Well spoken areas - Accents

[arizonagirl]

Hi there,

We currently live in Surrey and I have to admit - the accent is really nice and the children speak so nicely. Always gets comments.

Ok, so we are looking at preps in another home county (probably Hertfordshire/Bucks/Berks). I am going to probably get really slated for this thread but hey...I am intrigued and really do wish to know people's thoughts. Which areas within an hour of London could we go to where people are very well spoken eg. 'yes' instead of 'yeah' etc. Not too impressed with Kent, Essex, Epsom tbh. Looking at Bishops Stortford - any thoughts.

Thanks!

aarazoona gal I were taking the pisss maety, goodon everyone bless has an accent they just donie know it me cockles or meants depending on which southern point ye come frum

but accents on children are so adorable! DD1 moved from Wicklow to Durham and she has a lovely way of speaking, bless her. So I would definitely recommend moving to Ireland or the North East.

"And I think, Bishops Stortford would probably be a bit too much of a change from around here"

Ah, the gritty north that is Hertfordshire!

I am fine with accents - that isn't the problem. But cockney, Essex....now, that is where I'm not happy. Oh ivykaty44, how disappointing - I thought you were talking sense. Perhaps home-educating is the answer - I am a deputy headteacher fwiw. Now you will all be wanting to know which school I work at :)

Arizonagirl, you ain't a deputy headteacher you're too ignorant love!

Have enjoyed this thread - thank you. Now time for me to leave : o : o

Oh dear, ignorant me - must try that again. Not as well versed as all the other people on here. Was meant to say :o :O

But cockney, Essex....now, that is where I'm not happy** so would the west country accent be ok meants

I have a cockney father and a west country mother

not so much int he line of accents but it is the sayings that I mix up together and never am to sure which place they come from?

I love the Birmingham accents and sayings !i" and west country people that say "me lover" it is just the way they pronounce there particular phrases that is lovely about visiting differnet parts.

i rememebr meeting a chap in beijing and him telling me he was from kent, well we travelled together for a few days and eventually I plucked up courgage to ask after around 5 days why if he was from Kent did he have a welsh accent?

Why is the area relevant? Surely you would only send your children to a school that offered proper elocution lessons and a body of children who elocute properly?

What a mad thread!

We actually live around Bishops Stortford and DS has recently developed a 70 year old man's voice, so you can never can tell.

If you're willing to commute for two hours instead of one, try York preps.

You could come to Surrey.

But we have a very strict admissions policy.

You can only be admitted if you can simultaneously chew 3 toffees and say 'Imagine an imaginary menagerie manager imagining managing an imaginary menagerie' whilst walking in a straight line with a book on your head.

Oh dear.

All this toffee-chewing made me miss that you are already in Surrey.

Never mind.

Why would you leave, then?

Do you not like toffees?

Shodan, thanks for making me smile. You see what I mean, only you have come up with the only place that has a well-spoken accent (which was my exact point in the first place). No, I won't be leaving Surrey afterall. It's damn pricey but I have realised how much I really do love toffees afterall. Off to the shops (Guildford, naturally :o )

This is a daft thread - I was called (accused would be more accurate) a 'posh talker' when a child at school in Leeds - I had a Scouser for a Dad (who had working class Scotch Irish parents and who went to University) and a Mother from Northants (her Dad was Canadian and her Mum from Sunderland) while my siblings have picked up the Essex accent from when we moved to 'arlow. - I ended up with a very mixed up accent - with hard A from the Northern influences but basically a RP ish sounding Home Counties type voice.

I was nearly 15 when we moved dahn sarf and kept some of my Yorkshire accent but then went to Lancs for a while then London and now Beds. I would say my accent was 'neutral' if I didn't know better, but I think even 'enry 'iggins would have trouble placing accents in todays mixed up mobile population.

If you are sending your children to school in Sarrey you will get plummy voiced children most likely....

You can't beat a man with a Sheffield accent, thinking Sean Bean or similar Phwoar! :)

All depends what they hear at home. Here in London I have a charmingly delightful chum who sent her three gals to the local prep for about 30k per annum net. There was a big difference between them and mine who went to the local state CofE. Hers said "fack orf" so much more impressively!!

I was born in East London, live in Essex and everyone says I speak "posh".

Pronunciation and enunciation and vocabulary are far more important than accents.

To add to Cortina's Bean-worship: Bradford accent, Kimberley Walsh, double phwoargh!

Arizonagirl I live in Essex and certainly do not say innit and nor do any of my friends. I think you are being very ignorant and obviously have very little to worry about about.

Scottish accents are the best don't you know?

I think it's funny that most Scottish people pronounce English words more precisely than most English people .

UnquietDad
I'm from Bradford but my accent doesn't usually have that effect on people

Maybe it's because I don't quite look like Kimberley Walsh

Loving this

I am the offspring of a Liverpool Mother (with Irish Father and Scottish Mother) and a 1940's public school educated father. I grew up between Liverpool and West Claire in Ireland. I got called 'posh' in through my state education in Liverpool and they said I didn't have a Liverpool accent although when away people could tell I was from Liverpool however I am a bit of an accent morph, I don't realise I do it but I take the accent of where ever I am, I remember going over to Ireland and when I dropped the hire car back off the guy asked me where about in Ireland I lived... I had only been there for 2 weeks! (I did have a base of having spent every single school holiday in Ireland since I was small though).
I now live in Oxfordshire, have done for 5 years, people have no idea I am from Liverpool until I tell them!
My children have I guess quite a well spoken accent, I remember my dd and my dn on a visit to Liverpool stud arguing about how to pronounce the words 'bath' and grass'.
The funny thing is I know my accent has changed and I can 'do' a Liverpool accent but I can not comfortable speak like that day to day, I have become very much 'Oxfordshire', funny thing is I would say that there is not really a real Oxfordshire accent, not one you would here and say 'ahh yes, that's Oxford'