It depends where you live

My parents and teachers insisted on proper English albeit with a Scottish (but not too Scottish!) accent. I've been away from Scotland for 50 years and my DSs don't think I still have a Scottish accent! However, when I hear myself on an answerphone, I can hear it quite clearly. When I cross the Border, I immediately become more audibly Scottish!

Melwyn Bragg describes the need to get rid of one's Northern accent (I think he was from lancashire) in his book on the English language.

The introductory lecture given to all Teacher trainees (B.Ed.Hons) at Leicester Polytechnic (where I got mine in 1982- we were the last batch ever for Leics Poly), given by the Dean, was about accents, and how essential it is to get rid of one's regional accent to climb the ladder- was quite a surprise. Especially as he had a very clipped .... Afrikaan's accent!?!

When I was interviewed at Leics Uni- the Head of Langs said to me 'you are Swiss aren't you? I am not happy about that!' - when I queried his comment he said that as a rôle model for other students, if I had a Swiss accent it would be a bad example!?! (I was allowed to do 3 subjects instead of 2- eg French on top of the others as it it my MT).

(that was just before he told me he knew my OH, and asked if I knew that 'teaching is not a hobby for bored middle-class ladies' - charming)... hence my choice of the Poly instead!

My accent has been modified by so many things over the years. I remember a primary school teacher who tried to teach us to say 'one' properly. It should be pronounced 'wun' she said. Interestingly the Yorkshire 'u' remains when I speak and gets much worse when I go to stay in Gods own county.

My cousin was a Health Visitor in Liverpool for years and before that she was a Ward Sister and a Children's nurse in the 1940s and 50s.

She modified her lovely accent because she felt intimidated by the very posh Consultants.

Down here in the South we say "all right" sometimes instead of "hello" and when we get off the bus we say "cheers drive."

Darn sarf we say bu...er, omitting the t sound, and busses. Baases sounds a bit Afrikaans.

I don't call butter batter !! Batter is a mixture that Yorkshire puddings are made from.

Back room and front room! ... always say switch the big light on too!

It's not so much the look and cook with Yorkshire, but the Butter and buses. Them from doon south say batter and baases. Oop 'ere we say our "u"s proper like. I was married to a southerner at one time and did learn to say barth and grarss.

Belladonna luck would rhyme with the naughty word....

Same in Stoke MrsMopp- I just loved saying it when I first heard it ' a loooouk in cooouk boooouk'.

Tara luv'

I always thought that people who say 'u' instead of 'o' were just being snobby. My late MIL was always saying 'hud' instead of hood and 'fud' instead of food etc, we always teased her about her posh accent when she had a northern inflection in her voice.

Mrsmopp, I understand your example about the Liverpool pronunciation, but can't work out the Southern one despite your example. I suppose it depends how you pronounce "luck". It's very hard to give examples as many of us would see a word and pronounce it differently. My luck would rhyme with a swear word but then I suppose that has regional variations too. as long as we all know what we mean, and let's hope our interesting and varied accents don't die out.

How do you pronounce 'look in a cook book? We live in the South now so it is 'luck in a cuck buck's but in Liverpool we said 'loook in a coook boook'

We watched Ken Loach's 'Angel Share' the other day with sil and bil from Surrey (Glasgow slang) - they didn't understand a word apart from 'f**k*...
whilst I, a non-native English speaker, got it all- it was funny.

'Ladies who lunch', janea. I think of the Marie Curie charity lunches where 'ladies' come from all over the county for rather indifferent food!

Anno 'lunch ladies' has a completely different connotation, doesn't it? I immediately thought of the fantastic Gransnet farewell lunch that Absent hosted in Darlington before she went to live in NZ and all the lovely GNers who were there that day!

As a linguist, I was much more able to adapt to accents and expressions, different use of 'grammar' than British OH who has a typical Southern English grammar school boy RP pronunciation, funnily enough.

As a furiner, I first lived in London, then Staffs and later Leics- and I loved learning new expressions when I got to the Midlands. In the engineering firm where I worked in Burslem (Stoke), the staff loved to teach me. The char lady came everyday to my office and said 'come on luv, say it, make my day' and I had to reply 'go away you silly boogar' and she giggled and gave me my cup of tea.

Sometimes it was just beyond me though. I remember meeting 2 of my teenage students in East Leics coming back from an evening walk in the countryside (I was on my way to badger watch with a friend) and they told be 'we was dead frit Miss' and the other said 'I were shitting bricks' (they had heard a fox I believe- they thought it was a ghost!)... Differences in use of grammar were particularly interesting- especially the link with different invading tribes (eg Vikings/Danes in north east- Leics was right on the border with Danelaw - and geographical names with their different Saxon/Norman/Danish origins. All the names in 'by' 'toft' and 'thorpe' being Viking)..

'he is a sarny short of a picnic' came to mind, lol. I loved the word 'mardy' ... and so many more.

Did get caught out with the 'tea' word. We had just arrived in Leics and I invited children who were at play school and their mum for 'tea'- made a cake, biscuits and served home-made biscuits and cake- but by 5.30 they were still there... and then a little voice said 'mummy when is Claire's mummy going to cook our tea?' - I looked very puzzled then one of the mums explained ... and I quickly got fish fingers and other bits and pieces on the go- never made that mistake again.

Language is wonderful.

School meal attendants are almost universally described as 'dinner ladies'. Whoever heard of 'lunch ladies'?

Aa'm from Yorkshire, luv. When I grew up dinner was a hot meal at midday, tea was something lighter and supper was a snack before bed (bread and dripping?).
Aam an adopted Geordie now, hinny. And proudly bi-lingual (but can't get the accent quite right)
so
netty-toilet
bait-packed lunch
aa diva kna-I don't know
Gan yam- going home
Oh and narrow paths in Newcastle are called "chares"

I came from the East Midlands, "meduck". I had about 12 yrs in Bristol the London area for about 15 yrs.
I am now in Cheshire East which is not quite Northwest and not quite the Midlands. It has a sory of identity crisis.

If I have gravy on my plate I am having dinner, regardless of the time of day . I always feel sorry for people who have 'Christmas lunch'.

I grew up in a large house, we had a dining room, sitting room, morning room and lounge. Also a kitchen with the cooker and kitchen table where we would eat supper (cooked), a scullery with sink and a larder.
Sunday tea always ended with tinned fruit and evaporated milk and a compulsory slice of bread and butter - this was the 1950's and I suspect bread was a filler as we also had to have bread (no butter) with whatever we had for supper.
Our bread rolls are cobs and we too have pikelets.
The walkway between houses was a jitty, there was also a twitchel which I think was a longer footpath.
I have enjoyed reading all the posts - isn't it great that we are all different.

As a child if was breakfast - always a fry-up, dinner at school, supervised by dinner ladies, and tea at home after school, usually something on toast, boiled egg, and a pudding such as apple and custard. Supper would be cereal or a snack with milk before bed time. Now it is breakfast - coffee and toast, lunch (maybe a sandwich or light meal and fruit), and around seven it would be dinner. Probably nothing before bed, or maybe decaf coffee and biscuit. Afternoon tea these days would be a rather pricey treat in a hotel or similar with finger sandwiches and dainty cakes. The loo is always called that, as is loo paper, the room we sit in to watch TV is the sitting room, and always was. My daughter, who lives in Surrey, not too far from us, calls their evening meal supper, and I got told off recently for asking her 3 year old what she'd like for dinner (I may have said din dins) as I have always used that word for small children. Oh heck, does it matter? Vive la difference and long live dialects and regional ways of referring to things. It makes our language so charming and reminds us of different historical influences on our language.

Do you have a lav at the end of the garden rubylady?

rubylady do you grow giant leeks?