The English Thread

[Mermaid Blues]

You can't tell that Blair has the Glaswegian-RP though, can you?

Tony Blair? I'm not sure I follow you here?

[Mamma1]

Tony Blair is from Glasgow, but you can't tell from his accent. RP.

Endret 20. mai 2012 av Mamma1

[Mermaid Blues]

Tony Blair is from Glasgow, but you can't tell from his accent. RP.

No, according to his bio on wiki, he was born in Edinburgh and grew up in Edinburgh, Adelaide (Australia), Stepps and Durham.

[Mamma1]

Sorry, my bad. The point was that he speaks RP. You are not able to tell where he's from.

[HedvigR]

Well, my point earlier was that with some people you can still tell, because the RP (which they learn to speak at school from an early age) will always be influenced by the area you learn it in. Some people are not able to completely erase every trace of their accent. For us Norwegians it's probably impossible to hear, but not for the British.

And of course, with some people you can't tell at all. I have no idea about Tony Blair, I'm not THAT good with British accents, so I can't really tell.

[Mamma1]

No, they do not teach RP in schools. They teach Standard English. I think maybe you mixed the two terms up?

[Anglofil]

RP is an accent, not a dialect. If spoken correctly, you should not be able to tell where the person is from. It is also known as BBC -accent or the Queen's English.

In RP you would not pronounce the R in words like car. You would pronounce the H in the beginning of words.

True. I often get this question when I'm abroad, especially in the UK, as I got a RP accent. Kind of funny when they ask me "where in the UK are you from?" I take that as a compliment, and I agree, Tony Blair is a good example. I find it both fascinating and amusing.

.......

Ah, nearly there. I hate home exams, they take so much of your time, especially when they expect you to write between 6500-8000 words in just a couple of days.(..)

Mvh Yvonne

[HedvigR]

No, they do not teach RP in schools. They teach Standard English. I think maybe you mixed the two terms up?

Hmm, could be, but that's what I was taught when I was visiting an English school in January.

Edit: After some googling it looks like RP is no longer required to teach RP, although a lot of public (private) schools still do.

Endret 20. mai 2012 av HedvigR

[Mermaid Blues]

Sorry, my bad. The point was that he speaks RP. You are not able to tell where he's from.

True that

Like a friend of mine, she's lived her whole life in Falkirk and Glasgow, but she speaks RP and you'd never know she was Scottish just from listening to her. Sounds a little strange, but to each their own.

[Mamma1]

They really don't teach kids to speak in a certain way, they are allowed to use their own accent or dialect. If they did teach it, it is funny that so very few speak it.

Endret 20. mai 2012 av Mamma1

[HedvigR]

They really don't teach kids to speak in a certain way, they are allowed to speak their own accent or dialect. If they did teach it, it is funny that so very few speak it.

I edited my post now And I don't mean that they learn it for every day use, but for more formal settings. My ex for example always switches to RP if he has a job interview. But like I wrote in my post above, it is no longer required. Mystery solved :D

[Mamma1]

Yup. Most people, including myself, will modify their accent when required, to something closer to RP. Just to make it easier for people.

Only about 6% speak RP, if i remember correctly.

[Mermaid Blues]

Yup. Most people, including myself, will modify their accent when required, to something closer to RP. Just to make it easier for people.

Only about 6% speak RP, if i remember correctly.

Or to mask their social background, or sound more eloquent and sophisticated. Sadly, there's a lot of prejudice against certain dialects.

[HedvigR]

Or to mask their social background, or sound more eloquent and sophisticated. Sadly, there's a lot of prejudice against certain dialects.

Absolutely. I took a short course in York called "Britain's Worst Accent" which was about prejudice against accents, and even though attitudes have improved over the years there are still a lot of preconceived notions about people's intelligence and abilities based purely on accent.

(Oh, and the accent that was rated the worst was the Birmingham one. Quite funny, since our teacher on the subject was from Birmingham )

[Mermaid Blues]

Absolutely. I took a short course in York called "Britain's Worst Accent" which was about prejudice against accents, and even though attitudes have improved over the years there are still a lot of preconceived notions about people's intelligence and abilities based purely on accent.

(Oh, and the accent that was rated the worst was the Birmingham one. Quite funny, since our teacher on the subject was from Birmingham )

Haha, sweet!

Our linguistics professor did a lecture on attitudes to dialects and non-Standard English versus Standard English, here's one of the slides:

Bang on the money in terms of public prejudice, I guess :gjeiper:

Apparently, Scouse and Geordie speakers are often just labelled "car thieves", and the Welsh are "mainly sheep lovers". Oh well. Not sure what the general opinion of Glaswegian is down south, but I'm guessing it's not all too flattering

[HedvigR]

Bang on the money in terms of public prejudice, I guess :gjeiper:

Apparently, Scouse and Geordie speakers are often just labelled "car thieves", and the Welsh are "mainly sheep lovers". Oh well. Not sure what the general opinion of Glaswegian is down south, but I'm guessing it's not all too flattering

Haha, yeah, we got a handout with some different stereotypes that people had given different speakers. Scouses were labelled as thieves, Brummies as stupid, thick, lazy, unemployed etc. Nothing positive

The Edinburgh accent was rated the best, and was described as sexy, intelligent, pleasant and stuff like that.

[Mermaid Blues]

Aye, I can imagine. People from Edinburgh might sound a bit posh compared to Glaswegians, anyway I like both, though. Aberdeen, however, that's a different story... I went on a semi-blind (near-sighted?) date with a guy from Aberdeen, and I was kinda nervous about not understanding a word, but luckily he's lived here long enough for the accent to wash out.

So how's your exam coming along?

[HedvigR]

So how's your exam coming along?

Bah... don't really wanna think about it

I haven't done any work on it today, which I should have It's due on friday, so not much time left.. Going to work hard tomorrow though, promise!

I thought a bit about taking a semester in Aberdeen actually, but I decided to go to York instead. So excited! I was there for two weeks in January, at The Norwegian Study Centre, which is a part of York University. It was amazing, can't wait to go back!

You might have answered this before, but I'm a bit absent-minded at times, so I'll ask again. What is your connection to Scotland, do you study there?

[Mermaid Blues]

Don't be too hard on yourself, you need a day off every now and then to avoid mental overload Exams are stressful, had my last exam a week ago, and now I'm suffering from a severe case of withdrawal, keep having to remind myself I don't actually need to study for the exam I already had

I've heard all good things about York, a friend of mine is down there now and I keep getting texts about how awesome a time he's having

So you'll be doing the fall semester there?

Studying, aye, I'm at Glasgow Uni. Still a bit baffled as to how I even got in, to be honest, but no complaints here I'm absolutely loving every minute of it!

[HedvigR]

I'll be doing my autumn semester in 2013 there, so still over a year :/

I've always wanted to go to Scotland, mostly because of the accent really. I love (almost) all of the Scottish accents so much. I might go to Edinburgh this summer with my mum, heard good things about the place. What are you studying in Glasgow?

Edit: Damn you for making me write fall instead of autumn

(All in good humour)

Endret 20. mai 2012 av HedvigR