Follow Us!
Subscribe to Blog via Email
-
Recent Posts
All-Time Most Popular
1. The Accents in Downton Abbey
2. The 5 Best Irish Accents on Film
3. Arrr, Matey! The Origins of the Pirate Accent
4. The 3 Types of Australian Accents
5. Canadian Raising: Nobody Says Aboot
6. South African or Kiwi or Aussie?
7. Top 10 American Accents by Non-Americans
8. Mom Mum Mam
9. When Did Americans Stop "Talking British?"
10. The Wild World of the English "r"Recent Comments
For the Uninitiated
Sites I Love
Categories
Archives
- April 2015
- February 2015
- January 2015
- December 2014
- October 2014
- September 2014
- August 2014
- July 2014
- June 2014
- May 2014
- April 2014
- March 2014
- February 2014
- January 2014
- December 2013
- November 2013
- October 2013
- September 2013
- August 2013
- July 2013
- June 2013
- May 2013
- April 2013
- March 2013
- February 2013
- January 2013
- December 2012
- November 2012
- October 2012
- September 2012
- August 2012
- July 2012
- June 2012
- May 2012
- April 2012
- March 2012
- February 2012
- January 2012
- December 2011
- November 2011
- October 2011
- September 2011
- August 2011
- July 2011
- June 2011
- May 2011
- April 2011
- March 2011
- February 2011
- January 2011
Tag Archives: Cockney
The Van Dyke Controversy
Disney’s 1964 Mary Poppins adaptation has been in the news lately, in light of both film’s 50th anniversary and Saving Mr. Banks, a new film about the contentious relationship between Walt Disney and Anglo-Australian “Poppins” creator P. L. Travers. Of … Continue reading
Vowel Shifts in English and Dutch
As I recently discussed, English shares its penchant for r-variability with other languages. This got me thinking about another dialect marker common to English and other tongues, namely what might be called the “close diphthongs.” These are vowels typically found … Continue reading
I Thought He Was Australian!
I’ve recently noticed several comments on my weeks-old Orphan Black post taking issue with my praise of lead actress Tatiana Maslany‘s “Southeast English” accent. Here’s a representative example: I’ve only just watched the first episode and presumed Sarah was meant … Continue reading
Posted in British English Tagged australian accents, celebrity accents, Cockney, dialects in TV 15 Comments
David Beckham’s “Poshification”
Researchers from University of Manchester recently announced that David Beckham has “poshed up” his accent since moving the the United States (pun probably intended). Given that Beckham is one of the biggest sports stars in the world, it’s fairly easy … Continue reading
Posted in British English Tagged celebrity accents, Cockney, Received Pronunciation (RP) 19 Comments
Diphthong or L?
The other day, in a Philadelphia train station, I overheard a woman ask a ticket taker if a train would take her to what sounded like “Choatenham.” A moment later, I realized she had asked if the line went to … Continue reading
Is Rhyming Slang Irish?
An old saying goes “the Brits may have invented English, but the Irish perfected it.” Or maybe that refers to stout. Either way, there is truth to the sentiment: Ireland (besides providing the language with some of its most colorful … Continue reading
The Cockney v/w Mystery
When I think of ‘Cockney,’ my mind goes to gritty 1960’s tough guy films: Poor Cow, Get Carter, that kind of thing. That is, I imagine something like the hilarious ‘duelling Michael Caines’ from the Michael Winterbottom comedy The Trip: We … Continue reading
The ‘Near’ Monophthong or the ‘Near’ Diphthong
In non-rhotic accents, words like ‘near‘ and ‘fear‘ generally exhibit two pronunciation patterns: either a ‘centering’ diphthong (ɪə), which might crudely be transcribed ‘ih-uh;’ or as a monophthong, which is usually a lengthened version of the vowel in ‘kit‘ (ɪ:). … Continue reading
A New (Rhotic?) Dialect in New Zealand?
Needless to say, I was quite intrigued by this recent article at Stuff.co.nz about a new urban dialect spoken in South Auckland, New Zealand. A unique type of youthful, urban speech has emerged, not dissimilar to Multicultural British English in terms of … Continue reading
The Englishness of H-Dropping
Longtime readers may notice that I rarely discuss h-dropping. Novices might remember this accent feature from some unfortunate community theatre production of ‘My Fair Lady‘ in which the actress playing Eliza Doolittle bleats ”enry ‘iggins!’ Systematic h-droppers drop the letter ‘h’ at … Continue reading
Posted in British English Tagged class and accent, Cockney, Northern English accents, phonetics 37 Comments