Accent and Dialect

Question 1

Which department stores were surveyed in Labov’s New York Study?

Answer 1

Sak’s
Macy’s
Klein’s

Question 2

What speech feature did Labov’s New York study analyse?

Answer 2

The post-vocalic/ preconsonantal “r” in relation to socioeconomic status variation.
(Phonology)

Question 3

In what year was Labov’s New York study conducted?

Answer 3

1966

Question 4

What did Trudgill’s Norwich study analyse and who did he survey?

Answer 4

Non-standard forms such as g-dropping, as in “walkin’”.
(Grammar)
He sampled people from different electoral wards.

Question 5

What did Cheshire’s Reading study examine?

Answer 5

Non-standard “s”
Non-standard “has” and “was”
Double negation
Non-standard “what”
Non-standard “never”
Non-standard “do”
Non-standard “come”
“Ain’t” as an auxiliary “have”, auxiliary “be”, and a copula.
(Grammar)

Question 6

Define copula.

Answer 6

A word that links the subject of a sentence to a subject complement. (E.g. in the sentence “the sky is blue”, “is” is the copula).

Question 7

Which social variable did Labov’s Martha’s Vineyard study examine?

Answer 7

Loyalty.

Question 8

According to Giles’ Generalised Accent Prestige Continuum, which accents attract the highest prestige?

Answer 8

Received pronunciation, French-accented English, Edinburgh English, and one’s own accent.

Question 9

Which years did Howard Giles accent surveys take place? What trends were shown in the results?

Answer 9

1969, 2004, 2019
They all shared the same trends in accent, though the greatest change was the perception of the Indian accent, which garnered much higher ratings in 2019 than in 2004 and 1969.

Question 10

Which accents did Giles’ studies give consistently low ratings?

Answer 10

Ethnic minority accents (Indian, Caribbean), and historically industrial urban accents (Cockney, Liverpool, Essex, Birmingham).

Question 11

Give the order of accent prestige established in Giles’ Generalised Accent Prestige Continuum.

Answer 11

Received pronunciation
North American + French
German
South Welsh
Irish
Italian
Northern English
Somerset
Cockney + Indiam
Birmingham

Question 12

What did George Puttenham (1589) say about working class accents?

Answer 12

“the speach of a craftes man or carter, or of the other inferior sort… doe abuse good speaches by strange accents or ill shapen soundes.” (The Arte of English Poesie)

Question 13

What did Sharma’s study assess, and what did it conclude?

Answer 13

Real audio clips of job interviews were played to the participants, and they were asked to rank the accents. Comparatively, the differences between accents became smaller and people were more careful about letting accent bias affect whether they thought a person was a good fit for the job.
Younger people didn’t assess the accents differently at all.
Those above the age of 40 judged speakers of the two working class London accents to be less competent and less hireable, even though candidates gave exactly the same responses.
The same age pattern was found 15 years ago, suggesting not that the age pattern is a decline in bias over time, but that our views become more conventional as we age. Bias was also greater among people who grew up in southern England and were from a higher social class.

Question 14

Which accents did Sharma’s study assess, and how?

Answer 14

The 1014 participants heard five accents: received pronunciation(middle and upper class), estuary English (working or lower middle class), multicultural London English (young, multi-ethnic), general northern English (middle class), and urban West Yorkshire English (working-class).

Question 15

How did Sharma’s findings show themselves in the legal profession?

Answer 15

In a test of 61 lawyers, competency of candidates did not interfere whatsoever with their evaluation of candidates.

Question 16

Which study claimed that ethnic minority names on CVs received significantly fewer replies than Cs with typically white names?

Answer 16

2009 research from NatCen Social Research, commissioned by the government.

Question 17

In a 2013 study, what percentage of employers admitted to discriminating against candidates by accent?

Answer 17

76%

Question 18

What comments were made in informal feedback to Sharma?

Answer 18

One lawyer was told he would need elocution lessons before he could be introduced to a client.
One said “I will assume that someone with a posh accent is better educated, more intelligent, and reliable than someone with a less smart accent. I should emphasise that I don’t think it is right to do this, it’s just one of a series of snap judgements I make about people I meet.”

Question 19

What does Sharma’s informal feedback suggest about her earlier findings?

Answer 19

While people recognise their desire to promote equality and limit accent bias, this doesn’t mean professionals make the same effort in practice. However, it ultimately shows that people in positions of power can disregard their natural unconscious accent biases if they want to.

Question 20

Give examples of phonological variation in the North London accent.

Answer 20

G- dropping: words such as “morning” become “mornin’”.
Exchange of “l” phoneme for the “w” phoneme, meaning “school” becomes “scoow”.
Th-fronting, with exchange for the f phoneme, meaning “path” becomes “paff”.

Question 21

Give examples of phonological variation in the Kerry accent.

Answer 21

Lengthening of vowel sounds, shown in words such as “woke” which may be pronounced as “woorke”.
Alteration of monophthongs to be pronounced as diphthongs. For example, “school” may be pronounced as “schoowl”.
Absence of trap/ bath split, words such as “path”, pronounced as “pahth” in standard English, may be pronounced as “path”.

Question 22

Give examples of phonological variation in the Glasgow accent.

Answer 22

Lengthening of vowels, such as in words like “woke” which may be pronounced as “woorke”.
Rolling of “r”s in words such as “morning” (voiced alveolar trill).
Absence of trap/ bath split. “Path”, pronounced as “pahth” in Standard English, is pronounced as “path”.

Question 23

What proportion of passengers felt most safe with a male pilot speaking with a “posh accent”?

Answer 23

4/5, according to a Daily Mail article.

Question 24

Give the Daily Mail article’s findings on regional accents in relation to their pilot.

Answer 24

72% felt safe with an Edinburgh accent.
65% felt safe with a Geordie accent.
76% felt UNSAFE with a Brummie accent.
83% felt more safe with a male pilot than a female.

Question 25

How did Wilkinson (1965) classify accents?

Answer 25

First-class accents (RP, forms of Scottish and Irish)
Second-class accents (majority of British regional accents)
Third-class accents (certain large industrial towns)

Question 26

Define bidialectalism.

Answer 26

The ability to speak with two accents.

Question 27

What did Dr Hall and a team from University of York (2008) conclude about strength of accent and patriotism?

Answer 27

Accent and Identity on the Scottish-English Border found a very strong correlation between those who said they’d vote “yes” for Scottish independence and those with a very identifiable Scottish accent.

Question 28

What did Dr Damien Hall say about bidialectalism?

Answer 28

“Bidialectalism is almost always subconscious”
For people labelled “working-class” “there is no outside impulse at all to change how they speak”
“By contrast there are far fewer upper class people who have a regional accent to start with”
These factors aim to explain how bidialectalism is usually confined to the middle classes.
Both the working poor and powerful elite have historically stuck with their own.

Question 29

Where does Dr Hall’s study (2008) gain support form theory?

Answer 29

Labov’s Martha’s Vineyard study.

Question 30

Define covert prestige.

Answer 30

Prestige acquired in a community by using a non-standard language variety. This is intentional, as against bidialectalism.

Question 31

Define overt prestige.

Answer 31

Prestige acquired in a community by using standard/ formal language varieties associated with power and status.

Question 32

Outline Giles’ Accommodation Theory.

Answer 32

When people try to emphasise or minimise the social difference between themself and others in an interaction. The factors that lead to the accommodation activity are adjustments which can be made through verbal communication or through gestures.

Question 33

Define convergence.

Answer 33

A speaker modifies their speech to more closely resemble the addressee’s speech.

Question 34

Define divergence.

Answer 34

A process in which a speaker linguistically moves in the opposite direction to their speech partner in order to make their speech more unlike that of the person they are talking to.

Question 35

Give one example of phonological accent levelling.

Answer 35

In the 1950s, the proportion of people in the south-west of England who pronounced the “r” in “arm” exceeded 95%. As of 2016, this has dwindled to roughly 30% in areas such as Bristol and Cornwall and less than 5% in much of the surrounding region.

Question 36

Give one example of lexical levelling.

Answer 36

In the 1950s, the proportion of people who used the term “backend” instead of “autumn” was over 80% in much of Northern England. As of 2016, this usage has ceased entirely, as less than 1% across the whole of the British Aisles.

Question 37

What did a four-year study by Paul Kerswill and Dr Ann Williams suggest about regional accent?

Answer 37

Regional accent may be lost due to the levelling shown in the children of Milton Keynes.

Question 38

How was Kerswill and Williams’ interview conducted?

Answer 38

Dr Williams interviewed 48 children- half boys, half girls- from three age groups on two adjacent housing estates. A parent or carer was recorded for each child, as were elderly people who had been living in the area before the new town was built. They were asked to read from a list, given pronunciation tests, interviewed, and recorded talking to their friends.

Question 39

What phonological variables were recorded in the Milton Keynes study?

Answer 39

H-dropping and th-fronting. (e.g. “head” vs “ed” and “thing” vs “fing”).

Question 40

What was found in the Milton Keynes study?

Answer 40

Children of Milton Keynes, with a population of roughly 180,000 27 years after it was designated a new town, had adopted their own accent regardless of where their parents came from.

Question 41

What did Dr Williams say on the findings in accordance with age group?

Answer 41

“In the four-year-old age group they sounded quite like their parents because they had not started school, but by the time they were eight they sounded less like them, and by twelve they had few things in common with them linguistically.”

Question 42

Give phonological differences between traditional Buckinghamshire speech and the speech of children in Milton Keynes.

Answer 42

Buckinghamshire- “arm” as “arrm”, “night” as “noit”.
Milton Keynes children- “arm” as “ahm”, “night” as “naa-it”, similar to London accents.
The glottal stop (as in “water” becoming “wa’er”) is widely used in the new Milton Keynes accent.

Question 43

How could its findings be regarded according to the study?

Answer 43

It could be “regarded as a microcosm of developments in the south-east of England.” A levelling of accents is taking place all over the region.

Question 44

Give examples of counties whose accents may sound similar in the future.

Answer 44

Kent, Norfolk, and Devon.

Question 45

What is the difference between dialect levelling and ‘Estuary English’.

Answer 45

Estuary English is a new form of English in the south-east created by middle-class working people moderating their accents and upwardly mobile working-class people refining theirs.

Question 46

What does Kerswill believe to be the main reason for dialect levelling?

Answer 46

Population mobility.

Question 47

Give the five principle characteristics of the Norfolk accent.

Answer 47

1. It is non-rhotic, as is RP.
2. Does not usually exhibit h-dropping (different to many British regional accents).
3. Distinctive rhythm- some stressed vowels are longer than their RP equivalents, and some unstressed vowels are much shorter.
4. The foot-strut split is developed. The quality of the “u” in “strut” is more back and close than that of contemporary RP. It can be described as a centralized mid-back unrounded vowel.
5. Yod-dropping is common between consonants, “music” becoming “moosic”.

Question 48

Give three examples of grammatical difference in the Norfolk dialect.

Answer 48

-In the third-person present tense, the “s” at the end of verbs disappears so that “she goes” becomes “she go”. “Doesn’t” and “wasn’t” also become “don’t” and “weren’t” in the same way.
-Some verbs conjugate differently in Norfolk, “show” becoming “shew”, “snow “snew”, “drive” “driv”, and “sang” “sung”.
-The verb “to be” conjugates variously in the negative. “I’m not” may become “I en’t”, “I in’t”, “I aren’t”.
-The word “together” may be used when addressing multiple people to indicate the speaker is addressing a group. (E.g. “How are you getting on together?”).
-The word “never” has wider use, as a way of saying “did not”. (E.g. “I never did that.”)

Question 49

Give four examples of phonological variables in the Norfolk accent.

Answer 49

-Where RP has the rounded lot vowel in words containing the spellings “f”, “ff”, “gh”, or “th” (such as “often”, “off”, “cough”, “trough”, etc.) Norfolk show the “ou” phoneme as in “thought”. This is a manifestation of the lot/cloth split.
-Words with spelling “oa”, “oe”, snd “oCe” such as “boat”, “toe”, “code” sound like “boot”, “too”, “cood” respectively. An exception to that is words spelt with “ou”, “ow”, “ol” such as “soul”, “know”, “told” which have a diphthong quite similar to the RP. This is a preservation of the toe/tow distinction, lost in most modern English accents.
-Glottal stops are widely found in Norfolk speech so that “better” becomes “be-er”. Alternatively, /p, t, k/ may be pronounced with the glottal closure, as in “up-er” and “thik-er”. This pronunciation is also found when another consonant follows.
-In contexts where RP has the dark “l”, some older Norfolk speakers use the “clear l” so that the /l/ in “hill” and “milk” is pronounced similarly to the “l” at the start of “lip”. L-vocalisation is not as widespread in this accent as in other areas of England.