Sunday 29 March 2020

Still posh

I've always found regional accents fascinating and rather charming, as long as they aren't so thick as to be indeciph-erable (Glaswegian for example). But there's a lot of prejudice against certain accents. My mum hated the cockney accent, which she saw as ugly and grating.

I love the Liverpudlian accent, also the Australian and Irish accents. Apart from anything else, they make a nice change from the posh English accent, which is still the one you hear most in movies and on TV.

People read all sorts of things into accents. Whether someone is trustworthy, whether they behave well or badly, whether they're acceptably British or not, whether they're employable or not.

And those prejudices change from one year to the next. Regional British accents used to be seen as off-putting and quaint, but now they're often sought after because many people find them warmer and friendlier than posh English, which can come across as cold and arrogant.

My own accent is still posh English, despite being in Northern Ireland for twenty years. It can be hard to shed a well-established accent even if everyone around you has a different one. People who speak English as a second language quite often still have the accent of their original language, however much they try to lose it.

I find it rather ridiculous when politicians try to boost their popularity by erasing their posh English delivery and putting on a more proletarian accent. Those folk with the genuine article must find such antics absurdly unconvincing.

Oo do they fink they're fooling, guv?

Pic: Cockney money slang. Godivas, fivers; monkeys, £500; ponies, £25; edges, 50p; carpets, £30.

44 comments:

  1. You must live in India. http://adaniel.tripod.com/Languages1.htm

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Ramana: Yes, I shudder to think how many regional accents and dialects (and local colloquialisms) there are in India!

      Delete
  2. Thank goodness that i can comment agin...for some reason I could not for some time.
    I'm told that I sound like Princess Anne in English, French friends told me that my French had a Scottish accent and now I'm told that my Spanish has a French accent...
    As long as I can understand people I don't mind what accent they have - what gets my goat is mumbling.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Fly: That's an interesting set of accents you possess! Mumbling drives me mad as well. We often have to activate the subtitles on TV because the actors are mumbling into their chin.

      Delete
  3. We have the same thing happen here in the US. Some people think that people from states like Ohio and West Virginia sound too hillbilly and must be less than smart. A lot of my family are from there and I spent a year there so I can see why some would think that. lol

    While others think that people with a Southern accent like from Georgia are nice, polite and welcoming. Not always true.

    I'm originally from California but I don't sound like a surfer. lol

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Mary: That's funny about Ohio and West Virginia. So what does a surfer sound like, lol.

      Delete
  4. Accents are fascinating! When my daughter went to college, one hour away, people could tell where she was from. It's funny that a particular city could have its own accent, but I guess we do. I didn't grow up here, but I can tell I do the same thing now, with certain words. So, sometimes people adapt.

    My mother grew up in a rural part of the state and even living elsewhere for 60 years, she still says certain words with an accent. I find that amazing (and annoying - LOL).

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Bijoux: The same applies here in NI. The locals can always tell which town you're from - Ballymena, Larne or wherever. They all have slightly different accents.

      I'm not surprised your mother still retains some of her original accent.

      Delete
  5. Unfortunately, I pick up accents easily. I sometimes wonder if people think I'm mocking them when I don't even realize what I've done. Sometimes I hear it myself, though, and wonder why my speech is so easily influenced.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Linda: I'm the same. I can do a very good Welsh, Liverpudlian or Aussie accent. As you say, slipping into it unintentionally can look a bit like mockery.

      Delete
  6. Glaswegian's no' really that difficult tae understand unless it's being spoken by yon Rab C. Nesbitt.

    (Sorry for any faults , I haven't lived there for the last 60 years)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. SmitoniusAndSonata: Och aye the noo, there's a moose loose aboot the hoos....

      Delete
    2. Errabus.
      Werrabus.
      Errabusoererr.

      Speak aloud to get the public transport 'announcement'.

      Delete
    3. Fly: That's a tricky one. Sounds like something Irish. Eire Bus? Bus Eireann?

      Delete
    4. Glaswegians - Weegies - at a bus stop.
      There's a bus
      Where's the bus?
      There's a bus over there...

      Delete
    5. Fly: Ah! I would never have guessed. That's seriously mangled English!

      Delete
  7. in moving so much in my childhood we children would easily pick up the slang of that particular state. for instance in Virginia it was "right nice." or "that's right far" … everything seemed to be preceded by the word right! in Texas and Oklahoma it was Y'ALL. "do ya'll want some popcorn?" "are ya'll going now?"
    and in Minnesota.. it was "we're going to town do youse wanna go with?" I haven't used any of that slang since. it's fascinating isn't it? just another way to separate us all I guess! I can't remember Colorado or NY! but I'm sure it had its own too.
    I truly don't know what my accent is now. a mixture of it all probably!
    I confess to loving posh English though.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tammy: Northern Ireland has its own vernacular as well. The standard greeting is "How ya doing?". If you agree with something it's "dead on". If you're feeling cold "It's Baltic".

      Delete
  8. I am from the MidWest area in US and we have very little accent. that allows us to absorb other accents quickly. Good or bad, we could sound like we are from Minnesota or Kentucky or Ireland.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Susan: As soon as I open my mouth, everyone knows I'm from either London or England. When I say I've lived in Belfast for 20 years, they're astonished.

      Delete
  9. I love accents, and I love subtitles even more. :D

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Jean: Aren't subtitles wonderful? Especially when they name the music playing in the background, which you probably couldn't identify otherwise.

      Delete
  10. Oh, I so love accents...always have.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Rose: Me too. I still don't understand why my mum loathed the cockney accent so much.

      Delete
  11. I'm a sucker for accents. I can follow them around for days.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Joanne: I loved being in Australia and hearing that distinctive Aussie accent everywhere I went.

      Delete
  12. I haven't lost my Irish as most tell me I have "dulcet tones" which pleases me a lot as many Corkonians are far from that, they sound like Cardiff Welsh people but with dropped ts at the end of the words. Some American accents grate on me. Some Cornish I can't understand for the life of me but I like the rhythm. Many accents on Newfoundland are like poetry with counterpoint from others listening. Hard to explain but beautiful.

    XO
    WWW

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. www: Yes, I struggle with some Cornish accents as well. I was expecting some strange accents in the Canadian Maritimes last year but I never noticed any.

      Delete
  13. I appreciate accents, too, though intelligibility does matter for me to fully value. Generally speaking Americans seem to love accented English spoken by Frenchmen. The posh English accent is highly regarded as a touch of class by many here, too, I think.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Joared: Posh English also has its own vernacular of course. "Jolly super, old girl", "The place is full of frightful oiks", "What's your poison, old chap?"

      Delete
  14. Only Nigel Farage sounds like that.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. SandS: I think Farage does his best to sound like the man in the street. Not that anyone's fooled for a second.

      Delete
  15. I can speak "educated Australian" but I can also lapse into complete strine so much so that an American I worked with would sometimes remark that he was surprised we actually spoke the same language.
    I may have told that story before, if so forgive me

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Kylie: Throw a tinnie on the barbie, Sheila! And I imagine strine also has numerous regional variations and vernaculars.

      Delete
    2. The Australian accent is pretty homogeneous, I would never be able to pick which region somebody came from by accent. There are some parts of vocabulary that are regional

      Delete
    3. Kylie: That's unusual. But certainly Jenny and I have never noticed any regional accents, and Jenny has been all over - Perth, Adelaide, Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane.

      Delete
  16. If I wrote like I spoke I probably wouldn't understand myself.
    Sx

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Ms Scarlet: Dunno whatchar onnabart. I betchar talk kosher like.

      Delete
  17. I love the British accent. I'm guessing it's the one you're calling posh, but I'm not sure. I think the southern accent here goes in and out of favor. Sometimes people seem to view you as an uneducated/racist hick, and sometimes it's considered charming. I've noticed a lot of tour guides in southern cities try to fake a southern accent. I guess the tourists from other regions can't tell it's fake, but I'm from South Carolina, and a fake southern accent is like nails on a chalkboard for me.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Danielle: Yes, posh English does tend to be seen as "the" British accent, even though it's just one of many. That's funny how you can tell instantly if someone's faking a southern accent - and it's a horrible sound!

      Delete
  18. I like regional accents, and agree with you about the Liverpudlian, Australian and Irish, and I love the Geordie accent.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Polly: I like the Welsh accent too. It has a sort of soft, soothing quality.

      Delete
  19. I love the Irish accent and lots of regional ones. I don't like the welsh accent though! Which is unfortunate.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Liz: As you've lived in south Wales for some time, it's indeed unfortunate that you don't like the accent! Has George picked up a Welsh bark yet? :-)

      Delete