BS: American speech

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: meself
Date: 18 Sep 26 - 12:46 PM

It's terrible the way certain pronunciations can drive you up the wall. One such American pronunciation - that is creeping into Canada, I fear - is that of the long "u" or "ue" as "oo", when they occur in the middle or end of a word, as in "avenoo" for "avenue" (i.e., "avenyou").

At the same time, there are certain words that I myself pronounce in that fashion: "dew", for instance, I grew up pronouncing "doo" rather than "dyew" - and it doesn't bother me in the least when I hear it coming out of my mouth ... ! Go figger. I mean, figyour.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 18 Sep 26 - 02:33 PM

The one that boils my urine is ‘toon’ (tune).

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Lighter
Date: 18 Sep 26 - 04:30 PM

How about when people say "toon" when they clearly mean "song"?

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Rain Dog
Date: 18 Sep 26 - 04:36 PM

It would be a dull world if we all thought the same about everything.

It would also be a dull world if everyone spoke properly like me.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 18 Sep 26 - 04:41 PM

”How about when people say "toon" when they clearly mean "song"?”

Or, just as bad, ‘song’ when they clearly mean ‘tune’ (toon)!

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Lighter
Date: 18 Sep 26 - 05:48 PM

Ouch! I've known some of those people too. Maybe even more of them.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Manitas_at_home
Date: 18 Sep 26 - 06:28 PM

Even worse, track.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 19 Sep 26 - 10:13 AM

At this point the thread is making even less sense than when it started. Tune/toon? Track? Avenue? Is there more than one way to say those words, or are you suggesting they have different meanings in this part of North America?

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Lighter
Date: 19 Sep 26 - 11:47 AM

I've never heard a song or tune called a "track" unless it was on an album.

The noted colloquial differences are probably in use here and there across the English-speaking world. You just have to know the right people.

I say "toon." Always have, always will.

I say both "avenoo" and "avenue," usually the latter. Somebody tell me why.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Helen
Date: 19 Sep 26 - 01:24 PM

Many years ago I used to watch the "reality" TV (i.e. socially engineered situations which supposedly make "good television") singing competitions like The Voice, and Australia's Got Talent etc. I always thought it was annoying when one of the contestants sang an American song with an American pronunciation of certain words. They would sing Aussie songs in their usual everyday accents and the same for any UK songs, so it was only the American songs with the American pronunciation. Funny, weird, and eventually I gave up watching the shows for various reasons.

So as an example, if they sang the song At Last they would pronounce "lasst" and not "larst" etc.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 19 Sep 26 - 03:00 PM

Errrrrmm…in my part of the Lincolnshire Backwoods, we pronounce ‘last’, ‘bath’, ‘path’ etc. with the flat ‘a’, not ‘Larrst’, ‘Barrth’, or ‘Parrth’. Standard pronunciation here. ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Helen
Date: 19 Sep 26 - 05:49 PM

Yes but, BWM do you say a$$hole or ar$ehole? That is the million dollar question. LOL

I watch Pointless, the UK TV quiz show hosted by the excellent Alexander Armstrong. I notice that he says jog'raphy (with a big stress on "jog" and he always says that on a higher note) instead of what we say here gee-og'raphy. I'm wondering whether it is a UK social class thing - and THAT always reminds me of when I, a lowly working class young woman, was posted to a snooty high school. I'll never forget the deputy head mistress looking down her nose at me whenever she spoke to me. They made the mistake of thinking that because I had studied Latin I must be part of their upper crust social level. Wrong!! ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Lighter
Date: 19 Sep 26 - 06:06 PM

I bet you say jee-aw'-gruh-fy while I say jee-ah'-gruh-fy.

(That's the best I can do it with the English alphabet.)

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 19 Sep 26 - 06:07 PM

Tune vs Toon: I believe the latter came originally from Norfolk. Bernard Matthews, who hailed from there, became (in)famous for describing his turkeys as "bootiful" in TV adverts.

Standing by to be told that I've mentioned that before hereabouts.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Helen
Date: 19 Sep 26 - 06:26 PM

No Lighter, I've always said and heard jee-o'-gruh-fy - with the "o" sound as in "jot". I don't remember hearing an Aussie say it any other way.

Oh no, I've started another detour on this thread: jog'raphy, gee-og'raphy, jee-aw'-gruh-fy, jee-ah'-gruh-fy, jee-o'-gruh-fy.

I say potay'to, and you say potar'to, I say tomay'to and you say tomar'to.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Lighter
Date: 19 Sep 26 - 07:42 PM

That's exaactly what I mean by both "aw" and my criticism of the English alphabet.

The "o" in your "jot" is much closer to "aw" than the "ah" in my "jot."

Compare "aught" with "cot." Clearly different words based on sound alone.

But decades ago, when I was teaching, many of my university students (I won't say Most) could not distinguish between my spoken "cot" and "caught." They just couldn't hear the difference.

Which relates to a very obvious (to me) and I think fairly recent shift in the U.S., where I now constantly hear "cawt" for "caht" and "caht" for "cawt."

My impression is that most of those speakers are under 60. In other words, young whippersnappers born after about 1965.

I have no idea where or how this shift originated, but my mere impression is that it's very widespread.

Of course, things were far worse during the simplistically named Great Vowel Shift.

Try thus video to hear what happens when people talk to each other long enough: https://www.youtube.clom/watch?v=842OX2_vCic

The turning point for me is around 1400: Chaucer's day.

I find this equally informative but less fun: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RuXi6fn68SQ

Simon Roper has done several more excellent, quick YouTube overviews.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Lighter
Date: 19 Sep 26 - 07:50 PM

PS: I've never heard anybody say "bootiful" in the U.S., but that doesn't mean someone isn't doing it. (I have heard "beautyfull," many times.)

I grew up saying "tuh-mah'-toe" (until I was ridiculed out of it in a distant part of the Union) but have never heard any person seriously say "puh-tah'-toe."

My wife grew up less than 15 miles from where I did. I say "milk." She very clearly says "melk." I say "Halloween"; she says "Holloween."

As I've said before, "Go figure"! (Or "figger," depending.)

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Lighter
Date: 19 Sep 26 - 07:54 PM

Should add that, in the video, almost every word suddenly became intelligible around 1600.

Before 1400, absolutely nothing was recognizable.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Helen
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 12:11 AM

Lighter, I think the "puh-tah'-toe" pronunciation in the song was just a joke. I've heard "tomah'to" in Oz, but only ever heard "tomay'to" on some US TV shows.

I hear both pronunciations of either and neither here. In fact my own descriptive term for a non-specific transgender person is "ee'ther/eye'ther, nee'ther/neye'ther" but I have not been brave enough to say it to a person who fits that description.

I'll watch the videos you have recommended.

I'm beginning to suspect that we might have to revert to referring to the proper phonetic symbols in English to describe pronunciations in this discussion. My problem is that I find them a bit overwhelming.

I have never heard "cot" and "caught" pronounced in a similar way here.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Helen
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 12:43 AM

Links to the videos Lighter recommended:

From Old English to Modern American English in One Monologue in One Monologue

The Evolution of English Conversation from Old English to Modern English

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 02:09 AM

Here it’s Arsehole. Jog’raphy. Pot-ay-to. Tom-ah-to.

But is it day-ta or dah-ta in Oz, or even the US-ian ‘dada’? ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Helen
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 02:26 AM

I've mostly heard "dah'ta" here but I watch ABC (Oz) News etc and they use the pronunciations which have been deemed acceptable (by some unnamed bods, somewhere behind the scenes).

So - is it con'truh-ver'sy or contro'versy?

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Lighter
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 09:02 AM

I think dada is vastly less common than dayda.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 10:48 AM

day-ta. po-tay-to. to-may-to. Cot and caught are identical.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 11:15 AM

Cot = ‘cot’.
Caught = ‘cort’.

How do US-ians pronounce ‘aught’? Is it ‘ort’ or ‘ot’?

Back in the heady days of my youth, Controversy was pronounced with the stress on the second syllable - con-trov-er-sy. But influenced, I believe, by good ole Auntie BBC, it has generally become the third syllable that’s stressed, so con-tro-ver-sy.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: meself
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 12:51 PM

In Canada: CON-troversy, although you do hear the British con-TROV-ersy once in a long while - but never contro-VER-sy.

Both 'data' (as in dad) and 'dayta'. I believe most Canadians preserve the 't' pronunciation, although slipping toward the 'd' sound.

Used to be always 'con-TRI-bute', now I hear 'CON-tri-bute' all the time. Similarly, 'ad-VER-tiz-ment' (for 'advertisement') has become 'ad-ver-TIZE-ment'.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Lighter
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 01:08 PM

"Caught" has traditionally been "cawt" (as the "au" might suggest).

"Cot" for me has the "a"-sound in "hard."
Few notice and fewer really care about gradual changes. No generalization about pronunciations can safely be applied nationally.

With an estimated >`350,000,000 native speakers of English worldwide, and tremendous international travel and mass media, there is plenty of variation. Not everyone hears or reproduces precisely the same sounds, and with time everything changes (as in the revealing YouTube videos that Helen has kindly made even easier to watch).

I've mentioned that many of my students could not hear the difference between "cot" and "caught" even when I pronounced them carefully.

Because, in that far distant region of the Union, they themselves did not distinguish them. (We're starting to get technical now, so I'll just say it's a matter of phonemes, allophones, language acquisition, etc.)

There is (or was in the last century) greater variation within the U.K. than within the U.S., despite numbers and square mileage. At least so it seemed. But how could anyone know for sure?


"Controversy" has always been (in my lifetime and experience) "con' troversy."

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Helen
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 02:01 PM

Lighter said, "There is (or was in the last century) greater variation within the U.K. than within the U.S., despite numbers and square mileage. At least so it seemed. But how could anyone know for sure?"

When I watch the UK quiz shows Pointless and Tipping Point the contestants introduce themselves and state where they are from, and sometimes also whether they started life somewhere else. That means that I am starting to be able to hear the differences in accents and pronunciation from different areas of the UK. Also the norm used to be for actors and TV presenters in the UK to mostly speak "the Queen's English" (at that time it was "Queen's") even if the character in a show or the presenter came from an area with a specific accent or pronunciation.

One of the reasons I started using the subtitles/captions on TV was because dialects from various UK regions became more common in the TV dramas, comedies etc and being an Aussie I had trouble identifying some of their words and pronunciation. IMHO it was a good thing to bring the dialects in, but I needed help to understand some of them. I remember in the long running TV series called Shetland there was a character with a strong Shetland accent and it was almost a foreign language to my ears until I realised what the words were and the difference was mostly pronunciation with some local dialect words scattered throughout.

The pronunciation here in Oz of "cot" and "caught" has always been clearly differentiated. I've never heard "cot" with the "a"-sound in "hard" over here. Is the pronunciation of the vowel sound in "caught" longer than in "cot" in your area, Lighter?

The link I provided on 20 Sep 26 at 12:11 AM for the phonetic symbols page was a bit confusing. There might be simpler sites to navigate. There were a couple of lists further down the page of variations of pronunciations of vowel sounds including a section on longer vowel sounds and dipthong vowels, each with a few examples of words.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: meself
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 03:24 PM

In Canada, 'cot' and 'caught' have the same pronunciation. And, yes, I feel safe putting it categorically.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Lighter
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 03:37 PM

Yes, Helen, I would say so. I suspect the vowels in my "cot" and "caught" are slightly "longer" (i.e., lasts longer) than yours.

Americans often find British English [etc.] accents to sound somewhat "clipped." I suspect that slight differences in vowel duration are the main reason. (Also "sing-songy" and "finicky," with too few "R's." In some cases "snobbish" is added.)

British [etc.] speakers often describe the average American accent as "flat," "nasal," "poorly articulated," "rather drawling."

And certain accents on both sides take quite a while to become fully comprehensible! Even to fellow nationals!

Of course, all of this is slowly changing in strange ways even as we write.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Lighter
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 04:02 PM

But, meself, are they both "caht" or are they both "cawt"?

Those students of mine used "cawt" for both.

A Californian lady of my acquaintance uses "caht" for both.

She also says "cahl" for "cawl" (call).

("Father" and "bother" rhyme perfectly for me.

But "dog" and "hog" don't. At all.)

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 04:10 PM

OK, can somebody please enlighten me why a fringe is called ‘bangs’ in the US? Drives me nuts!

I’m so glad I’m English and I talk proper like! ;-) :-)

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Helen
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 04:25 PM

BWM, don't you mean "talk all proper like"? LOL

We haven't even started discussing Aussie accents. I have noticed that most UK and US people are dreadful at mimicking our accents. A lot of them just get away with saying "g'day mate" unless they say "Good da-a-ay, ma-a-a-te" with a sort of upward then downward sliding pitch. Even our higher/richer social class here in Oz don't have a really posh accent. They just enunciate a bit more clearly and usually avoid the obvious Aussie words and phrases.

The important thing to remember is that Aussies are great, mate at laughing at ourselves so we sometimes "bung on" the accent just for a laugh.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: meself
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 04:29 PM

I'm not sure what the difference is between 'caht' and 'cawt', tbh. But caught, cot, not, knot, hot, fought, trot, lot, sought, taut, rot, wrought, as examples, all rhyme (couldn't think of any words that end in 'awt'). Words such as gnaw, yawl, shawl, awl - all(!) share that same vowel sound.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 04:36 PM

H - one of my colleagues in my last job before I retired was an Aussie from Sydney, and he had a very sing-song-ey way of speaking, with a rise in pitch at the end of every sentence, so every sentence sounded like a question! Weird at first but, over time, we got used to it.

You’re right about Aussies laughing at themselves - every one I’ve met (and that’s a fair number) has been equally good at giving it out, and taking it back. Good guys!

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Lighter
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 04:54 PM

Maureen O'Hara always spoke in American movies with an impeccably refined northern-style American accent.

I saw her interviewed many years after she'd retired from films. Her actual Irish accent was not just perceptible, it was amazing.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 05:01 PM

Don’t you think the Irish accent is audibly present in certain American accents? Often seems that way to me.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Helen
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 05:46 PM

BWM, I don't hear that rise in pitch at the end of every sentence very often here, so when I do hear it it is very noticeable. And, for me, it is very annoying. I don't know how that speech pattern evolved, or whether it relates to a specific area of Oz, or whether it goes back to TV actors or presenters, or even social media influencers.

There are some very funny comedians here who play on certain Aussie speech patterns. Magda Szubanski is my absolute fave - in everything she does - and then there is the Kath and Kim TV series with Jane Turner and Gina Riley, and Magda plays a regular character in the series. Many of the comedians who have been around for decades had their start in two extremely clever and funny skit shows called Fast Forward, and Full Frontal. They were similar in style to Goodness Gracious Me, which I suspect might have been inspired by the Aussie skit shows.

Magda Szubanksi "I said Pet, I said Love, I said Pet. Who needs a kidney anyway?"

Hubby and I still quote that line nearly 40 years after seeing the show.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: JennieG
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 06:22 PM

Going back a few posts....my Posh Melbourne Grandfather used to say "Con-tro-versy" with the emphasis on "tro".

He was born and grew up in England, migrating with his mother and siblings in his 20s during the early years of the 20th century. I don't know if he brought the pronunciation out to Oz with him, or acquired it after getting off the boat here.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Lighter
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 06:39 PM

Probably the most "Irish-y" sounding feature in North America is the distinct pronunciation of "r" after vowels at the ends of words though it isn't universal.

It was certainly a feature of Irish English in the 17th and 18th centuries. But it was also a feature of English English - and still is in the southwest of England.

"R-dropping" only became the norm in England in the mid-to-late 1700s.

Massachusetts and the rest of New England had been settled largely by people from areas that had "dropped their r's" before that.

What is called the "Upper South" of the U.S., which includes the Appalachian mountains, was mostly settled by people from Ulster - who kept all of those "r's."

More Irish came, mainly from outside of Ulster, during and after the Famine. The estimate is over a million between 1845 and 1855, when the U.S. population was just under 20 million. By the time of the Civil War in 1861, about one American in 20 had been born in Ireland.

So the characteristic American "r" has two origins: early English settlement and later Irish immigration. (Scots came with r's too, but mostly to Canada.)

Dutch and many German settlers also had the postvocalic "r."

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Lighter
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 06:53 PM

The press began noting that rise in pitch around 1994, and somebody gave it the name "uptalk."

It had supposedly just been invented by "Valley Girls" in California.

But I was hearing it from female students (I'd say only), far from California, ten or fifteen years earlier. It was already the norm (for young women) and hard to miss if you weren't used to it. It's spread since then.

One more unsolved mystery.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Helen
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 08:27 PM

Yes, it is a mystery and I mostly recall young adult or teenage females doing it but I have heard a few males as well. It makes it sound like every sentence ends in a question.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Gibb Sahib
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 09:27 PM

Merger of the vowels in "cot" and "caught" (i.e. pronouncing both words with the same vowel) is one of the (I dare say) *famous* ways to distinguish Eastern vs. Western US dialects. Well, "famous" for people who think at all about accents. Maybe a rough analogy would be coming from England and knowing Cornwall accents are rhotic? ie fairly common knowledge.

The folksy American way of describing the situation is "East/West of the Mississippi," corresponding to the idea that the variety of accents West of the Mississippi River have minimal variations, as the region (like much of Canada) was settled sparsely and late by English speakers.

West of the Mississippi is not the *only* region where these vowels are merged. But elsewhere the vowel which is the same is a different vowel. My mother grew up in part of New England where they are also merged, but that's a sort of footnote to the general rule.

The (dumb, in my opinion) meme of US English as "Simplified English" has some understandability here if one thinks that a reduction in the number of vowels makes things "simpler." Western US accents' cot/caught vowel is close enough to Spanish vowel A. Now, Spanish has very few vowels and that makes it easy to learn to pronounce, but I've never heard anyone *deride* Spanish for being simple... My wife, who speaks English as a second language and with whom I live in California, wishes I would just cut the nonsense of these extra vowels and follow the simpler scheme. (This is not to say, however, that Californians don't do other things with vowels that are distinct, but I think that overall it's an easier dialect to learn, in the way that Spanish is "easy.")

In any case, what I meant to say is that this East-West divide is so consistent that any attempt to ascertain an American's region of origin typically *begins* with narrowing down East or West, no-merger or merger. And when people from the East go to the West, locals can sense "oh boy, here comes one of those Back East people" through this pronunciation. They don't necessarily know the explanation, but they know intuitively.

In my own home region of souther New England, I've observed that, beyond the basic distinction between cot-caught (etc), the further south one goes--or, the closer to the sea coast--the more the vowels sound like they are distinguished. Roughly speaking. That takes you closer to Long Island, NY. The distinctive vowel in "caught" is very noticeable in the regions adjacent to Long Island Sound (which is a body of water, if you're not familiar with the geography). I grew up within the reaches of that phenomenon, so, living in California, where the vowels have reduced, even though much of the rest of my accent is unremarkable, this feature really stands out and marks me as a foreigner. I have tried to reduce the difference in everyday life to blend in, but when I sing I pronounce all words "correctly" (ie according to the native blueprint in my head).

Sociologically, Western US (and Canadian) speakers sound "bland" and even somewhat "weak" to me. This is illogical, not at all fair, and inappropriately prejudicial but it is, nevertheless. The non-merger maps to a sort of "having cultural richness" and "toughness"—again, completely wrong from a logical standpoint, but prejudices against accents are nothing new. The Western speakers probably have their own prejudices against "me"—weird, unhip, old, whatever.

As Western/general California accents have become common in fast-form media (eg reality TV), compared to the former dominance of "New York" (read: Eastern) accents in film/TV, the possible effect is that someone like me feels saturated by a soundscape lacking richness and "soul." For the final time: This is not logical, but it is one perception that can have a cultural effect. (Despite it all, I love California and its people... just if aliens were attacking the earth and I had to build an army to fight them, I might choose more soldiers from the Eastern parts of the country.)

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Gibb Sahib
Date: 20 Sep 26 - 09:29 PM

Well, Australian speech characteristically has "up-talk," so there's that.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 21 Sep 26 - 02:38 AM

Helen, my niece is, to all intents and purposes, an Aussie, having emigrated there with her mum - my sister - and dad when she was two or three. Around 50 now, and having lived in Perth and Bunbury WA for most of her formative years, she still speaks like an Aussie and has that ‘up-talk’ thing - it’s apparently very persistent! Having moved back to Blighty for quite a few years, she married and emigrated (again) to NZ. I haven’t seen her since she moved over there, I’d love to hear how she speaks now!

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: r.padgett
Date: 21 Sep 26 - 02:44 AM

"In Canada, 'cot' and 'caught' have the same pronunciation. And, yes, I feel safe putting it categorically." reminds me of East Yorkshire speech and Bod for bird

The basic long "a" and short "a" is a fundamental in British speech ~ long "a" being South of England and short "a" Northern England

100 years ago accent in South Yorkshire where I grew up and a mining area had very early English pronunciation

School did its damndest to smooth out the speech pattern but it does still exist in day to day speech

Actors can be in demand lol

Ray

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Helen
Date: 21 Sep 26 - 03:53 AM

Ah BWM, does your niece now say "fush 'n' chups" in a Kiwi accent? ;-D

I really haven't heard any up-talk for a long time. Maybe it isn't common around Newcastle, NSW>

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 21 Sep 26 - 06:28 AM

Remind me, please: Have I mentioned hereabouts that the English pronunciation of "data" seems to have propagated to certain groups in the US, thanks to Patrick Stewart (a full-on Royal Shakespeare Company alumnus) starring in Star Trek NG? Or that parents in the States were up in arms about their childrens' accents getting contaminated by English pronunciation due to prolongued exposure to Pepper Pig?^†

Herself complained once, when Sir first went to infants' school, that he started speaking with a Nottingham accent: "Can't you stop it?" "But he's a Nottinghamshire lad," quoth the teacher. "He doesn't need to advertise the fact!" responded Herself, with some heat. She is now amused that Sir's own son, who is growing up in Somerset, generally has a West-Country accent (which she likes, but Sir doesn't) .... but swears like a Nottingham lad.

† At least it wasn't East Enders.

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 21 Sep 26 - 07:39 AM

Dunno, Helen, I haven’t seen Jo since she went Kiwi, wish I had!

Mrs Backwoodsperson is an inverterate accent-impersonator, and very good she is too! Her ‘Kiwi’ (which she describes as ‘Aussie with a clenched anal sphincter’) is hilarious!

Subject: RE: BS: American speech
From: Rain Dog
Date: 21 Sep 26 - 08:40 AM

Michael Rosen presents Word of Mouth
on BBC Radio 4

The programme yesterday was about:

Voices of Manchester

Word of Mouth

Rob Drummond, Professor of Sociolinguistics at Manchester Metropolitan University, talks to Michael about the ways people talk in Greater Manchester. They discuss which areas are seen as more 'Lancashire' or more 'Manc' in their speech, and what is known as the 'happy vowel.' Plus they dissect the accents of celebrities such as the Gallagher Brothers, Gary Neville and Sara Cox.

Rob's project can be found here: https://explore.manchestervoices.org/

Produced for BBC Audio Bristol by Sally Heaven, in partnership with the Open University

+

I appreciate that it might not be easily available to those of you outside the UK.

If you scroll down the page that I have linked to, you will find a further link to an Open University page which tests you on your ability to identify various British accents. It's not the most difficult of tests, especially if you have been living in the UK for a good while.

All previous episodes of the programme are available to listen to.