Dragon

I once watched a show talking about why people speak differently even when they live close to each other like the Canada/USA border. It said that our speech patterns are learned much more from our parents and people we have direct contact with than anything else like TV. That explains why TV doesn't seem to truly effect our accent. I often wondered why you can have people who live a stones throw across the border from each other and they have radically different accents. Appearantly the physical border works as a border for accents as well because of that tendency to learn from those immediatly around you.

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Polenta, here is an interesting site explaining ‘received pronunciation’. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Received_Pronunciation
Bear in mind that RP is used throughout Britain but only by about 2% of the population, mainly by those families who went to (and send their children to) private boarding schools. So, instead of growing up among the local people and acquiring the local accent, they acquire the accent of their own small family group and fellow pupils. You’re right about Queen Elizabeth speaking very clearly, never clipping her words … always pronouncing the word ends.

I would say that, in general, the ‘r’ is far less pronounced these days. There are regional exceptions, such as here in the south east for example … the ‘r’ is pronounced much the same as you would hear it in US. The Scots roll the ‘r’ in a similar way to the Germans. I like the sound and can imitate it but it doesn’t come naturally to me.

polenta

Thanks for your website Login.
I should have said that people here think British English has more reputation than American and that received pronunciation is the one that is supposed to be taught at British institutes (the principal one is called Anglo here). British influence here is very strong although later people want to travel to US and visit or study there. We are very conservative here and the change to accept American English is rather slow.
Understanding people speaking English in all corners of the world is quite a challenge to us foreigners. Some Uruguayan people read novels , textbooks, newspapers in English and understand them quite well.... but they see a movie where someone says : "Good morning" and can't figure out what they said. LOL
Listening is the most difficult skill to grasp indeed.

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Marius, regarding having to 'tune in' to the accent when watching movies etc., I often have to do the same with US movies. It takes several minutes and, even then, I sometimes miss parts of the dialogue completely.

You asked “What do most people in England sound like when they talk” … “like the actors in English-made movies, or like the guy who sounded (to me) like he was from Australia?” No, the majority of us don’t speak like you hear in English-made movies, especially the old black and white movies. The dialogue in those is almost entirely ‘received pronunciation’. Accents vary from region to region. A good example of a north eastern England accent is Sheryl Crow (XFactor Judge and British singer). She has a delightful ‘Geordie’ accent … from the region around Newcastle and extending to the Scottish border. My guess is that the waiter who sounded Australian to you was possibly from London … there are similarities. Britain is like a patchwork quilt of accents, with no two patches the same.

Nowadays, there are many sit-coms made in regional accents. If you have ever seen episodes of Last of the Summer Wine, you will have heard a Yorkshire accent (with an occasional neighbouring Lancashire accent.

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Occasionally, in TV interviews, we may hear someone from Belfast or Glasgow speaking (they are just two of the accents that I have to tune into). If they speak very, very quickly I sometimes don't catch one word of it.

That brings me to another point ... the speed of speech. Young English people are speaking much faster than I am used to ... sometimes too fast for me to catch the words, especially on the telephone. I have no idea why this has come about.

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Dragon, that's exactly it "... speech patterns are learned much more from our parents and people we have direct contact with than anything else like TV ...". That's very true and coincides with the 'received pronunciation' explanation.

However, TV is influencing the speech of English youngsters. They watch the American 'soaps' and imitate, not the accent, but the phrasing of sentences.

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In #262 I said "... here in the south east ... the r is pronounced much the same as in US." That should have read "... in the south west .." i.e., Dorset, Somerset and Cornwall.

marius

Thank you, Login! Had read a comment Polenta made about ‘received pronunciation’ but went right over the head. Had no clue what it was.

Still don't ... except, have heard that in the states people from the midwest tend to be easily understood by everyone. So, newscasters tend to "speak midwest," in other words - the National news people do not tend to speak with accents. Guess you could say National news people speak midwest without the twang.

Wondering, do actors in English movies speak "received pronunciation" so that everyone can understand? Guess what I'm asking, is received pronunciation as sort of universal English?

And that is lovely, what you wrote, "Britain is patchwork quilt of accents, with no two patches the same." Got it!

marius

About young English people speaking very fast - how interesting! About 30 yrs ago met a young gal from India who had recently gotten married and moved to our town. We could barely understand a thing she said! Finally realized her English was perfect, but she spoke it so fast that it sounded like a 'foreign language.'

It was difficult to be around that fast pace of speaking. It felt so hyper-active I thought she needed medications to calm down, but she told me all of her Indian friends spoke that fast.

Maybe what she said is true. Maybe people are speaking faster in some parts of the world. Mercifully have not noticed it here yet.

polenta

Remember Professor Higgins in "My Fair Lady"? He said he could recognize a person's pronunciation depending on the London neighborhood this person came from. In fact I think he said he could say exactly WHAT BLOCK this person lived in with a possible mistake of two blocks. Am I dreaming or he said something like that? Can our pronunciation give us away that easily??? Of course he was a linguist.
I remember an anecdote by someone who was born in Vienna but came to Uruguay when she was still a child. She studied English and when she travelled to US they asked her if she was a foreigner of course. Thinking it would be interesting to make these Americans guess where she was from, she was absolutely amazed at hearing they answered: "You must be German or Austrian."....She had thought these Americans would say any Latin American country and had hoped they would say England because she had learned English at the Anglo,a British institute. ISN'T IT FUNNY?????

marius

Reminds me of when my sister moved back to the Midwest after seven years of living in NY city. Finally had to tell sis, "You have got to slow down. Maybe in NYC everyone goes 500 miles per hour, but in the Midwest we go twenty." She laughed, but I told her, "You are acting like a lab rat on speed. It is exhausting."

When she finally slowed to the pace of life here she said it felt better. Well, (giggle) it felt better to all of us! The way I see it, there is no reason to go about rushing here, rushing there, when you can get somewhere just as fast by moving calmly and leisurely as you can if moving rushed and hurried. In fact, moving slowly seems to get you there faster.

marius

Polenta, I do remember Prof. Higgins in "My Fair Lady." Thought of that after asking Login my questions. So, Login, before Higgins got hold of Eliza, was the way she spoke an accent that is common somewhere? Anywhere?

Polenta, your anecdote about the woman from Vienna made me wonder - if we met you, would we know what country you are from by your accent? And, maybe you don't HAVE an accent? But, would people get confused and think you are from Spain, or Mexico?

Dragon

marius, I may be wrong but I think Eliza (before Higgins trained her up) was supposed to sound Cockney. I'm no linguist myself though, so I may just be making that up.

polenta

I also think Eliza's accent was Cockney before Prof. Higgins. It's VERY, VERY DIFFICULT to understand.
Marius, if you are speaking about my English I think it sounds near-native American. Well, near-native could be the first sentence. Later on, I don't know I might have a slight accent but I don't know if it would sound Spanish. And you know why it's more American than British? Because when my mother decided I should study English decades ago, there was better transportation to the American Bilingual Institute called Alianza than there was to the Anglo, the British Bilingual Institute. LOL LOL LOL Whatever English I know is just due to random circumstances. LOL LOL LOL

My Spanish is definitely River Plate Spanish, that is Argentinian or Uruguayan Spanish. If anyone in Latin America or Spain is fairly educated I would understand them perfectly well.... but some uneducated people from certain regions are kind of hard to understand unless until you get familiar with it, maybe the first minutes.
In Spain, the region of Seville (Andalucia) is hard and some Central American countries also (not educated people) Mexicans are easy. The problem with Sevillians and some Central Americans is they "swallow" or don't pronounce many sounds. Well, the story is really similar to what happens with English.

matthew

It was cockney... My personal favorite english accent... You will find a bit 'a Cockney in Mary Poppins as well...

French is my favorite language... I swear a woman could tell me she had a puss filled sore on her butt & make it sound seductive...

Dragon

Is that a puss filled sore or a pus filled sore? 'Cause if it's the first she might be TRYING to be seductive. hehehe

matthew

lol... glad I didn't add the "SY" to the end... I did at 1st, then errased only the y... (didn't want to be misunderstood...

matthew

Just to prove my point...

J'ai un pus suintant remplis plaie de mon cul ...

matthew

Yea baby!!!

Login

I'm just catching up on this thread ... what interesting questions you ask.

Bear in mind I am not an expert, but I remember thinking (in the film) Eliza's 'cockney' accent was over exagerated and the vowels more contorted than they should have been. Eliza was played by Audrey Hepburn who, in real life, had a delightful speaking voice but I could never place her accent. Having just googled her, I have discovered why. http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000030/bio She was born in Belgium ... her father was a wealthy English banker and her mother was a Dutch baroness. So I can forgive her that 'not quite perfect' cockney accent.

'Cockney' refers to working-class inhabitants of London. A 'true cockney' is said to come from within hearing distance of the 'Bow Bells' in the City of London. Nowadays, cockney refers to people from the East of London. Their accent is similar to that of Audrey Hepburn's 'Eliza' but not quite so stretched out. You may have heard of cockney rhyming slang ... they replace words with a rhyming word or phrase. For example, wigs would be referred to as a 'syrup of figs', or even just 'syrups'. There are lots of examples that you could google for yourselves.

I have to go out right now but I'll be back ... I'm enjoying hearing about other peoples views and experiences with accents.