“Incomprehensible” Accents

Posted on February 3, 2011 by Ben

On occasion, I may refer to a certain accent as “incomprehensible” or “inscrutable” or some other questionable attribute. I would like to take a moment to clear up what I mean.

I love the dialects of English. I think they are all beautiful in their own unique ways. When I refer to comprehensibility, however, I am making an objective statement: some dialects are more understandable to outsiders than others. Just as Portugese speakers can understand Spanish speakers more than vice versa, a man from Belfast is more likely to know what an American is saying that the other way around.

But I do not want to give the impression that I think certain accents are “dodgy” or “ugly.” I want this site to be free of the kind of prejudices that loom in people’s minds about certain accents. In fact, some of the most gorgeous dialects–Scottish, Western Irish, the various Carribean creoles–are amongst the most difficult for foreign ears to process. The beautiful things of this world are often the hardest to understand.

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Dublin: A Tale of Two Accents

Posted on February 2, 2011 by Ben
Dublin, Ireland

Wikimedia

NOTE: This post uses the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). For information about this notation, please visit my page of IPA Resources.

Why does Dublin have so many dialects? Even compared to other cities in the British Isles, the city has a startling amount of linguistic diversity: Although London (for example) has a number of accents, the poshest aristocrat and the most rugged Cockney at least seem to be part of the same dialect spectrum. In Dublin, however, the social classes seem to be living on different planets entirely.

To illustrate this point, I am going to reference video clips of two Dubliner celebrities of different backgrounds. First, take a quick look at Aiden Gillen of BBC’s Queer as Folk and The Wire on America television. Here’s him accepting an award for the latter program.

Gillen grew up in the suburbs, and his accent is notably mild. (He has spent some time in the UK and America, but not enough to alter his accent radically, in my opinion). His speech has a flat, measured intonation that reminds me of an American, an impression which is enforced by his tight dipthongs: “face” is pronounced [feɪs], rather than the more popular Dublin [fɛɪs]. When Dubliners have expressed to me that they feel like people in their city are starting to sound like “Yanks,” this accent is probably what they are referring to. This is the Irish accent most easily comprehensible to outside listeners.

Then there is Damian Dempsey, an Irish singer-songwriter who grew up proudly working-class on Dublin’s Northside. Check out this interview he did with an Irish-American newspaper.

It’s a world of difference. Suddenly we’re talking about an accent as inscrutable to outsiders as Glaswegian. Dempsey speaks with a “cramped” vowel system that is so unusual it’s hard to even analyze. Notice the pronunciation of “wiser” as IPA [wəizə] (sounds a bit like “woyzer”). This is a major dividing line between the working- and middle-class accents. This dialect is so different from Gillen’s that they might as well be on opposite sides of the world. And yet both are Dubliners.

So what is going on here? Well, according to Raymond Hickey, something of an expert in the field of Irish dialect study, Dublin is heir to two distinct linguistic traditions. The first is the Working-Class Dublin accent, which harks back to the earliest days of modern English. The other tradition is that of the Anglo-Irish aristocracy which emerged in the city in the 18th and 19th Centuries. One dialect was largely preserved up to the present day; the other morphed into the “suburban” dialect we hear among most middle-class Dubliners.

I am not versed enough in the history of the city to offer any commentary on why Dublin remains so divided in terms of dialect. I am a bit suspicious, however, when people of different backgrounds speak with wildly different accents in the same city. It’s an indicator of an educational and societal chasm that has not being bridged.

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Is Cockney Dying?

Posted on February 1, 2011 by Ben
Whitechapel Street, 1905

Wikimedia

Cockney, the beloved working-class dialect of East London, may soon be extinct. Linguists will still study this dialect, and it will maintain a place in the city’s mythology. But its days may be numbered:  I have never encountered anybody of my generation, either personally or in the media, who speaks with a classic Cockney accent.

This is the subject of Henry Hitchings’ article in the Evening Standard, Language Can’t Stay Still–Just Listen to London. Hitchings points to the rise of Multicultural London English, the youthful dialect that mixes London English with a slight Carribean flavor, as one of the major factors contributing to Cockney’s demise. The situation resembles (albeit to a greater degree) the way that African American Vernacular English has weakened the scope of the classic New York City dialect.

But I can think of a better analogy: Classical Latin. On the surface, that seems like a ludicrous comparison. Yet both Cockney and Latin are examples of extinct (or dying) dialects that display a huge influence after their extinction. As Latin spread to its conquered territories, many world languages sprung up in its place: Spanish, Italian, French. Likewise, as features of Cockney spread to the suburbs and beyond, they created Estuary English, one of the most widespread dialects in England today.

Like Latin, Cockney isn’t dying out so much as it is consuming other accents. In the next few centuries, we may see this happen to other once-widespread dialects. I would not be surprised if the accent we know as General American will split off into so many different accents that GenAm itself will disappear. I’ve already seen some indication of this: regions that used to be strongholds of “normal” American English–California, Connecticut, the Great Lakes–now have dialects that are strikingly different than GenAm.

But Cockney, no matter how dead it is, will always remain one of England’s cultural treasures. Just as the classic Dickensian Christmas still captures Britain’s heart (even as December snow in London is no longer common), Cockney will eternally be a cornerstone of English heritage.

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6 Accent Tips For Actors

Posted on January 31, 2011 by Ben

A few days ago, I gave my list of the best American accents done by non-Americans. Which got me thinking: what makes actors succeed at dialects and what makes them fail? Below is a list of the six most important things an actor should keep in mind when learning a dialect.

1.) It isn’t just how you pronounce words. When you learn a particular dialect, don’t merely switch out one pronunciation for another. We’ve all seen the results of such lifeless dialect work in movies: British actors playing all Americans as bored suburbanites; Americans playing all Brits as stuffy Edwardian aristocrats. Accents are as much about musicality, tempo and physicality as they are about how you say the word “bath.”

2.) Learn the slang. Actors should learn dialects, not accents. What is the vocabulary and unique grammar of the dialect? How is this used in everyday language? If you’re playing someone from Ireland, you’d better understand that “crack” means more than what you do to an egg.

3.) Listen to strong dialects. There is a trend in dialect coaching that I find aggravating: coaches give actors recordings of “mild” accents to listen to, so the actor can learn a more “understandable” dialect. This is a bad move. You need to hear actual, un-watered down versions of an accent before you start thinking about comprehensibility. Too often, these “mild” dialect recordings are of people who spent a lot of time elsewhere, thus allowing their dialect to become Americanized, Anglicized, or some other kind of “-ized.” Hear dialects of people who are as close to your character as possible, who have spent their lives in the character’s region. Then work on being understood by your audience.

4.) It’s about the character, not the accent. Many people say that Hugh Laurie’s accent on House is the best American accent ever done by a Brit. I agree, but I don’t think it’s because Laurie gets the pronunciations better than other actors. I think it’s because he works on creating a dialect for a character, not a region. Think about your character’s class, their age, their outlook on life, their upbringing, and how these factors influence their speech. They are the most important things of all.

5.) Work on your voice. I have always had a knack for doing accents. But as a younger actor, I didn’t realize how pointless this talent is if it isn’t back up by strong vocal work. You need to make sure your voice is supple and free. Otherwise you either won’t be heard in the accent or you’ll quickly tire your voice.

And most importantly:

6.) Don’t get overconfident. What ultimately dooms many actors doing accents, more than anything else, is that they get cocky. They think they’ve “mastered” an accent that they haven’t. People’s delusions about their dialect abilities can be unbelievable. I’ve seen actors who barely grasp the fundamental features of a particular accent who sincerely believe they know it inside and out. Always be vigilant. There will always be plenty you don’t know.

And that’s really it in a nutshell. What makes an actor good at accents, move than anything, is a willingness to learn.

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Rick Aschmann’s Dialect Map

Posted on January 30, 2011 by Ben
Rick Aschmann's American Dialects Map

Rick Aschmann

I have been studying dialects for years, and I have never come across anything as remarkable as Rick Aschmann’s American Dialect Map. For serious linguists, Aschmann’s research might seem wildly unscientific and cavalier. But for a hardcore dialect nerd like myself, his map is a godsend.

Because really, what Aschmann has done is what all of us language freaks have wanted to do, but been too lazy to do ourselves. He has compiled (and continues to compile) as many video clips of American English speakers as possible, and has fashioned a staggeringly detailed map based on his observations.

Before you indulge in this glorious resource, I want to offer a few caveats (all of which Aschmann is upfront up about):

1.) This map is not 100% scientific. That’s actually a selling point, in my opinion. Aschmann doesn’t busy himself with excessive background profiling. He makes judgements based on his own perceptions, and it allows him to move at a much faster pace than most academics.

2.) There are occasional inaccuracies. Aschmann openly admits that there are things that will sometimes be wrong on the map.   His project is a slow one, gradually illuminating America’s dialect divisions as they exist in the 21st Century.   Therefore, Aschmann makes educated guesses as he analyzes more and more audio.

3.) The map doesn’t get into specifics of phonology (the study of the sounds of language). If you want to know the precise difference between the way somebody from Texas and somebody from Louisiana say the word “goat,” this map ain’t for you. If you want to see how, generally speaking, people in a certain swath of the country tend to say the word “goat,” it’s a great tool.

4.) The map is pretty unwieldy at this point. The map isn’t a paragon of readability. One blog uncharitably referred to it as “the worl’d most unreadable map.” I think it has to be convoluted in order to be functional.

These (slight) liabilities aside, however, I would strongly recommend studying Aschmann’s map when you need to get a good perspective on the American dialect areas.

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The Top 10 American Accents done by non-Americans

Posted on January 29, 2011 by Ben
Hugh Laurie

Kristin Dos Santos / Wikimedia

USA Today ran a piece yesterday listing the top five American accents done by British actors. While I am unfamiliar with the number one actor on the list, Jamie Bamber, I’m glad to see that Hugh Laurie and Idris Elba are represented: both actors who have done fantastic dialect work.

Continuing this meme, here is my own list of the top 10 non-Americans who have excelled at British American dialects.

1.)  Idris Elba, The Wire. It was hard to pick number one, but at the end of the day, this British actor won out. He didn’t just do any American accent on the wire. He mastered, from top to bottom, the variety of African American Vernacular English spoken in West Baltimore. It is some of the most masterfully specific dialect work I’ve ever seen.

2.)  Hugh Laurie, in House. There is a debate about the authenticity of Hugh Laurie’s accent on this American TV show. Personally, I don’t think authenticity is what makes this fake accent seem so real. It’s that Laurie realizes that Americans can be just as witty, ascerbic and cutting as Brits. Laurie gives the accent a refreshing intelligence and vigor.

3.)  Heath Ledger, in basically anything. What was great about this late Australian actor was that you never noticed that he was doing a dialect. Ledger created characters, from Ennis del Mar to the Joker, with voices so developed that the whole notion of “putting on an accent” was an afterthought.

4.)  Toni Collete, in the Sixth Sense. Collette’s accent work is always phenomenal, but her work in the Sixth Sense impressed me for one reason. She is basically the only actor, ever, and I mean EVER, who has grasped the fact that Philadelphia actually has an accent. She could have done some standard American something or other, and would have been fine. But no. It’s that attention to detail that separates sublime dialect work from the merely competent.

5 & 6.)  Guy Pearce & Russell Crowe, LA Confidential. Continuing the theme of “Australians do the best accents” is this one-two punch of Aussies in this 1997 crime drama. Like a lot of actors on this list, these two layered in lots of great character work: Crowe was rough and grizzled, Pearce uptight and bookish. And they fit into the period and milieu perfectly.

7.)  Naomi Watts, in most things she’s in. I have to give props to this Australian actress, who has played Americans more than she has Aussies and has never once slipped. Extra points for being able to handle some seriously emotional material while donning a different accent than her own.

8.)  Daniel Day-Lewis, Gangs of New York. Day-Lewis did not use an actual dialect in this movie, but rather a faschinating interpretation of how a New Yorker would have spoken in the mid-19th-Century. The dialect coach working on the film spoke of trying to return the accent to its roots in British English and Dutch, and Day-Lewis nailed this concept beautifully.

9.)  Christian Bale in Rescue Dawn. Bale’s accent work can be hit or miss, not the least because, given his international upbringing, I have often questioned whether he has a natural accent. However, I thought his dialect work in Rescue Dawn was excellent: he didn’t just do an American dialect, but actually managed to add just the perfect hint of a German influence. Another of those small details that really steps things up.

10.)  Tracy Ullman on the Tracy Ullman Show. This now-forgotten show (the inauspicious birthplace of the Simpsons) featured the superb dialect abilities of Tracy Ullman in a variety of characters. All flawless.

What actors do you think do great accents?

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Dialect vs. Accent

Posted on January 28, 2011 by Ben

Many people ask me about the difference between a “dialect” and an “accent.”  Really it’s pretty simple:

  • An accent is the way that particular person or group of people sound.  It’s the way somebody pronounces words, the musicality of their speech, etc.
  • A dialect describes both a person’s accent and the grammatical features of the way that person talks.

To provide an example, you could say somebody from Alabama has a “Southern Accent,” meaning that they pronounce words differently than somebody from the Northern US.  However, “accent” would not refer to a Southerner’s use of the word “y’all.”  That would fall under the category of Southern dialects.

This distinction is not that important for a layperson.  Unless you’re a linguist, the difference between these two words is pretty abstract. [Ed. Note, 1/17/15: For the record, I no longer agree with this statement. I think the difference between pronunciation and grammar is helpful for everyone to understand, and that misunderstanding the difference can be dangerous for those who seek to “correct” others’ language.]

One thing you’ll notice is that I use the word “accent” about as much as I use “dialect” on this site.  That’s because “accent” makes it easier for laypeople to find this site–people search for “Australian Accent” far more in Google than they do for “Australian Dialect.”  “Dialect,” although a commonplace word for anybody with a basic knowledge of linguistics, is still a bit obscure to most of the population.

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5 Reasons Why Some Dialects are Unpopular

Posted on January 27, 2011 by Ben

I try to promote acceptance of diversity in dialects and accents. In the real world, however, things are not so fair. Numerous dialects of English are stigmatized: many people, even educated people, harbor the belief that some accents are “uneducated,” “ugly” or betray some kind of character flaw. Why is this?

Below are the five most common reasons why some dialects are stigmatized (and why others aren’t).

Poverty. Cockney, working-class Dublin, Appalachian, African-American Vernacular English: all of these dialects are associated with the often impoverished people who speak them. At the risk of sounding political, I believe people make a false association between poverty and the superficial attributes of the poor. If a poor person dresses a certain way, we assume that their dress contributes to them being poor. If poor people live in a certain neighborhood, we assume living in that neighborhood makes you poor. This is no different with language. When poor people speak a certain way, we think this “improper” way of talking makes them poor. The result is that this accent or dialect becomes stigmatized. And a vicious cycle begins.

Regional/Cultural/Ethnic Animosity. Some Americans believe New Yorkers to be aggressive, money-hungry, and rude. Some Britons think people from Birmingham are loutish, violent and uneducated. In both cases, there is a cultural prejudice that exists about people from a certain place. And examples of how racism and bigotry affect our perception of dialects are too numerous to mention. These attitudes extend to how people speak. We associate our prejudices with accents.

Divergence from prestige dialects. The flip side of these two points is that dialects are often judged on how closesly (or unclosely) they resemble “prestige” dialects. Few Britons speak Received Pronunciation anymore, but I still think British dialects are judged based on their proximity to that accent. The same holds true for General American English and the “neutral” accents that have emerged in the past fifty years in Ireland, Australia and South Africa.

Nasality. Detroit. Liverpool. Long Island. What do these seemingly different English accents have in common? All are stigmatized. All are “nasal” in quality. I have long puzzled over why the most nasal dialects of English tend to be the most disliked. But we find this again and again throughout the English speaking world. People complain about an accent being too “whiny.” My theory is that people who speak with nasal accents, by engaging their nasal resonators, speak a bit more loudly than speakers of other dialects. Their voices are often more easily heard. English-speaking culture, wherever it is found, is more puritanical than other cultures. We don’t like to be interrupted, don’t like hearing other people talking, don’t like communicating over crowds. Hence we don’t like the more “forceful” (read as “nasal”) dialects.

Non-standard Grammar. The idea of “standard” English Grammar is an abstraction. Dialects preserve, to different degrees, their grammatical legacies. In a world that sees non-standard grammar as inferior, however, dialects that don’t conform to this standard are usually judged as “bad English.”

What are your reasons for liking or disliking a particular accent?

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Will Twitter Affect Dialects of English?

Posted on January 26, 2011 by Ben

A few weeks ago, AOL ran a timely article about the connection between Twitter and regional American dialects. The piece begins with some rather obvious points: that people in the American South tweet “y’all” more than people in the Northern US, for example.

Then the article gets to the good stuff:

According to Scott Kiesling, an associate professor of linguistics at the University of Pittsburgh, the next step from this study is to examine whether these Twitter dialects spread, and if they do, how. A conference later this year at Georgetown University will examine language and new media, Kiesling told The Associated Press.

The article is too vague to explain if this study would measure Twitter’s effect on spoken dialects, or simply the way dialects are expressed on Twitter. But I’ll offer my analysis anyway.

In terms of spoken English, I’m unconvinced twitter and social media can spread dialects. These sites strike me as much too fragmented as communication devices to achieve the kind of influence as other media.

By contrast, for two decades white American teenagers have adopted features of African American Vernacular English, due to listening to large amounts of hip hop. That makes more sense to me, since young people can listen to certain genres of music hours upon hours a day.

I have no doubt there are also kids who visit twitter obsessively. But they’re just not exposed to dialect or accent features enough for it to make a real impact in how they communicate verbally. And given the divide that already exists between written and spoken language, I think Twitter’s influence in this regard is dubious.

But the more pertinent question is whether there are “twitter dialects” emerging. As any linguist will tell you, dialects exist in any kind of language, not just spoken. To give the most notable example, there are dialects of American Sign Language.

I’m wary of the notion of “e-dialects,” however. I use gchat and skype a lot, and I’ve noticed that people maintain their own idiosyncratic ways of communicating much more than when speaking, rather than less. Some folks punctuates their chats, anothers use ellipses, others go crazy with emoticons. Personally, I find the appeal of electronic communication is the very opposite of accent or dialect spread: technology lets you maintain your own voice, and feel more fearless about asserting your identity.

These are of course layman’s observations, and future studies may prove me wrong. One thing is for certain though: technology will continue to impact our language, and in even more powerful ways than ever. I’m just not sure Twitter is going to be the agent of these changes.

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Accent reduction: do you need it?

Posted on January 15, 2011 by Ben

A lot of people ask me if they should get “accent reduction,” the process in which a foreign-language speaker (or someone with a stigmatized accent) goes to a specialist to learn a more “standard” accent.

Do you need accent reduction?  In my mind, you do if you fall into one of three categories:

1.)  People cannot understand you. You should know if this is the case or not.  If you have a difficult time being understood by co-workers, strangers or friends, you may be able to benefit from “neutral” accent training.

2.)  You are an actor or voice-over artist.  This is self-explanatory.  If you make your living through your voice, it is invaluable to be able to change your natural dialect.

3.)  You work at a job where you communicate with many nationalities.  Accent alteration is helpful if you work at a job where you have to communicate with people from different parts of the globe on a daily basis (for example, customer service).

The point should be to facilitate communication, not to make somebody over.  If I were an accent reduction specialist (I am not), I would not try to eliminate anybody’s accent entirely.  I would instead focus on softening the parts of the accent that hinder communication.

For the record,  I hate the term “accent reduction.”  There are no neutral accents, linguistically speaking.  If the world had gone a different route, African-American Vernacular English might have been the standard dialect, with General American English perceived as some kind of “incorrect” variant.  The point is, nobody is “reducing” anything.

That being said, I don’t believe this type of work is racist or classist if it’s done for the right reasons.  If you want to adopt a more neutral accent than the one you have now, I would recommend finding a qualified professional, one focused on the principles of good speech.  The point is to sound like yourself, not an airline stewardess from Iowa.

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