To want my children to speak beautifully

[MiniMonty]

I'm a Londoner, we use "nice round vowels" so bath is "baarth" and grass is "graars" but I live in Birmingham with a partner from Sheffield and my kids use flat vowels which, I confess, are simply ugly on my ears.
Am I being unreasonable to want (and to encourage) my kids to use "round vowels" and to have a Southern (BBC or RP) accent ?

I did have one university lecturer who spoke in a very strong working class accent. And it sounded thoroughly affected, as we all knew that his dad was a professor and he had never been near a working class life.

YABU - BBC now have a range of presenters with a range of accents. No-one speaks RP on the BBC now and RP is far from "beautiful"! I used to say grarss and barth but have moved west and now round my vowels even further, I fool no-one though, they all guess my sarf-east roots.

Interestingly, my parents are geordies who moved to Essex and they hated the unnecessary rounding and lengthening of vowels, they thought it was ugly and common and persistently corrected me when I was younger. I used to manage two accents, one for home and one for school etc.

I like all different accents generally and as long as someone speaks with intellegence their accent wouldn't make me feel differently about them (I even include RP in this).

It is not my experience ay all that people who work in universities speak RP, or even insert the 'R's

Using different accents doesn't make you able to communicate with more people

x-posts again. Maybe that's the accent I can do then, when In Company.

or On The Phone

We don't do extra R's either, Crackers, but nobody in this vicinity seems to pronounce the letter T and I can't help thinking it may be useful for dcs to at least know that it exists. I have been known to drop it myself, don't see anything wrong with it, but wouldn't necessarily do so in say a job interview or in any other context where people around me do pronounce it.

What the FECK is a working class accent?!

What the FECK is a working class accent?!

Oddly enough, research showed (a while ago admittedly) that the best Queen's English was spoken in Inverness.
This was/is because there were fewer idioms and "slang" up there than anywhere else in the country.

Add to this the fact that Invernesians have a lovely lilting accent OP and consider moving there.

Although they may not accept your rather weird view on life. You sound tedious.

RP sounds absolutely hideous - Mr Cholmondley-Warner and all that.

second that question bejeezus and also where the ef is the OP? Obviously not a genuine post - effers!

"Using different accents doesn't make you able to communicate with more people"

I found it did. When I first moved here, some of the other mums thought I sounded snobbish and stuck up because of my accent. I found we got on better= communicated better, when I modified my accent a little. On the other hand, I didn't feel using the full Southampton accent was the best way of communicating my suitability for the academic post I was interviewed for, so again I modified things slightly.

The OP is finishing his/her homework.

Or his/her mum has sent him/her to bed.

Notwithstanding the disappearance of the OP, I'm with villagebikermum way upthread.

Children can be bilingual accent-wise. They can 'speak nicely' and yet still switch to the local accent and vocabulary.

It doesn't matter what they speak like- they will sound strange to most people.
If they live in Birmingham then they wll stand out like sore thumbs with a bbc accent!

I agree that you'd use slightly modified language in different situations (like my mum's best Phone Voice, or my own finest pub voice)

But

I think the OP's idea of getting his kids to speak in a London/RP accent when they live in Birmingham is only going to cause unneccessary stress (for want of a better word) in the long run. Make sure they can conduct polite conversation and don't speak like they would when talking to their mates if they're going to be interviewed for Head of Department or whatever.

I agree cory. DP is a master of this. I know who he is on the phone to when he is working just from the accent he uses. Its all Medway Towns Geezer when he's talking to suppliers and contractors, but seconds later when he's courting his Creative Agency clients he's rocking the Nathan Barley. Then when his Sugar Daddy business investor calls, any accent vanishes altogether unless kiss arse could be considered an accent

bejeezus Sun 08-Jan-12 00:53:26
"What the FECK is a working class accent?!"

My post referred to an experience abroad and the lecturer I spoke of had adopted his accent deliberately as a measure of solidarity with the working classes. In the city in question it is very much a question of intonation, the quality of certain vowels (i in particular) and the way in which you pronounce d and t.

There is a big difference in speaking with a local accent and using street slang/ bad grammer
It is possible to speak 'nicely' with a regional accent

I do agree, Cracker, that the OPs idea is bound to end in tears. Not least because it rests on the idea of one accent out of many is superior in itself, rather than simply suited to a particular situation.

Surely no-one speaks like that in RL? Apart from the Queen maybe?

And a Polish friend of mine from University who had taught herself to speak English listening to the World Service, she sounded like she'd escaped from a Noel Coward play.

You see, I went to University, with the clever southern people, with their hideous whining voices beautiful vowels, despite having an unreconstructed Black Country accent.

If you stay in the Midlands your children will have Midlands accents, there is nothing you can do about this. It is in fact a wonderful thing, the accents and dialects of Birmingham and the Black Country area (to the native ear they are as different as German and Spanish) are colourful, onomatopoeic and full life, much better than stilted lifeless RP.

I suppose the alternative is elocution lessons, but one or two things will happen. They will either rebel and thicken their natural Midlands accent, or have every shade of shite kicked out of them at school for talking like little Lord Fauntleroy.

YABU and there are no Rs in Bath.

It's a little strange to imagine one's children growing up to say things differently (I am a Northerner living in the South East), but it's a fact of life.

I don't have a problem with people teaching their kids to speak correctly (t in water, etc), but insisting on 'round vowels' is just offensive - half the country manage perfectly well without them, thank you.

You changed your accent so you felt you fitted in better. That doesn't mean they couldn't understand you before.

My accent is very much part of who I am. I would never adjust it to fit in. And I will certainly be teaching my kids to be true to themselvees

Good grammer, syntax, confidence and manners is what makes you able to communicate

Dione I completely understand.

Amen, Bejeezus.