Regional non-RP Accents of England

           The division of regional accents into southern and northern is very approximate, because there are western and eastern accents, but their main accent variations correspond either with southern or northern accentual characteristics. Thus we would like to point out here the main differences between southern and northern accents.

           Vowels. One of the main differences between these groups of accents is in the phoneme inventory — the presence or absence of particular phoneme. Typically, the vowel [ʌ] does not occur in the accents of the north:

           It could noted that many northern speakers while they do not have [ʌ] have [u:] rather than [ʊ] in words such as hook, book, look. They therefore distinguish pairs like book and buck, which in the South sound [bʊk] and [bʌk], in the North as [bu:k] and [bʊk]:

           Another well-known feature which distinguishes northern and southern accents concerns the vowels [æ] and [ɑ:].

           Before the voiceless fricatives [f, θ, s] and certain consonant clusters containing initial [n] or [m], [æ] is pronounced in the North instead of [ɑ:].

           Note: speakers with more strongly regional southern substandard accents may not have the contrast or, at most, have a contrast that is variable.

           In the South, however, [æ] is often pronounced as [ɑ:]:

           One more major north — south differentiating feature involves the final [i:] like in words city, money, etc. In the north of England they have [ɪ]. In the south of England these words are pronounced with [i:]:

           Consonants. It has been mentioned above that some English accents are “rhotic”, or “r-full”, and others are “non-rhotic”, or “r-less”. Rhotic accents are those which actually pronounce [r], corresponding to orthographic “r” in words like bar and farm. This [r] sound is post-vocalic and is most often heard in Scotland, Ireland and in the southwest of England.

           In most regional accents the glottal stop is more widely used than in RP. In some areas, especially the northeast of England, East Anglia and Northern Ireland, the glottal stop may also be pronounced simultaneously with the voiceless [p, t, k], most strikingly between vowels: pity [pɪtʔi:].

           Many non-RP speakers use [n] in the suffix “-ing” instead of [ŋ]:sitting ['sɪtɪn]. In the western area of central England which includes Birmingham, Manchester and Liverpool they pronounce [ŋɡ]: singer ['siŋɡə], wine [wiŋɡ].

           Now about [j]-dropping. In most accents [j] is dropped after [t, s]: student ['stu:dənt], suit [sʊ:t]. In parts of the north the change has progressed a good deal further, it is lost after [θ]: enthusiasm [en'θu:ziəzm].

           In large areas of eastern England [j] is lost after every consonant. In London [j] is lost after [n, t, d]: news [nu:z], tune [tu:n].

Southern English Accents

           We now turn to an examination of regional non-RP accents of England and we shall first give a brief outline of the group of Southern accents.

           As it was stated above, educated Southern speech is very much near-RP accent whereas non-standard accents are similar to Cockney. So we are going to give a detailed description of this London accent.

           It has been long established that Cockney is a social accent typical of the speech of working class areas of Greater London. Here are some pronunciation features of Cockney.

           Vowels:

           1) [ʌ] is realized as [æɪ]: blood [blʌd] — [blæɪd];

           2) [æ] is realized as [ɛ] or [ɛɪ]: bag [bæg] — [bɛg], [bɛɪg];

           3) [ɪ] in word-final position sounds as [i:]: city ['sɪtɪ] — ['sɪti:];

           4) when [ɔ:] is non-final, its realization is much closer, it sounds like [o:]: pause [pɔ:z] — [po:z]; when it is final, it is pronounced as [ɔ:ə]: paw [рɔ:] - [рɔ:ə];

           5) the diphthong [eɪ] is realized as [æɪ] or [aɪ]: lady [leɪdi] - ['læɪdi], [laɪdi:];

           6) RP [ɜʊ] sounds as [æʊ]: soaked [sɜʊkt] — [sæʊkt];

           7) RP [aʊ] may be [æə]: now [naʊ] — [næə].

           Consonants:

           1) [h] in unstressed position is almost invariably absent;

           2) [ʔ] is widely spread in Cockney speech: paper ['pæɪʔpəa], butterfly ['bʌʔtəflaɪ];

           3) the contrast between [θ] and [f] is completely lost: thin [fin], booth [bu:f];

           4) the contrast between [ð] and [v] is occasionally lost: weather [ꞌwevə]

           5) when [ð] occurs initially it is either dropped or replaced by [d]: this [dis], them [(d)əm];

           6) [1] is realized as a vowel when it precedes a consonant and follows a vowel, or when it is syllabic: milk [mɪvk], table [teɪbv]; when the preceding vowel is [ɔ:], [l] may disappear completely;

           7) [ŋ] is replaced by [n] in word-final position: dancing ['dɑ:nsin], or it may be pronounced as [ɪŋk] in something, anything, nothing: ['nʌfɪŋk];

           8) [p, t, k] are heavily aspirated, more so than in RP;

           9) [t] is affricated, [s] is heard before the vowel: top [tsɒp].

Northern and Midland Accents

           Midland accents, Yorkshire, for example, West Midland and Northwest accents have very much in common with Northern ones. Therefore they are combined into one group; peculiar realization of vowels and consonants will be marked, of course, when each subgroup is described separately.

           The countries of northern England are not far from the Scottish border, so the influence of Scotch accent is noticeable, though there are of course many features of pronunciation characteristic only of northern English regions. The most typical representative of the speech of this area is Newcastle accent. It differs from RP in the following.

           Vowels:

           1) RP [ʌ] is realized as [ʊ]: love [lʌv] — [lʊv];

           2) RP final [ɪ] sounds like [i:]: city [ꞌsɪtɪ] — [ꞌsɪti:];

           3) words like dance, chance which in RP have [ɑ:] are pronounced with [æ]: [dæns], [tʃæns];

           4) [eɪ], [ɜʊ] are either monophthongs, or much narrower diphthongs than the ones in the south of England, or they may even sound as opening diphthongs [ɪe], [ʊo]: bay [be:], [bɪe], plate [ple:t], [plɪet], boat [bo:t], [bʊot];

           5) words that have “al” in spelling — talk, call, all, are pronounced with [ɑ:]: [tɑ:k], [kɑ:l], [ɑ:l];

           6) RP words with [з:] are pronounced with [ɔ:] in a broad Tyneside accent: first [fɔ:st], shirt [ʃɔ:t]; so first, forced, shirt, short are homonyms;

           7) [aɪ] is [ɛɪ]: right [rɛɪt];

           8) words which in RP have [aʊ] may have [u:], e. g. about [əꞌbu:t].

           Consonants:

           1) [l] is clear in all environments;

           2) [h] is usually present in all positions;

           3) –ing is [in]: shilling ['ʃilin];

           4) [p, t, k] between vowels are accompanied by glottal stop [ʔ]: pity [pɪtʔi:];

           5) in parts of Northumberland and Durham [r] may be uvular (in its production the tongue and the uvula, not the tongue and the alveolar ridge take part).

Yorkshire accents

           Yorkshire and Bradford accents are identical with northern vowel features in points 1, 3, 4. Only many speakers pronounce words which have “ow”, “ou” in spelling with [зʊ]: know [зʊ]; with northern consonant features in point 3.

           Now having accomplished the description of regional non-RP accents of England we would like to say that we didn’t attempt to give a detailed account of all the regional differences in accents of remote rural areas. We concentrated on urban accents which are more likely to be encountered by foreign tourists.

Welsh English

           Wales is a bilingual area. This speech situation in linguistics is known as exoglossic. In Wales English dominates over Welsh in urban areas, in the west and northwest of the country the balance being in favor of Welsh, where English is learnt at schools as a second language. At the moment nationalistic feelings are rather strong in Wales and we are witnessing a movement in favor of the revival of the Welsh language and its spread in all areas of Wales.

           However, Welsh English at the level of educated speech and writing is not much different from that of English English. Most differences are found at the level of more localized dialects.

           The principal phonological differences between WE and RP are as follows.

           Vowels:

           1) the distribution of [æ] and [ɑ:] is as in the north of England. Last, dance, chance, etc. tend to have [æ] rather than [ɑ:];

           2) unstressed orthographic “a” tends to be [æ] rather than [ə], e. g.: sofa ['so:fæ];

           3) there is no contrast between [ʌ] and [ə]: rubber ['rəbə];

           4) [ɪ] at the end is a long vowel: city [ꞌsɪti:];

           5) in words like tune, few, used we find [iu] rather than [ju:]: tune [tiun];

           6) [eɪ], [ɜʊ] may become monophthongs: bake [bɛ:k], boat [bo:t];

           7) the vowel [з:] as in girl is produced with rounded lips approaching [o:];

           8) the vowels [ɪə], [ʊə] do not occur in many variants of Welsh English: fear is ['fi:jə], poor is ['pu:wə].

           Consonants:

           1) Welsh English is non-rhotic, [r] is a tap, or it is also called a flapped [r]. Intrusive and linking [r] do occur;

           2) consonants in intervocalic position, particularly when the preceding vowel is short are doubled: city ['sɪtti:];

           3) voiceless plosives tend to be strongly aspirated: in word-final position they are generally released and without glottalization, e. g. pit [pʰitʰ];

           4) [1] is clear in all positions.

           Intonation in Welsh English is very much influenced by the Welsh language.

Scottish English

           We must first make clear that the status of Scottish English is still debated. Some linguists say that it is a national variant. Others say that it is a dialect.

           English has been spoken in Scotland for as long as it has been spoken in England. In the Highlands and islands of northern and western Scotland, however, Gaelic is still the native language of thousands of speakers from these regions. A standardized form of this language, known as Scots, was used at the court and in literature until the Reformation. Then it was gradually replaced by English. Incidentally a number of writers and poets of the likes of Robert Burns (25 January 1759, Ayrshire, Scotland – 21 July 1796, Dumfries, Scotland) retained their native language.

           Nowadays educated Scottish people speak a form of Scottish Standard English which grammatically and lexically is not different from English used elsewhere, although with an obvious Scottish accent. We must admit, however, that non-standard dialects of Scotland still resemble Scots and in many respects are radically different from most other varieties of English. It is very difficult to understand them for students who learn RP.

           At the moment there is currently a strong movement in Scotland for the revival of Scots. Nevertheless Scottish Standard English is still more prestigious and in this lecture we concentrate on Scottish English as used and spoken by educated urban Scots.

           As for the status of Scottish English, in this lecture it will be treated as a dialect, though it is fair to say that there is much in favor of calling it a national variant of English.

           Vowels.

           1. Since Scottish English is rhotic, i. e. it preserves post-vocalic [r], vowels such as RP [ɪə], [з:], [ɛə], [ʊə] do not occur:

           2. Length is not a distinctive feature of Scottish vowels. So pairs like pool — pull, cot — caught are not distinguished. It should be noted, however, that vowels are longer in final stressed open syllables than elsewhere.

           3. Monophthongs are pure, there is no trace of diphthongization with the exceptions of [aɪ] — [ɛɪ], [aʊ] — [ɛʊ] and [ɔɪ].

           4. The RP [æ] - [ɑ:(ɑ)] distinction doesn’t exist: hat [hɑt], dance [dɑns].

           5. [ɪ], [ʊ] may be central.

           6. In non-standard Scottish English accent [u:] often occurs when RP has [aʊ]: house [haʊs] — [hu:s].

           7. It is interesting to mention that [ɒ] and [ɜʊ] may be not contrasted.

           8. In very many regional accents do, to are pronounced as [də], [tə].

           9. In some accents words such as arm, after, grass may have [ɛ] rather than [ɑ:]: after ['ɛftə].

           Consonants:

           1. Scottish English consistently preserves a distinction between [ʍ] and [w]: which [ʍ ɪtʃ] — witch [witʃ].

           2. Initial [p, t, k] are usually non-aspirated.

           3. [r] is most usually a flap.

           4. Non-initial [t] is often realized as glottal stop [ʔ].

           5. [ł] is dark in all positions.

           6. The velar fricative [x] occurs in a number of words: loch [lɒx].

           7. –ing is [in].

           8. [h] is present.

           9. A specific Scottish feature is the pronunciation of [θr] as [ʃr]: through [ʃru:].

           Non-systematic difference.

       Some words have pronunciation distinctively different from RP:

Northern Ireland English

           It should be stated first of all that English pronunciation standards in Northern Ireland and in the Republic ofEire are different. The explanationlies in history.

           In the Middle Ages almost the whole of Ireland was Irish speaking. Nowadays, however, native speakers ofIrish are few in number and are confined to rural areas even though Irish is the official language of Ireland and is taught in schools. The English language in Southern Ireland was originally introduced from the West and West Midlands of England shows signs of this today. This kind of English has spread to cover most of the Irish Republic. Naturally the pronunciation of these areas retains features of western parts of England.

           The English ofnorthern parts ofthe island with its center in Belfast has its roots in Scotland, as large numbers of settlers came to this part from the southwest of Scotland from the seventeenth century onwards. Now speaking about Northern Ireland, it is true to say that English here is not homogeneous. Areas ofthe far north are heavily Scots-influenced. Other parts are marked by less heavily Scots-influenced varieties of English. It is, of course, obvious that the language distinction is not coterminous with the political division ofthe Republic ofIreland and Northern Ireland, some areas of the Republic, Donegal, for instance, speak Northern Ireland English, while some of the northern provinces speak Southern Ireland English.

           In this lecture we shall deal with Northern Ireland English pronunciation.

           Vowels.

           The vowel system is to that ofScottish accents, post-vocalic retroflex frictionless sonorant [r] used as in Scotland.

           The following notes on vowels should be read with the association with the list above.

           The actual realization of a vowel may vary considerably according to the following phoneme:

1) in words like bay, say the vowel is a monophthong [ɛ], preconsonantally it may be a diphthong of the type [ɛə] – [ɪə]: gate [gɪət];

2) [ɔ:], [ɒ] are fairly central;

3) [ɔ:] and [ɒ] contrast only before [p], [t], [k];

4) [aɪ], [aʊ] are very variable;

5) realization of [ɑ:] may vary considerably.

           Consonants.

1) [l] is mainly clear;

2) intervocalic [t] is often a voiced flap [ḏ]: city [ꞌsɪḏi:];

3) between vowels [ð] may be lost: mother [ꞌmɔ:ər];

4) [h] is present.