To wonder what your views are on 'working class' accents

[Timri]

And think people need to learn the difference between the words correct and standard
Inspired by a comment by somebody saying they didn't look down on anybody's accent, but hated words being pronounced 'incorrectly' such as 'bovvered'.
Uhm, it's called th fronting and it's one of the central features of a cockney accent FFS.
Please tell me I'm not alone in this?

Pteranodon I did the same, thought I was missing something.

I'm wondering if Bobo's post was a joke?

Michelle Dockery's dad is Irish.

Eh Deo, did you read my post?
It specifically stated to take my comment in a spirit of fun.

AyeAmorock I thought aristocratic Scottish people spoke with a posh English accent?

They do. Some of them may have a teeny tiny Scottish lilt but in general they sound generically posh.

I'm from South London and can tell which part of london most people are from by their accent. I think my accent comes as a bit of a surprise to most people that meet me - we live in a very MC area and if you look at me and the family we are like a bloody boden catalogue (no literally but you know what I mean) I have a nice middle class job in tennis of all things. When I open my mouth people are a bit taken a back - I sound like a SE london version of Barbara Windsor having a common day!

"A lot of "working class accents" are actually regional accents that have retained more dialect features. Middle class accents tend to be regional accents that have less dialect features"

Yes, I suppose and I think the OP is actually talking about dialect more than accent i.e. the choice of words rather than intonation. However, I don't think working class accent is necessarily regional as many of the features can be found in different regions e.g. dropping 'h's or using 'me' instead of 'my'.

i'm working class, female, ethnic migrant, northern,brought up in a densely asian-populated mill town, in a family that was even back then classed as living 'below the poverty line'. Had a free education at my local nursery/primary/junior/secondary/college - none of it was grammar or private. i'm as common as common is.....

Yet the first impression people get of me when i open my mouth is 'posh, rich, must have had a private education'

I used to get picked on in school for the way i spoke and the vocabulary i used. Once i entered the adult world of employment etc i noticed that people made big assumptions about me....and once they got to know me they were very surprised to know my 'class'

i was socially isolated as a child and growing up. i was only allowed to socialise at school/6th form college during school hours. i wasn't allowed to hang out with friends, play out after school, hang out with cousins etc. Luckily i was born with a love for reading and i'd devour any book i could get my hands on. i wasn't allowed to watch tv much, so the radio was my best friend - especially the talk shows.

So i believe that's where i got my 'accent' and vocabulary from. For me the way i speak is normal and has nothing to do with class/money.

Still tickles me every time people make the wrong assumption about me...and i still love playing along with it i still love the shocked/surprised look on their faces when they realise i'm actually just 'one of them' .

Saying that, i have noticed the positive discrimination-in my favour-based completely on the assumption that i must be middle/upper middle class. I think it's disgusting that this kind of discrimination still exists in our society.

"Saying that, i have noticed the positive discrimination-in my favour-based completely on the assumption that i must be middle/upper middle class. I think it's disgusting that this kind of discrimination still exists in our society."

Yes, I've noticed people in better jobs having posh accents and wondered if they were promoted because of that.

Its absolute bollocks.

I have a very strong scouse accent. Both prents grew up on working class estates in Croxteth. I grew up in a prestigious part of Chester, yet still have my scouse accent.

I know someone with a "naice" southern accent yet shes rough as a trolls shit.

Im really struggling to see why on earth anyone would give a shit about what someone else sounds like

Well I don't really give a shit about what other people sound like, but I do give a shit about what I sound like because I want people to understand what I say.

This thread is so typical of the UK - this simple point gets obscured by lots of wibble about class.

AyeAmorock I thought aristocratic Scottish people spoke with a posh English accent?

They sound very definitely Scottish to me.

I do know a lot of Edinburgh people who are desperate to tell me that they are so MC Edinburgh that their accent is English. They also sound nothing but Scottish and a bit desperate to me.

I have a fairly neutral but very definitely Irish accent. I often get teased by my (posh) workmates for pronouncing my r's, and my general Hiberno English phrases. I also find it very odd hearing my 20month old saying certain words in RP (which she is obviously not picking up at home!). I don't think in Ireland there is quite as much focus on accents- I work in a traditionally upper class field but certainly in Ireland don't find that most of my colleagues speak with a similar accent, whereas it was one of the first things I noticed when I moved to London.

I have a north London accent. I worked in a very upmarket shop and put on a fake posh accent when speaking to customers, as did the other staff. Although in the stockroom it sounded like the Eastenders cast was in there.

Dh is Irish, he also tones it down for work. Although i'm sure his coworkers heard it full throttle after he drank half the bar at the Christmas party last night.

The result is our children sound slightly Australian.

I recently spoke with someone I'd not seen since I left England for NZ well over a decade ago. She said my accent had got posher.

She's right. I switched to RP because I couldn't pick up a local accent and I was fed up with being asked to repeat myself. RP is an accent that is understood everywhere. A good many regional UK accents really aren't.

I was relentlessly bullied at school for being 'posh' (among other things). I am not remotely posh, very average middle-class-ish background. I just have an RP accent. I don't know where it came from; my mum has an accent that is far more 'local' to where we're from than mine.
Nothing wrong with working class accents as far as I'm concerned! DP is Essex born and bred and sounds it and I love it. I think my accent makes me come across as unfriendly

I think it is really sad that people are talking about accents they can't stand or accents that "grate".Very discriminating and perpetuating the inequalities we see in society. It's like being racist. Culprits - For goodness sake try to overcome this affliction and be more open-minded.

threespike

It's not discriminating to point out that certain accents are hard to understand.

Take how a good many people in London speak now. They run all their vowels together and almost consciously turn Ls into Ws. Fine, I suppose, if you only ever talk to people with the same accent (and who are not hard of hearing), but otherwise it poses certain problems for the listener.

Saying it's about class not communication is the worst sort of victim mentality.

Accents don't bother me at all but I am sometimes jarred by certain common grammatical mistakes that seem to go with them. I know a lot of Essex people, for example, who say we was and we done instead of were and did but then I am anal when it comes to grammar.

The only accent feature I do dislike a little is with Scouse- the accent in general I don't dislike, except when some people make the 'K' sound it sounds like they're retching or something- does anyone know what I mean? I'm not explaining it very well...

AyeAmarok you should YouTube Rose Leslie- actress from Downton Abbey and GoT. A proper Scottish aristo but has the poshest RP accent ever!

I live in Huyton just outside Liverpool and ds goes to school in Prescot ( as shown on map by pp ) and I don't see a difference in accents to be honest, it's more towards St Helens the difference becomes apparent. My ds thinks I talk posh and it makes me laugh! I grew up on a rough estate but have lived in a few places and have a lighter scouse accent. When I was in America I was constantly asked if I was Australian :) I'm also fascinated by accents and love working out where people come from! Class doesn't come into it for me. Some of the most well off people I know have the strongest regional accents.
There are huge variations of the scouse accent though and it's just accepted that some people speak broader than others, in the song " in my Liverpool home " it says " we speak with an accent exceedingly rare " make of that what you want :)

You can definitely tell the difference between huyton and prescot well I can anyway but I've come from a family with the 'scally' accent which I have even though I've lived in the 'posh part' of Liverpool for about 20 years!

I spent a long time disliking my accent, which being from SE London is a cockney/estuary type hybrid. But if you're raised by people that sound like it and surrounded by people sounding the same growing up how do you change it to please people who are grated by your lack of th's

Eventually, I took my dads advice. Sound however you sound and if people automatically think that makes you stupid/common more fool them.

(To be honest, I don't know how I'd define my class anymore! Working class folk wouldn't think I fit in with them and I probably wouldn't make the grade to some middle class people either.)

I cant differentiate between London accents but I can tell the difference between a manc and salford one

My accent is as common as they come

If people struggle to understand you, then you are speaking incorrectly in the strictest sense.

There are some accents which are very hard for people not from the area to understand which is fine if you've no intention of leaving that area.

Always confuses me when people think going up university changes class automatically. Broadly speaking it will change the class of your future children not you.

I won't change my accent for anyone I shouldn't have to.