To find snobbery around vocabulary very silly?

[crayolacom]

I too don't particularly like the idea of regional dialects and differences disappearing, but language does change and everyone should just deal with it!

I wonder if Shakespeare would be moaning about the modern lexicon if he was alive!

@imyournextdoorneighbour

I am tolerant about regional accents but some things seriously wind me up, the worst one being the letter H. It is 'aitch' it is in the dictionary as 'aitch' so why tf do people say 'haitch'? No one says 'feff' for 'eff' or 'lel' for 'el'. So WHY haitch.

Thank you!!!! I tell people all the time it's aitch not haitch and they think I'm mad. I also really don't like when people say I instead of me.

Agree with you, OP. Sadly (and pointlessly) there are quite a few posters on this board who can't help themselves but pick at people's SPaG, so vocabulary will not be exempt from that.

I haven't read the thread yet but I would put money on it being heavily peppered with other 'dislikes' that posters have. Same old, same old.

@Iminaglasscaseofemotion

I can accept that language changes, and I find regional differences quite interesting, what I can't stand are things that are just wrong e.g bought instead of brought, and vice versa. That's just wrong, and I see it on here all the time. I can't really talk about spag though because I'm dyslexic and really quite shit at getting things right and spotting my mistakes.

That's just autocorrect. A common autocorrect at that.

I was taught, in school in 1957 (Girls Grammar School)
Different - from
Similar - to
Compared - with
I know that language changes over time.

And I always find that the people who can’t tell the difference between a Sheffield, Hull, Manchester and Newcastle accent seem to have no problem differentiating between Essex, Kent, Bristol, North London and South London accents

Why on earth would that be surprising if those are accents they are more familiar with in the areas where they've lived? Even when you hear less familiar accents quite frequently (e.g. on tv, radio etc), you don't necessarily associate them with the specific area they come from.

I moved to Cumbria a few years ago, not far from Yorkshire and very near the Lancs border, having been a lifelong southerner. I'm now pretty good at identifying accents from this part of the country. The fact that I wasn't before was not down to prejudice.

What a load of bollocks. Accent and language use are two very different things. Language use may tell you more about a person in certain respects but an accent tells you no more than where they were brought up.

It's not a load of bollocks at all. Even if we just concentrate on accent, I can't believe anyone would try to claim that accent is classless. For example are you claiming there's no difference between a posh London accent and a cockney one then? Or would you say there is a difference but you'd claim it was entirey based on your location within London and nothing to do with your family or social class?

Is this true? I am C of I and went to a private school (protestant) in Dublin and we all said haitch as well.

Sorry, I might have drawn the wrong generalisation there! My parents are from the north of Ireland (but not NI), and that's how they explained it to me. Maybe it's more of a NI/ROI difference that becomes politically charged if you live nearer the border, or in NI itself?

I was born in England but went to a RC primary school in London with lots of Irish and Irish descent children (and teachers) and we were taught to say haitch.

@lovingmyppe

I'm from Northern Ireland original, but live elsewhere now. I'm extremely offended that there are some in this thread criticising the way the letter "H" is pronounced. In Northern Ireland if I was in the wrong place at the wrong time with the wrong pronunciation, I could potentially have been in a troublesome situation. There is a place for both, and no one should judge.

that sounds a real tight rope @lovingmyppe :-/

@m0therofdragons

The aitch / haitch thing annoys me because the argument is always so bizarre about it starting with h because that’s the letter. We don’t have wouble-u. The Irish origins makes more sense and explains my dad’s insistence on aitch - his granddad was Irish Protestant.

It’s not the same. It’s drummed into people from an early age that dropping the H from the beginning of words is incorrect/lower class/poorly educated speech. (}In Hertford, Hereford and Hampshire, hurricanes hardly ever happen” etc etc). So they apply it to “aitch” as well, because of this association. Kind of like how children are repeatedly told “It’s ‘Josh and I ‘ not ‘Josh and me’!” without having the difference between subject and object properly explained - So they then use “Josh and I” even when it should be “me” - eg “Give it to Josh and I”. If dropping the W from words were a similar cultural and social marker, people might say “wouble-you”.

Sorry but I wince at bad grammar - particularly- I done I seen, we was - I have a strong regional accent use some bizarre colonialism’s and say haitch tho. Had to explain to partner this week what cowping is and recently also lepping as in cow cowping and the dog was lepping all over the bed

@Knitterbabe

Is ‘axe’ instead of ‘ask’ a regional thing? Or ethnic?

What do you mean by 'ethnic'? We're all "ethnic". Or do you mean a specific ethnicity?

I'd think not for a whole ethnicity. It's more a particular regional way of speaking, whether it's wrong or right, it's just the way some people say it.

So funny and again, narrow-minded how many people don't realise everybody has an accent and your accent is also HEAVY/THICK to some people.

No one really has a neutral accent...atleast not to everyone. Your 'neutral accent' will be to those who're used to your accent or can't tell where it's from or it's considered 'standard or neutral' where you're from. To those who've never heard it or not used to it, you have a heavy/thick accent.

‘
Is ‘axe’ instead of ‘ask’ a regional thing? Or ethnic?
What do you mean by 'ethnic'? We're all "ethnic". Or do you mean a specific ethnicity? ‘

I don’t understand why that was confusing. We are also all regional but you seemed to understand that meaning clearly enough.

didn’t USE to like watching

I’d generally say “I used not to like” or “I usen’t to like ...”

I don't understand why you have a problem with me being confused enough that I asked a question, then guessed what I thought was meant. I don't understand why my post bothered you so much that you took it upon yourself to confront me about it.

"So funny and again, narrow-minded how many people don't realise everybody has an accent and your accent is also HEAVY/THICK to some people.

No one really has a neutral accent...atleast not to everyone. Your 'neutral accent' will be to those who're used to your accent or can't tell where it's from or it's considered 'standard or neutral' where you're from. To those who've never heard it or not used to it, you have a heavy/thick accent."

People on MN are obsessed with "not having an accent", because heaven forbid something were to mark them out as gasp working class.

People on MN are obsessed with "not having an accent", because heaven forbid something were to mark them out as gasp working class

Agree. Also, the obsession with social class on MN is bordering on toxic. Everything has to be allocated to a class or seen from the lens of classism.

It's quite sad to see people acting so brainwashed about who they are while thinking they're being "classy"/'cultured'/'educated'.

Middle class this, UC that, LC this, working class that. Goodness.

@lazylinguist

What a load of bollocks. Accent and language use are two very different things. Language use may tell you more about a person in certain respects but an accent tells you no more than where they were brought up.

It's not a load of bollocks at all. Even if we just concentrate on accent, I can't believe anyone would try to claim that accent is classless. For example are you claiming there's no difference between a posh London accent and a cockney one then? Or would you say there is a difference but you'd claim it was entirey based on your location within London and nothing to do with your family or social class?

Sadly, I can believe someone would try and claim an accent defines your social class. People like you have projected these lazy stereotypes for years and people with strong accents have had to deal with your ignorance as a consequence.

What class do we all fit into then? Every single scouser, Geordie, brummie, Glaswegian? What class are we all based on our accent?

The type of person who would hear my accent and make snap decisions on who I am as a person, what ‘class’ I belong to etc, when in reality they know nothing about me and are just making their own ignorant generalisations based on incorrect stereotypes is not the sort of person I give much time of day to.

@MeltsAway

didn’t USE to like watching

I’d generally say “I used not to like” or “I usen’t to like ...”

I agree that’s more elegant.

@StillCoughingandLaughing

‘Off of’ drives me mad. There’s no need for the ‘of’!! And it sounds so clumsy that I just can’t understand how people don’t know it’s wrong.

I might be out in a minority here, but I think "off of" is correct, when "off" is part of a phrasal verb, and "of" is the preposition. Eg "to drop off" is a verb, same as to "to drop out".

I think maybe there is not one right answer to this.

Language does change, however, not all language change is the same.

Sometimes there is a change is use that means a useful bit of language is lost. I feel this way about the phrase "begs the question" which is often used now to mean something completely different - as a replacement for raises the question. I tend to resist this because the phrase "begs the question" is actually pretty useful and there is already a perfectly good way to say raises the question. It's just that people mix them up because most don''t know the difference and they sound similar, but it's easy enough to understand for anyone.

Then there are attempts by factions of some kind to change language in line with an agenda. That's a type of attempted thought control and should be resisted.

Sometimes too you see people object to regional or class based accents because they see something in them as crass or non-PC - like calling someone a pet name. I have no time for that.

@SmokedDuck

I think maybe there is not one right answer to this.

Language does change, however, not all language change is the same.

Sometimes there is a change is use that means a useful bit of language is lost. I feel this way about the phrase "begs the question" which is often used now to mean something completely different - as a replacement for raises the question. I tend to resist this because the phrase "begs the question" is actually pretty useful and there is already a perfectly good way to say raises the question. It's just that people mix them up because most don''t know the difference and they sound similar, but it's easy enough to understand for anyone.

Then there are attempts by factions of some kind to change language in line with an agenda. That's a type of attempted thought control and should be resisted.

Sometimes too you see people object to regional or class based accents because they see something in them as crass or non-PC - like calling someone a pet name. I have no time for that.

Please explain what begs the question means

I have been an expat for years and something that has always fascinated me is how fellow expats begin to speak English in the same way the non English mother tongue speakers form their sentences. An example off the top of my big frazzled head is 'You will deliver the baby where?', rather than 'Where will you have the baby?' or 'I erased my mistake' rather than 'I rubbed it out'. All these sentences are perfectly understandable of course, but I think it's interesting to hear people who grew up speaking like me, developing a kind of inverted version of their own first language. I am sure I do it too, and I think its great to expand your style of speaking to reflect your experience.

• my examples are crap **does anybody know what I'm talking about above? *I'm very tired

I do that.
I'll say "we can do or this or that"
Then I slap myself round the head and remember I need an "either" in there.

Thejoyfulstar

I know what you mean, I grew up in England and speak English better than Italian, but if I ever spend time speaking in English with my Italian cousins so they can practice, after about half an hour I sound like the Dolmio advert (I have a home counties accent usually).