English Lang AS: Language and Region

English Lang AS: Language and Region

1. Linguists

   • Joanna Thornburrow (2004)
     • “One of the most fundamental ways we have of establishing our identity, is through our use of language.” This ‘use’ may include: specific lexical choices, grammatical constructions in speech and variations in phonology.
   • David Crystal
     • a leading linguistic expert; he suggests that Cockney rhyming slang is not dying out at all but that the nation’s current obsession with celebrity culture has been responsible for more dialects
       • RP indicates social and educational background and obscure the location of the speaker's birth
   • Buchanan (1766)
     • published an essay making explicit links between language and class
   • Paul Kerswil
     • 'the reducion of rural employment and construction of new towns lead to dialect levelling; the fading out of RP'
       • 1831 - 34% living in cities
         • 1931 - 80%
           • 1991 - 90%
     • Dialect levelling:form of standardisation where local variations of speech lose their distinctive regional features to a more mainstream dialect
       • South-East - gradually everybody sounds the same
       • only non-changing language is Latin
       • people in Reading or London council estate have a strong local accent because they mix with strong local networks
       • Reasons for it:
         • Industrialisation - move from rural
         • Scattering through travel
         • Education
           • only teach Standard English
         • Media brings us new accents
         • ICT - widespread communication
   • Leslie Milroy
     • Increased geographical mobility leads to disruption of close-knit networks that have historically maintained highly systematic sets of socially structures linguistic norms

2. Martha's Vineyard by Labov (1963)

   • A small group of fishermen began to exaggerate a tendency already existing in their speech. They did this seemingly subconsciously, in order to establish themselves as an independent social group with superior status to the despised summer visitors. A number of other islanders regarded this group as one which epitomised old virtues and desirable values, and subconsciously imitated the way its members talked. For these people, the new pronunciation was an innovation. As more and more people came to speak in the same way, the innovation gradually became the norm for those living on the island.

3. Regional Dialects

   • Accent: dinstinctive pronunciation which marks a person's regional identity
   • Dialect: variety of a language, marked by a particular grammar and lexis and used by speakers with a common regional and social background. Include more than just the sound
   • RP: an accent which carries a high social status
     • Overt prestige: posh/RP
       • Covert prestige: associated with street cred
   • Standard English: prestige variety of English
   • Yod-dropping - 'toon' not 'tune
     • Diphthongs - two vowels one syllable
       • Monophthongs - a vowel with a single sound
         • Th-fronting - 'free' not 'three'
           • Rising inflection - declarative sentences uttered with an increased pitch
   • Surviving forms of regional dialects
     • multiple negation
       • use of aint
         • use of never as a negative marker
           • use of demonstrative them
   • SCOUSE
     • orginated from Scandinavians
       • working class
         • negative stereotypes
           • Shelagh Coleman security check - 'lock up the silver'
     • 'my' = 'me' - Irish
       • 't' is stressed
         • filler 'y'know'
           • multiple negation
             • plural marking
     • Beatles - charming
   • GWENTIAN
     • cwtch
     • chopsy - argmentative
     • lilting - change of stresses
     • tapped 'r' in 'brilliant'
     • yod-dropping - 'toosday'
   • GEORDIE
     • cheap
     • funny - Ant/Dec
     • 'sexiest in Britain' - Guardian
     • yod-dropping 'toon'
     • /au/ dipthong - aboot
     • non-rhotic unlike Bristolian

4. Why do we have different accents in the UK?

   • The main reason in the UK is that over the centuries, different peoples settled in the islands that now form part of the UK - Celts, Romans, Norse, Anglo-Saxons, Normans etc.
     • When the English language we know today was still evolving, as a result of the merging of Anglo-Saxon and Norman French, an event happened known as the 'vowel shift'.
       • 'a' went from 'cat' to 'bar'

5. Accomodation Theory - convergence, divergence

6. Cockney Rhyming Slang - collection of phrases used by gang members to encrypt messages in London

   • Idiomatic phrases - 'part of the furniture'
   • Cockney Article : U.K.’s Poetry of the Proletariat Goes Pop.’
     • Mike Coles - The Bible In Cockney
   • 19th Century

7. Hybrid dialects - MLE, Bradford Asian English

8. Queen's speech differences 1957-2010

   • epitome of RP lessening
     • lengthening of vowel sounds > speaks faster
       • 'heppy' > 'has' normal
         • lowers pitch of voice; no rising inflection
     • WHY?
       • after Diana's death
       • hierarchy change, age change
     • article : 'speak the Queen's English if you want to sound intelligent and be trusted'

9. 1470 - William Caxton developed printing press

   • which dialect to produce books in?
     • led to the creation of Standard English
       • developed by OxBridge universities, 15th century
       • AKA - public school pronunciation, general british, BBC english, oxford english
         • only 5% of population
           • corps, BBC, civil service

10. Received Pronunciation

    • clipped consonants; elongated vowels
      • Maypole, Olde English

11. British Broadcasting Corporation - 1922

    • announced RP as standard; announcers of the elite
      • 1942 - introduces non RP Wilfred Pickles
        • accuracy?
          • Six o'clock news - poem by Tom Leonard
            • ironically mocking the credibility of Scottish accent reading news
        • 1982 - no longer assumed to speak RP
          • RP
            • Peter Trudgill estimated in 1974 that 3% of people in Britain were RP
            • first edition of the English Pronouncing Dictionary (1917), Jones named the accent "Public School Pronunciation",
            • 1927 - Wyld 'received standard' received = approved

12. Estuary English

    • result of influences from RP and Cockney
      • REPRESENTS THE BREAKDOWN OF STRINGENT CLASS BARRIERS

13. Matched guise approach

    • a sociolinguistic experimental technique used to determine the true feelings of an individual or community towards a specific language, dialect, or accent.
      • Dixon - 2002
        • hypothesis : 'a Brummie accented suspect would elicit stronger attributions of guilt than a standard-accented speaker'
          • Statistical analysis showed the Brummie suspect was rated lower in Superiority than the RP suspect.
    • Wallace Lambert, 1960s

14. COCKNEY

    • glottal stop
    • mouth vowel
    • th-fronting
    • Danny Dyer
    • EASTEND/ESTUARY
      • London
      • Kent
      • Surrey
      • Essex
      • MLE (Multicultural London English)
        • sociolect, 20th century
        • Brent, Hackney
        • 'man' as a pronoun
        • non-rhotic phonology
        • ADJECTIVES
          • bait
            • buff
              • peng
                • clapped
                  • ting
        • INTERJECTIONS
          • ahlie!
            • dun know