but very much harder for a non Australian to acquire.

A truly remarkable feature of the Australian Accent is its uniformity across the continent. It is only idiomatic usages and some local expressions that would enable you to tell where a person may come from. This is truly astounding when you consider that each state began as a separate and distinct colony isolated by great distance from from its neighbouring colony. My memories of the NZ accent from childhood into teenage years is that it was pretty well indistinguishable from the Australian accent. Over the years this has changed and Kiwis now have a quite distinctive accent.

The Canadian accent seems to be pretty uniform as well and somewhat softer than the general American accent. And yes, the Canadian "O" is different to the American "O". Love to hear Canadians say "house". It has a wonderful ring to it.

In America the differing accents have flourished despite the proximity of states to each other and a massively mobile population.

'Tis indeed an interesting subject to contemplate.
 
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You ought to come up here and hear the "Downeast" accent of some Mainers. Lobstahs and hosses and deah. We drive cahs and live on fahms. Eyuh.

I've met a few people from Newfoundland (Newfies we call them) and they sound like they're asking a question with every sentence? I don't know why they do that? Even when they're stating a fact?
 
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Daniel said:
eh? come again there Ligget?
the US has regional accents. some so rich that they also are almost non understandable buy the rest of the country.
The only people that speak real pure English are Californians. But we had to leave something for them to get right.
I have what I would call a hill billy accent.(mid west)
New Yorkers have an accent that is so faint it is not worth the trouble to actually use.
Tennessee has probably the best accent in the US in my Opinion. but Australians rule the world. Funny thing is, having a waiter with an English accent is like having a small gold mine. If you are a caterer. been there done that.

of course it needs to be the right English accent. Sorry Ligget but you aren't it.
we want visions of Mary Poppins with her urchins in tow, not the farmer pitching hay to his cattle.
Click to expand...

Daniel, the Tennessee accent really depends on which part of Tennessee, around Nashville and over around Knoxville and the areas that have better education systems, have a completely different drawl than we do in west Tennessee, I believe most regional accents are derived from being around the populace of a given area, as new blood comes in, the particular accent slips away. this can really be noticed now in Texas parti8cularly around Dallas, the difference between 1990 to the last time I was there their pronunciation of the letter I had noticeably gotten more pronounced in same with hard A sounds. Round these here parts we speak Redneck. Ain't no other way ta discribe it it aint the soft slow southern drawl it is in the more populated areas of the state, it's more the way the piggy brothers sounded in Deliverance, and that aint a purdy sound ta no budy ceptin thays mamaws
 
I reely aint to keen on difernt acsents. To me, if yall dont speak Texan your all foriners.

Mark, I had fun tryin to get the accent just like you spelled it. Made me think of "My fair Lady". Loved that show.
 
artme said:
The Canadian accent seems to be pretty uniform as well and somewhat softer than the general American accent. And yes, the Canadian "O" is different to the American "O". Love to hear Canadians say "house". It has a wonderful ring to it.
Click to expand...

You've got me wondering what's neat about how we say 'house'...sounds normal when I say it! :)
 
I have a younger sister who when she was a teen would pick up accents as she lived in various parts of the country. My mother was married to a guy who worked for a company that had government contracts to do upgrades on airforce planes.. problem was when she picked up an accent, it usually was added on top of the previous accent... She moved from Texas to Oklahoma to Boston to Georgia... I don't know what language she actually spoke. :biggrin: Fortunately, she moved back to Oklahoma, married and stayed there for a few years until the strange accents wore off, then moved back to Texas and learned to speak correctly.:biggrin::biggrin:

She's of an age now where moving to New Mexico won't have much effect.:tongue:
 
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