Language desk
< July 19	<< Jun \| July \| Aug >>	July 21 >

Welcome to the Wikipedia Language Reference Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is a transcluded archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages.

July 20[edit]

Accents in England[edit]

Besides English, are there other accents in England? Like Scottish and Irish? 86.128.214.77 (talk) 21:00, 20 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

See Regional accents of English#Britain and Ireland. Mikenorton (talk) 21:42, 20 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

86.128.214.77 -- You could spend a lifetime studying local, class-based, etc. accents in England or the UK. What you think of as "English English" is probably some kind of hybrid between "Estuary" and "RP", but there are many intricacies beyond that... AnonMoos (talk) 22:22, 20 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

P.S. For a traditional "dialect atlas" approach, see the publications resulting from the Survey of English Dialects, which focus on how older rural people spoke 60 years ago. (Wikipedia doesn't seem to have a general "Dialect atlas" article, but it could be useful...) AnonMoos (talk) 22:31, 20 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

So the official accents of Britain are...? Southern English, Northern English, Scottish, Welsh and Irish. 86.128.214.77 (talk) 11:41, 21 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

There is nothing "official" about accents. Fut.Perf. ☼ 12:48, 21 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

This YouTube video; 20 British Accents in 1 Video, might help. Alansplodge (talk) 13:04, 21 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

That video, however, should not be taken as complete and immutable, however. Dialects and accents often exist on a dialect continuum, and there are many ways to slice that pie. Identifying differences in speech patterns can be done down to the individual level (see idiolect), and the same person may even speak in multiple dialects depending on the social situation (see code switching). Language is complex, messy, and continuously changing and evolving. If you are looking for a canonical and complete list of English accents or dialects, you aren't going to be satisfied. It doesn't exist. --Jayron 32 15:27, 21 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

That is addressed in the spoken introduction to the video, where the narrator says that he is using umbrella terms and that accents vary in different areas of each region and even from person to person. Alansplodge (talk) 11:40, 22 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Accents don't just vary from person to person. A single individual's accent can vary noticeably depending on context: see Register (sociolinguistics). AndyTheGrump (talk) 11:45, 22 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, I understand what you are saying Alansplodge. The issue is that the OP appears, from their multiple comments, to expect there to be a simple, official, and permanent number of "accents" that one can just quote for him. I was explaining to the OP why that thinking was in error. Your response was most useful. --Jayron 32 12:16, 22 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I think we both have the same hymnsheet now :-) Alansplodge (talk) 14:21, 22 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

So other English accents sound like Scottish and Irish? 86.128.214.77 (talk) 19:51, 22 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

What?? —Tamfang (talk) 01:38, 23 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Geordie from Tyneside in the northeast of England has some points of similarity with Scots, and Scouse from Merseyside in the northwest is said to have some Irish influence, but both are easily distinguished from the various Sots and Irish accents. See the linked video for examples. Alansplodge (talk) 15:08, 23 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

In the opening scene (i think) of My Fair Lady, Henry Higgins claims that if he hears an Englishman speak for a minute he can tell their birthplace within six miles, "or within six streets in London." So yes, there are other accents. —Tamfang (talk) 01:38, 23 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Society was a whole lot less mobile in Edwardian England, but even so, I would take that claim with a pinch of salt. Alansplodge (talk) 15:08, 23 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I mean, do other English accents sound like the way the Scottish, Irish and Americans pronounce words like can't, grass, dance, number, her, doctor, girl, there, sir and never? 86.149.32.193 (talk) 20:34, 25 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

—Tamfang and Alansplodge, I would like to think that I can tell where someone with a local accent comes from, to within around 30 miles or so, certainly in England. I once located the particular valley in South Wales where someone lived (the Taff Valley, since you ask). The lack of mobility contributed to the huge variety of accents and, perhaps more importantly, the dialect words they used. For example, A glossary of dialect & archaic words used in the County of Gloucester (1890). 90.252.183.121 (talk) 03:40, 26 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The variety of accents and dialects in the UK is bewildering. Scouse, Liverpudlian, Bristol#Dialect (Brizzle), Brummie accent, Estuary English, Oxford/RP all have very wide variations in vowel sounds and the words they use. There is an ancient Midlands dialect (search for "The Black Country: Last Haven of the Mercian Tongue", blacklisted url) from north of Birmingham which is literally incomprehensible to anyone who doesn't know it. Try this quiz, from the New York Times. 90.252.183.121 (talk) 03:40, 26 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

So the English accents that sound like Scottish and Irish are...? Merseyside, Liverpool, Bristol, Birmingham, Oxford and Midlands. 86.149.32.193 (talk) 21:57, 26 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The Merseyside/Liverpool accent has some Irish influence. None of the other accents you list are significantly influenced by either Scottish or Irish. AndyTheGrump (talk) 22:06, 26 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

What about the North West, East of England, South West and West Country accents? 86.149.32.193 (talk) 19:19, 27 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

86.128.214.77/86.149.32.193 -- Some of your questions are rather misguided, and you don't seem to be able to learn much from the answers, due to your fixed preconceptions and/or relative lack of linguistic knowledge, so I'm not sure what the whole point of this exercise is... AnonMoos (talk) 22:33, 27 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]