BS: Regional UK Accents

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 05:46 PM

I'm a bit biased because she hails from Poplar in east London, where I lived for several years in the 70s (in Robin Hood Gardens) and taught there in a secondary school from 1973-80. I think it's great that a girl from that background (I use the word girl, as opposed to person, advisedly) can come good in the way she's done, and the last thing I'd want for her is for the flabby and outmoded Lord Digbys of this world to be imposing his idea of the Queen's English on her. Go, Alex!

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 05:16 PM

Well I'm not privy as to the reasons Alex was employed as a pundit/presenter. As far as I can see, she's qualified in multifarious ways: she's attractive, she's articulate, she's a sportswoman of considerable achievement (recognised by the state, in fact), she speaks with considerable clarity, she's upbeat and cheery, and, generally, she appears to know what she's talking about. Of course, all that is just my opinion. Your opinion is that she's a bloody crap pundit, etc., then you berate the BBC for employing her, then, the icing on the cake, you try to prevent the rest of us from commenting in the thread you've raised all this in. I find that just a bit weird.

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Manitas_at_home
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 04:43 PM

I remember, as a child, holidaying in Brightlingsea in north Essex. I was sent to buy newspapers and was amazed at the strength of the local accents. It was so strong that when I asked for a Sunday Mirror it turned out the local pronunciation was Sunday Pictorial!
Some thirty years ago I was surprised to find Essex accents in a small pocket near
Corbets Tey just inside the M25. I bet they've been swamped now.

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Raedwulf
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 04:20 PM

Elsewhere, folks, elsewhere. I commented only because a number of comments had already been made. Accents and presenters / pundits are totally different subjects. This wouldn't be a meander (which is very much the Mudcat way! ;-) ) but a hijack. Let's not, please. :)

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Allan Conn
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 04:07 PM

Surely she is just as qualified as Gary Lineker, Sue Barker etc etc. It is a long standing thing that retired sports people go on to be pundits and sometimes presenters.

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 03:58 PM

I think she's a breath of fresh air. As is Jermaine.

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Raedwulf
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 03:30 PM

It's the meejuh, alas, Sen, as you say. It's something I've commented on (not here) ere now. Language morphs, diction morphs; under the influence of mass media, I'm afraid it all drifts towards a bland commonality.

Have you ever Kipled, madame? ;-) He often wrote not merely in the vernacular, but attempted to represent speech as it sounded. In his earlier days, there were The Soldiers Three (Mulvaney - Ortheris - Learoyd; Oirish - Corknee - Yaaarkshure). Towards the end of his career, there was Zussex in a lot of his stories. But that same zlow, zoft tone was also in the idealised schoolboy tales of the much earlier Stalky & Co.

That slow, soft accent is (or was) the southern country accent. All the way from the uttermost West to the uttermost East! I doubt you can find an authentic Ezzex accent now; it's all been overtaken / overlaid by "Estuary" Hinglish. But I have heard it in recordings. It used to be the tone of the whole of southern England. Not just Devon, Dorset, Norfolk & Suffolk; Zussex, Ezzex, Kent & Etc too.

I'd like to say it's been displaced; alas, it hasn't moved, it's disappeared. Mmmmm… where is it? Ahhh… the biggest influence on language is mass media & has been for 40-odd years now. Practically every house now has at least one TV. For many years, we all watched the same small handful of channels, so we all watched the same programmes. The never-watched (Soap operas? ARRRGH!!) Eastenders has been running for 35 years now. Has geezer become more widely used as a result (it must feature from time to time, if it's claiming to be set in the East End)? I imagine so.

I've seen quite a few laments about the dumbing down of English over the years. Let's go back to guising – if you're not familiar with the term, the simplest way of explaining it is to tell you it's adults trick-or-treating. How many words & phrases have we imported from US English because of the number of imported American programmes on our TV screens? We never imported their radio shows (and whilst there's Hollywood, the language of films always tended to be more formal in the days before mass TV). And the mass media effect is no doubt even more exaggerated now by the internet & social media.

The irony is that whilst the BBC long ago abandoned Received Pronunciation, and you hear every accent going on TV these days, we are actually losing the variety of both dialect & accent. Wot's an Essex accent, guv? Because that's what you probably think of, but that isn't the native county accent, which you quite possibly will no longer find at all. The native accent right across the south used to be the sort of soft burr we now associate with 'Zummerzet'. But read any of Kipling's Sussex-set short stories, and you'll hear the authentic Zussex accent as it used to be just a century ago.

They've been displaced partly by the diaspora of better off Londoners having moved out to nicer areas, but also by the homogenising effect of TV. Dialect seemingly is being replaced by slang – the 'secret' language of your sub-culture, rather than the local language of where you live. And that phenomenon is being replicated globally too – why bother teaching your kids your native tongue, when there's only 5,000 speakers? Your national language, spoken by 5 million, and English, spoken globally, are far more useful...

I think that pretty much covers my thoughts on the matter. The only other thing to add is that I've no interest in what some random idiot thinks of Alex Scott's voice, but she's a bloody crap pundit, and she only gets employed (along with Carney, "Ebbers", etc) because the BBC are openly agendaist, and nakedly, blatantly, flagrantly sexist. They do NOT employ male pundits on female team sports; they do not employ male pundits who do not meet their unspoken, unwritten, but extremely obvious 'requirements'. They do employ women who don't meet those requirements, which inescapably leads to the conclusion that the unqualified female pundits are employed solely because they are female... Which is sexist. And if you want to discuss that, I'm happy to explain my thoughts further, but not here, please. Open another thread, don't hijack this one (Sorry, Sen, but the last comments were...).

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: fat B****rd
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 02:43 PM

I was naive enough to think that people like Digby were almost obsolete. Who's a cock eyed optimist then!? :-(

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Black belt caterpillar wrestler
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 02:42 PM

The way she talks reminds me of the way Martin Jarvis reads the dialogue spoken by William when he tells the "Just William" stories on Radio 4.

Robin

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 02:17 PM

Ol’ Diggers hasn’t criticised Not-So-Priti Patel for droppin her Gs in exactly the same way as Alex Scott, has he? Funny, that.

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Rain Dog
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 01:31 PM

Huntin', shootin' and fishin'.

He should look closer to home for those missing gs.

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Bill D
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 01:29 PM

About Yorkshire tea... and tea in general.

I was given some nice Yorkshire tea when I hosted several Brits in Maryland a few years ago. It was fine, but I almost never use teabags. I have preferred different types of loose tea with specific origins for over 60 years.
That being said, I can barely comprehend how people can tell one tea bag from another if they put milk in it. Perhaps there are subtle differences that require taste buds more 'highly trained' than mine. ;>).
Even then, I see that Yorkshire teas come in a variety of types ... including 'some' loose. I suppose certain ones are more common in areas where the hardness of the water is relevant. How they process and source tea to complement the water in not clear.
   Note..I have had Twinings a lot, and Fortnum & Mason, but not recently. I have also tried Typhoo... quite a while ago. These days it is very difficult here to find loose tea in shops, except for one chain which treats it as a snobby hobby.
I finally found a combo market and restaurant owned by Persians, but which carries many Middle Eastern items... and boxed & tinned loose tea. I must be very careful, as probably half their teas feature Oil of Bergamot.. as in Earl Grey. I don't dislike it, but it's not always clear on the label and when I thought I was buying simple Ceylon, it's frustrating.

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 11:25 AM

It should become a silent G. Like the silent P in wranglers

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 08:11 AM

Runnin, swimmin, boxin, etc., are what millions of us say (includin me). I absolutely don't mind the knowledgeable and articulate Alex pronouncin her words that way. Objectin to that puts us on the slippery slope towards prescription. Just sayin.

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Rusty Dobro
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 07:56 AM

When I first heard about Lord Digby’s attack on the very capable and knowledgeable Alex Scott, I thought it had to be an unfair judgement, probably based on class or geographical prejudice. However, when I actually heard her in action, I lasted about ten seconds before screaming at the TV: ‘ It’s not runnin, boxin, swimmin, rowin!!!!!’

Yes, it was perfectly easy to understand what she meant, but truly distracting coming from a professional BBC commentator.

But then….

‘It is impossible for an Englishman to open his mouth without making some other Englishman hate or despise him.’ (GBS)

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: The Sandman
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 06:31 AM

accents change, the old Essex rural accent that i remember from the 1950s 1960S has gone like the corncrake, its there but rarely heard

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 06:13 AM

Maybe we should have a go back at Lord Digby for setting a bad example by presenting himself in public as an overweight, rather slobby-looking chap.

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Allan Conn
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 06:04 AM

For me the Digby Jones v Alex Scott thing is bizarre. She speaks perfectly clearly and is easily understood. The idea that he can dictate who does and who doesn't speak "properly" is just so wrong. So she doesn't pronounce the "g" in "ng" but there are various accents like that. We all speak differently. Some English folks nowadays really emphasise the middle "g" in words like singing. We Scots of course often pronounce the letter "r" whereas English folk often don't. We are all different and life is all the more interesting for that.

Digby still having a go at her on GB News and really privileged ex-public school and House of Lords types bullying ordinary young women over how they speak is never going to sit that well with most folk. Especially when she is easy to understand.

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Senoufou
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 05:31 AM

When I first arrived in Norfolk (decades ago!) I rented a tiny flat in Norwich, near to the school where I took up a teaching post. My Norwich pupils spoke in a particular Norwich accent, and I later learned that it is quite different to the rural Norfolk one. More nasal, with more glottal stops.
When I did voluntary Prison Visiting in many English prisons, 'my' prisoners were from all over the place. One was a Scouser and his accent was very entertaining. He sang me little Liverpool songs and made jokes in his lovely accent. The Visits could last up to two hours in a large Visits Room, and that gave me plenty of time to study the collection of speech patterns and dialects from both the inmates and their wives/girlfriends.

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Jos
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 05:08 AM

When I asked someone with a North American accent in a pub whether she was from Canada she was delighted, as people usually assumed she was from the United States.

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 03:50 AM

@JennieG - we go to both sides (we’re UK-ers), Ontario to visit my wife’s brother and his family, and AB/BC because we love it there and can’t get enough of it! Every trip, be it East or West, someone (usually several someones) asks us where we’re from and remarks on our ‘cute accent’ (which, as we’re from an area more or less between Lincolnshire, Nottinghamshire, and Yorkshire, is a kind of mish-mash of those three, and is far from standard ‘BBC’ English). It feels really, really strange to be told we have a ‘cute accent’ because, to our own ears, we don’t have an accent at all, it’s the nice Canadians complimenting us who have the accent!

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 06:39 PM

That will live with me forever, Dave! :-) :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 06:27 PM

Nah, Steve, the phrase is "How fuckin' much?!?!?!"

Hear all
See all
Say Nowt
Eat all
Sup all
Pay nowt
and if tha' does owt for nowt, do it fer thisen!

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: JennieG
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 06:12 PM

Likewise, Eliza......"oh, we just lurve your accent" say the Ontarians. We don't think we have an accent. The rest of the world does, but we don't.

We think it's because more Europeans visit the east side of Canada, and most Ozzies visit the west side, so the folk in Ontario aren't as used to hearing it. One man with a strong Irish/Canadian accent actually thanked us for coming to Toronto, he said "we don't get many Ozzies!"

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Jos
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 04:40 PM

I've heard some odd pronunciations lately. I suspect that people are learning new words by reading instead of hearing them, so they guess at how to pronounce them.
A recent example was 'hyperbole', which was pronounced as 'hyper-bowl', like some superlative kind of Superbowl.

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 04:18 PM

It jars when I hear anything said by Priti Patel.

Dave, the commonest remark made by any Yorkshireman is "Does it cost owt? "

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Helen
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 03:14 PM

One of the pronunciations in Oz which surprises me a bit is a particular way of saying "o" as in "home" but - it's hard to describe - it's sort of nasal, but drawn out, and almost like "ho-ome" but with an exaggerated emphasis on the first "o" sound. More like "hoe-em". The nasal sound is in the first syllable. This might not help but the first "o" sound reminds me of a vacuum cleaner when the nozzle sticks to something and there is a deep humming sound.

It surprises me when some of the (Oz) ABC-TV news people say it. It seems to be mostly young women, and possibly from Melbourne. The next time I hear it I'll take note of the presenter's name and see if I can find a video of her.

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Black belt caterpillar wrestler
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 02:53 PM

I see that Alex Scott, the Olympics presenter is being castigated for dropping her "g"s, as is Priti Patel, of course.

I suppose the thing is that it does not sound like it is a proper part of the accent.

I know that it jars when I hear it from Priti Patel as the rest of her speech sounds close to RP.

Robin

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 02:39 PM

Blame Kipling:
"Five and twenty ponies, trotting through the dark . . ."

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 02:11 PM

As a Manc I always check my wallet when I hear a scouse accent...

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Senoufou
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 11:00 AM

Ha ha Raggytash! I expect there are adjacent towns/villages in Eire where the accent changes. My mother, born in Cork, had a lovely brogue, which stood out among our slightly Cockney-ish neighbours.
I well remember as a child seeing dreadful signs in the windows of houses with a room to let :- 'No Irish No Dogs No Blacks'
Maybe certain accents conjure up detrimental ideas about people's origins and cultures. But that in itself is interesting and sociologically worth studying.
(Well, I DID study Sociology (and Anthropology and Psychology) at University, among other subjects, for my Masters degree and Postgraduate Teaching Qualification)

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Raggytash
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 10:07 AM

Southern Irish Senoufou? Which Southern Irish are you referring to.

The Cork accent is vastly different from the Kerry accent and the Kerry accent is vastly different from the Wexford accent. Needless to say the Wexford accent is vastly differnt to the Galway accent



..................... you get the picture :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Senoufou
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 09:51 AM

I get cross when some people declare that a certain accent isn't 'nice'. There are apparently a few that aren't popular. For instance Brummie (Birmingham area), Essex, Estuary English (innit?) Northern Irish and so on. Southern Irish is 'good', as is Somerset, Highlands and R bloomin' P. I can't see why there should be this 'hierarchy'.
We should celebrate and be proud of our plethora of accents and dialects. I love diversity. We aren't clones are we?

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Black belt caterpillar wrestler
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 09:20 AM

Five and twenty was used when I was small, but it was used in those situations where the speaker was giving a considered opinion rather than a quick reply; as though savouring the sound of the spoken word.

Robin

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 08:49 AM

Sorry to hear that, mate. Have you tried dictating your posts? Daft things do get thrown up via that method, it's true, but we'd let you off!

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Jos
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 08:46 AM

"Twenty-seven blackbirds" would have scanned. Maybe the other three flew away though, or the price for twenty-seven birds was more than sixpence.

To go back to accents, I used to think the pronunciation of "ask" as "arks" was a West Indian feature, but then I saw a Punch cartoon from the nineteenth century in which a Cockney character used it.

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: banjoman
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 07:55 AM

I left Liverpool almost 50 years ago and am proud of my scouse accent. People I meet almost all know at once that I am from Liverpool.
Its good to see that most here support the upkeep of regional accents.
I have not been posting much lately as the arthritis is really bad now. Took over 10 minutes to write this. but enjoy all the threads

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 07:47 AM

I couldn't even scan one blackbird. It kept flying off.

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 07:07 AM

"Twenty-four blackbirds" don't scan, Jos!

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Raggytash
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 05:32 AM

One of my Grandmothers would always say it's five and twenty past the hour. It amused me as a child.

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 05:21 AM

My parents used to say ‘five and twenty’, meaning twenty-five (Lincolnshire). I think I used to use the expression in my youth but, as it fell out of favour generally, I guess I just ‘dropped’ it.

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Jos
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 05:16 AM

I grew up quite used to people saying 'five and twenty past' or five and twenty to' when telling the time. It is so normal for me that I have no idea when I last heard it. It could have been yesterday - I wouldn't even notice.
And there is 'Sing a song of sixpence', of course: 'Four-and-twenty blackbirds ...'.

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 05:00 AM

Could well be, BWM. Mrs G seemed to think that the derogatory term was the right root and, in the context of the posted phrase, it seems right but there is no reason to doubt the root you give either. Funny old thing, language!

One thing just sprang to mind about the Bill Bryson book I mentioned earlier. There are bands across the UK that use "one and twenty" as opposed to the more common "twenty one". Anyone here use that?

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Jos
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 04:42 AM

"'Southern' tap water is pretty dire - very hard"

Not all of it is hard. I asked the D.J. Miles tea company (in Porlock and Minehead) whether they meant hard or soft water when they said their tea was blended to suit West Country water, and it turned out they meant water in their bit of the West Country, which is soft. But not far away in north-east Somerset the water is extremely hard. There was a rumour that this meant more than the usual number of people living to a hundred in Weston-super-Mare.
When I first lived where I am now we had lovely water sourced from underground aquifers. Some time probably in the 1980s the water suddenly changed and was no longer a pleasure to drink. So many houses had been built that the aquifers could no longer cope, and we started getting chemically treated water from the rivers. It was a nasty shock.

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 03:49 AM

“Surrey" (Sorry) in this context is derogatory. Probably short for sorry state. My grandad used it but I never really found out the etymology.”

Dave, I worked for a number of years over the border in Nottinghamshire, and ‘Surrey’ was a frequently-used expression by the locals. Several of them told me, and I had no reason to doubt them, that it’s a corruption of ‘sirree’, used to intensify a word or phrase, e.g. “Oh yes sirree!”.

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Senoufou
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 03:25 AM

Jennie, I visited my Irish aunt and uncle in Ontario in the sixties and was amused when the 'natives' kept asking me to 'say something!'. I still had my rather Cockney accent, which they couldn't get enough of.
I agree that 'Southern' tap water is pretty dire - very hard. Glasgow water was soft and delicious.
Neighbour didn't really want the Yorkshire teabags - "Oi dornt reck'n oi loik that there Yooorkshire tay. Thass gart a waird tairst hint it?"

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Jos
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 03:24 AM

My elderly Bristol relatives didn't wash their hands, they 'swilled' them.

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Senoufou
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 03:17 AM

Norfolk was invaded and settled by Anglo-Saxons, who apparently had the 'th' sound in their language. There are many place names here with Thorpe in them, a Saxon word meaning 'settlement'. I used to take pupils to Thetford Forest occasionally, and they made me smile by pronouncing it 'Thet-thord Thorest' rather lispily. They used to insert that 'th' sound into many words.
There is a town here called Themelthorpe! The residents must sound as if they've forgotten to put their false teeth in.

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 03:16 AM

I don't mind Yorkshire tea at all but I do now live in Yorkshire! Some years back though one of the discount stores, possibly Home Bargains, did a Lancashire Tea which was far better and half the price. Talking of Lancashire I believe the following passage, written phonetically, was used in training ticket staff at British Rail

"A mon an a dog tut bongs an bi bludy andy, surrey"

Or

Please may I have a single adult ticket and a ticket for my dog to Tyldsley and would you please hurry as the train is due.

"Surrey" (Sorry) in this context is derogatory. Probably short for sorry state. My grandad used it but I never really found out the etymology. My grandma, who was a bit posher, often used to tell him to speak English:-)

Subject: RE: BS: Regional UK Accents
From: Helen
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 01:09 AM

Jennie, I missed the John Clarke program. He was a classic. An honorary Aussie! I remember on one of his shows he was wearing a green and gold track suit with Straya printed on the back.

I'm fairly sure that I ordered the book of The Story of English for the library branch I worked in, and bought a copy for myself as well after seeing the show on SBS-TV (I think, or was it ABC?).