Accent and Dialect Flashcards
Which department stores were surveyed in Labov’s New York Study?
Sak’s
Macy’s
Klein’s
What speech feature did Labov’s New York study analyse?
The post-vocalic/ preconsonantal “r” in relation to socioeconomic status variation.
(Phonology)
In what year was Labov’s New York study conducted?
1966
What did Trudgill’s Norwich study analyse and who did he survey?
Non-standard forms such as g-dropping, as in “walkin’”.
(Grammar)
He sampled people from different electoral wards.
What did Cheshire’s Reading study examine?
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)
Define copula.
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).
Which social variable did Labov’s Martha’s Vineyard study examine?
Loyalty.
According to Giles’ Generalised Accent Prestige Continuum, which accents attract the highest prestige?
Received pronunciation, French-accented English, Edinburgh English, and one’s own accent.
Which years did Howard Giles accent surveys take place? What trends were shown in the results?
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.
Which accents did Giles’ studies give consistently low ratings?
Ethnic minority accents (Indian, Caribbean), and historically industrial urban accents (Cockney, Liverpool, Essex, Birmingham).
Give the order of accent prestige established in Giles’ Generalised Accent Prestige Continuum.
Received pronunciation
North American + French
German
South Welsh
Irish
Italian
Northern English
Somerset
Cockney + Indiam
Birmingham
What did George Puttenham (1589) say about working class accents?
“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)
What did Sharma’s study assess, and what did it conclude?
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.
Which accents did Sharma’s study assess, and how?
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).
How did Sharma’s findings show themselves in the legal profession?
In a test of 61 lawyers, competency of candidates did not interfere whatsoever with their evaluation of candidates.
Which study claimed that ethnic minority names on CVs received significantly fewer replies than Cs with typically white names?
2009 research from NatCen Social Research, commissioned by the government.
In a 2013 study, what percentage of employers admitted to discriminating against candidates by accent?
76%
What comments were made in informal feedback to Sharma?
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.”
What does Sharma’s informal feedback suggest about her earlier findings?
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.
Give examples of phonological variation in the North London accent.
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”.
Give examples of phonological variation in the Kerry accent.
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”.
Give examples of phonological variation in the Glasgow accent.
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”.
What proportion of passengers felt most safe with a male pilot speaking with a “posh accent”?
4/5, according to a Daily Mail article.
Give the Daily Mail article’s findings on regional accents in relation to their pilot.
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.
How did Wilkinson (1965) classify accents?
First-class accents (RP, forms of Scottish and Irish)
Second-class accents (majority of British regional accents)
Third-class accents (certain large industrial towns)
Define bidialectalism.
The ability to speak with two accents.
What did Dr Hall and a team from University of York (2008) conclude about strength of accent and patriotism?
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.
What did Dr Damien Hall say about bidialectalism?
“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.
Where does Dr Hall’s study (2008) gain support form theory?
Labov’s Martha’s Vineyard study.
Define covert prestige.
Prestige acquired in a community by using a non-standard language variety. This is intentional, as against bidialectalism.
Define overt prestige.
Prestige acquired in a community by using standard/ formal language varieties associated with power and status.
Outline Giles’ Accommodation Theory.
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.
Define convergence.
A speaker modifies their speech to more closely resemble the addressee’s speech.
Define divergence.
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.
Give one example of phonological accent levelling.
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.
Give one example of lexical levelling.
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.
What did a four-year study by Paul Kerswill and Dr Ann Williams suggest about regional accent?
Regional accent may be lost due to the levelling shown in the children of Milton Keynes.
How was Kerswill and Williams’ interview conducted?
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.
What phonological variables were recorded in the Milton Keynes study?
H-dropping and th-fronting. (e.g. “head” vs “ed” and “thing” vs “fing”).
What was found in the Milton Keynes study?
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.
What did Dr Williams say on the findings in accordance with age group?
“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.”
Give phonological differences between traditional Buckinghamshire speech and the speech of children in Milton Keynes.
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.
How could its findings be regarded according to the study?
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.
Give examples of counties whose accents may sound similar in the future.
Kent, Norfolk, and Devon.
