Surprise surprise - Kirsty has a Mini Sausage Roll in the oven! Discuss the Archers here

[PseudoBadger]

Happy New Year to you all.

I bloody hope so vango because I find accent prejudice to be one of the most pervasive and accepted "isms" on MN. And certain accents are open season for mockery and hatred.

Toby's visits to Brighton are always sudden and rushed so I don't think they can be for planned appointments such as probation officer or contact times with a child, hospital appointments for child etc.
He seems unable to ever get out of going as though there is some sort of compulsion so that makes me think it is shady, illegal. He takes chunks of cash. Also the still came from there.

Maybe Rex doesn't know himself?

I think he does, because ages ago, he said, "it'll be like Brighton all over again." Can't quite remember the context, though.

Don't think it can be probation, because it's not regular enough - and wouldn't he have to inform them of change of address and maybe transfer to a local probation team? Plus there's the money - I don't think the probation service expects people to randomly cough up £500 whenever it's clients come into a bit of cash.

I wondered if Rex's sporting career isn't the only one he's wrecked through idiotic behaviour, and there's some sort of blackmail going on.

I'm sure I'm right BOOP.

I read that statement to imply that the characters who are there to portray the working/lower middle classes are all allocated regional accents and RP is reserved for the landowning, wealthier types. For the purposes of distinguishing the haves from the have-nots in radio drama.

I'd say that's exactly how accents are used in TA.

Let's hope that's not how they are portrayed here then eh?

I wondered if Rex's sporting career isn't the only one he's wrecked through idiotic behaviour

• Wait. What? What did I miss? (I did actually miss a whole two weeks sometime in Autumn.) I thought Rex stopped playing through honest injury, nothing to do with Toby?

I thought Toby caused the injury. I might be misremembering, though.

(I'm turning into Jill, just blaming Toby for everything!)

BOOP that was me with the accent ref. Just popping back to clarify that Vango was absolutely right in her interpretation of my comment. Certainly not intended as a slur on the Brummie accent.

Of course Francis, but generally speaking, well-off equals neutral accent at the moment (was worried that BOOP was offended - didn't write the original comment but interpreted it differently!).

X post Lillian.

Good. Although that's not how it came across to me, though I may be a bit touchy about this on MN. It really is such a judgy place about accents.

I'm not a Brummie btw

Blimey BOOP I think that the largest judgey pants are donned on MN for the 'quite understandable' typos and bad spellings. There's not a lot of kindness around where they' re concerned

The whole accent thing could be subject for an entire paper for the Academic Archers conference! For me the Brummie accent (on TA) seems to indicate townie - e.g. Jeck Woolie, Hayley, Vicky. When Hayley first began it was much more pronounced then watered down with the change of actress - not sure if this was a deliberate decision to indicate how well she had established herself or just how the new actress sounded. Kirsty is interesting as she is not a local, but comes from an indeterminate place (where do her family live?) she is neither posh, nor Borsetshire burr and certainly not Brummie. Alan and Richard are indistinguishable northerners (professional incomers accent?). Johnny is also northern though much broader to remind us he didn't grow up in Ambridge. Ruari inexplicably held onto his Irish accent for much longer than was realistic presumably for a similar reason. Matt (oh how wish 2017 would be year he returns) had more than a hint of Cockmey wideboy And who could forget professional northerner Heather Pet whose accent became more and more exaggerated until it eventually killed her (though ironically she went out singing a Cockney ditty). There's no doubt the accents are a kind of shorthand in radio drama where we can't see the actors.

ppeat maybe. But the accent thing is very nasty at times.

Interestingly Usha (from Wolverhampton) is a professional with a quite authentic accent from where she's from.

There's no doubt the accents are a kind of shorthand in radio drama where we can't see the actors

Not just radio. TV and film are just as bad

Brummie = thick
Liverpudlian = shady
Cockney = wide
North east = friendly
Yorkshire = tight

I could go on

Do you think we could launch a public appeal for Matt's return Lillian? I miss him the most.

The whole accent thing could be subject for an entire paper for the Academic Archers conference!

We had a paper on accents last year.

That would make a good paper, as would EBearhug's comparison of Emma vs Helen.

I wanted to add a small BOOP for Phoebe and Abbie going to stay with Roy at NY - I'm glad someone has remembered he has another child at long last!

Quick question- Did they ever explain how Kaz came to be released from the slammer?

Thankyou for the new thread and happy new year!

Jessie I don't remember why she was in there in the first place?

I don't remember if they explained it jessie it's difficult to listen to every single word isn't it?