In 'Life is Toff' on BBC 3 Does anyone know what created that upper class speech impediment?

[Noellefielding]

Do people like Francis Fulford actually have a speech impediment which makes him say 'wabbits' for 'rabbits' and 'Vair' for 'There:?

Is that an actual impediment or is it a historical affectation that turned into an impediment? It seems to be so common among that class of person.

I have difficulties with "r" too, though it's got better as I've got older.

But lots of people have it - look at Jonathan Ross. I don't think it's a particularly upper-class thing. Haven't seen the programme you're talking about.

I haven't seen the programme in question, but having studied a bit of phonetics at Uni as a 'sideline' I'm wondering if the gentleman had protruding teeth? If so, he will find himself making the sound 'th' (a voiced dental fricative)with his top teeth and bottom lip. It would come out as 'v'. I have noticed Sister Wendy doing the same thing, and she has protruding top teeth too.

I've heard recordings of George VI on TV, and he said 'w' for 'r'. For example 'realise' would be 'wealise'. The approximant 'r' uses the tongue, and if the latter is too short or inflexible, the lips come into play instead.

We studied all kinds of speech in Phonetics, including foreign languages with clicks (eg Kalahari bushmen) and reflex 'r' (eg many Indian languages such as Hindi) and I was so fascinated I became almost obsessed!

Regional accents are delicious, and I can't get enough of them. My niece has inherited our family talent for mimicry, and she can 'do' any accent you care to name. She could do this from the age of three, copying speech from the TV. All her Sylvanian families had their own accents, it was phenomenal!