Accents Flashcards
(16 cards)
What did Lesley Milroy look at ?
Looked at communities in Belfast
Acted as a friend of a friend and asked about people’s knowledge of people in the community. Gave them a network density score based on their amounts of knowledge.
Higher the score = stronger accent (they talked more)
Lower NSS = due to isolation had weaker accents, talked less
What did William Labov find in his NY department store theory?
He looked at the use of the post voliaric /r/ used in the word "fourth floor" Looked at three stores with different classes - Kleins = lower Macy's = middle Sacks = high When asked to say fourth floor Kleins never used the feature even when asked to repeat Macy's - didn't at first but then did when they repeated it, want to be of the higher class, showed the highest shift upwards Sacks - always used the feature - their customers are off a higher class so they need to use it
What did Paul Kerswill find ?
Milton Keynes Study
Looked at children aged 4,8,12
Children spoke like parents up to age 4 1/2
Then when they got to school started to develop MK with EE - fit in with social groups
I.e. “H” dropping
What did Trudgill say about RP
Only 3% of the population speak RP
What did Martin Montgomery say ?
He looked at TV advertising and their use of accents
RP used to show expertise
Brummie and Leeds - for comic effect
Regional Accents - a more natural product
What did Lance Workman suggest about the Brummie accent ?
That staying silent is better than speaking Brummie, they are more intelligent than Brummies if you stay silent
What did Dixon and Cox investigate ?
Looked at the attitudes towards RP and Brummie
Played two tapes from court cases and got people to judge whether the person was guilty or innocent
RP - judged innocent
Brummie - judged guilty
What did BBC voices find ?
Looked at attitudes towards accents
RP - most prestige
Brummie unpleasant and unattractive
SE best when applying for jobs
78% of people enjoy hearing a variety of accent on tv and radio
What did YouGov investigate?
Ranked accent based on their attractiveness
Brummie - least attractive -53
RP - 2nd top - 31
What did Howard Giles find ?
Capital Punishment experiment
Students listened to speeches on Capital Punishment from three lecturers - same speeches but people with different accents
Brummie - least intelligent but most persuasive
RP- most intelligent but cold and not persuasive
What did Peter Trudgill find in his Norwich study?
He looked at the use of “ng” at the end of words such as “walking” and “talking”
A lot of people around Norwich said “walkin” and “talkin”
Women tended to say that they used the “ing” ending more than they did, while men said they used the “ng” ending more than they did
What did Ives investigate ?
Looked at social groups in Bradford
Found that youngsters used code switching - (changing their accent from English with parents to Punjabi with social group)
Their accent was different from people with different post codes - BD22 = posh while BD08= slang
They spoke a “secret language” in order to create group identity and exclude others who wouldn’t understand what they were saying.
Links to LABOV Martha’s Vineyard study
What did Howard Giles say in his accommodation theory?
He said that people adapt their speech in order to either match or enhance the different between them and the other speaker
Convergence = matching the style
Divergence = increasing the difference, away from who we are speaking to
What did William Labov find in his Marthas Vineyard investigation?
He looked at group identity and how islanders adapted their speech in order to differentiate themselves from the holiday makers
One group - Chilmark fishermen = tight knit community, they are traditional Vineyard speakers
He found that younger people’s speech on the island was getting further away from Standard English and closer to the Chilmark Fishermen.
The fishermen exaggerated their features in order to establish themselves and get away from the visitors to the island- to create group identity
What is MLE ?
Multicultural London English - influenced by black Africans
Combine Cockney with Jafrican
What is EE?
Estuary English - mid point between Cockney and RP
Used to not have negative connotations of each accent
Used by youngsters
