Accent

I have a Cheshire/Merseyside accent. I'm not at all scouse, but am quite obviously a Merseysider!
Granjura A true Scouser would say...."I'm stoochk on a rochk and I wanna gerroff". To get the true 'chk' sound at the end of a word, try speaking as though you have a cold with a bunged up nose and a 'claggy' throat.

MinniesMum, i was born and brought up in Aberfan, just 4 miles from Merthyr , one cousin born and still living in Benlinog , just over the mountain , different accent . I now live in Mid Wales, have done so for many a year yet when I first started having deliveries from Tesco in Ebbw Vale the drivers said - your from Merthyr . So yes many welsh accents in Wales and have you noticed with Welsh actors? They attend RADA , move to America yet one hears their Welsh accent clearly, think Richard Burton, Anthony Hopkins, Sian Phillips, Ioan Gruffud, Michael Sheen - the list goes on - and Dylan Thomas's parents paid for him to have elocution lessons the accent is still there in them all. I am not sure if it will not let us leave it or we will not leave it. May I ask? Did your Aunties say 'over by there ' my grandchildren are amused by my use of it

Although I was born in Cheshire I have lived in the west of Scotland since I was very young and I sound like a native, as I realise when I hear my voice on a recording! My Dad, who was born in Lancashire, and my Mum, who was born in Cheshire with very strong Welsh connections, lived in Scotland most of their lives but never lost their English accents.

No accent here because have lived in quite a few places. However my son has married a Geordie lass with a very very strong accent and the two little GSs speak in the same way. I worry not about the accent but the grammar ( I've went, I seen him, gizzit, gannin to toon. ) It really is strong and makes me wince sometimes especially as I'm an English teacher.
Does that make me an awful snob? I love the little boys to bits and only want the best for them.

'Three Aunty Gwens from Merthyr' ..love it!

I also have a stong but unconscious tendency to adjust my accent to someone I am talking to

That's me, too. A forces childhood moving from posting to posting has left me with largely RP, but when I'm talking to local folks, I do tend to drift into Black Country. Proud of it, too!

Btw, Black Country is a dialect, not an accent as such, with roots in Anglo Saxon. For example as in the local greeting, 'Aer bist, aer kid?' 'Bist' being the second person singular of the verb 'to be' in modern day German... IYSWIM.

Mind you, speaking with an Australian once in the course of my job, I found myself sliding into Aussie twang, couldn't stop. In the end I made an excuse and took a break to get my own voice back. Empathy can have an unforeseen downside

Your relatives must have lacked a deal of confidence to change their accent wot. They were obviously impressed by themselves

I have a dear cousin who although now retired, won a scolarship and went to Oxford. Then went on to work in the Treasury, but hated the "types" that he had to mix with. Then went on to work in the IMF. His accent is still broad Cornish.

My South African accent bothered me when I was younger but now not at all and pleases me if someone recognizes it

Anniebach - you are so right. My mother's family were all from the Valleys. At on point I had three Aunty Gwens, from Merthyr, Tredegar and Pontycymmer and woe betide me if I got the wrong one when they rang us! All fairly close together but different accents.

My accent is as Northern as they come... Don't ever feel 'ashamed' wot. It's not nice to feel like that and I'm quite sure that you shouldn't. Accent is not indicative of intelligence

Interesting about the poll favouring the 'Irish accent'. There are many varieties of English accent in Ireland, as in England, depending on where the speaker originates. Inner city Dublin accent is very harsh and grating, whereas the accent heard in the Cork area is a real lilt, even if very fast. In the north west think Daniel O'Donnell.

Wouldn't it be boring if we all sounded the same. Like a lot of automatons. I am in praise of the regional accent, but not sloppy speech.

wot, you have no right to feel ashamed of your accent , don't know about posh people but people of good breeding and good manners have no problem with accent , so stop it right now , all that matters is they are nice people

Remember , people who matter don't mind, people who mind don't matter X

BB, that is so funny

Daisy I quite agree with you. But it is perceived by many as posh.

Black Country is a great accent with plenty of unique words and expressions. Although I have lived most of my life only a few miles away I am convinced the Black Country also has its own droll sense of humour which isn't found outside the area. One GD's other grandfather has it all in spite of being half Yugoslavian! I've recently met two BC poets who have a take on poetry all of their own!

The results of pole in the i newspaper today said that Irish was the most popular accent in the British Isles[ though they aren't British ) and of course poor old Brummies came bottom again. I enjoy the Birmingham accent which they reckon Shakespeare spoke in. It has colour. It is often confused with Black Country which is very strong. Such snobbery.

I've got a Cockney accent although I left Brighton [Hove, actually,] in 1972. I feel ashamed of it when talking to "posh" people. My brother and his wife adopted rediculously upper class accents when he went to University. Very overdone! I don't talk like them on Eastenders though

Jacob Rees-Mogg's voice isn't posh (imho) because it's real. It isn't an affectation.

Anniebach, my auntie , who lives in Caerphilly, was considered ' posh' as she had two front doors. ( one for the porch) So it is all relative I suppose.

I love regional dialects, some more than others. Love the Norfolk, Suffolk, North Essex, dialects along with those of the North East. Unfortunately many of these dialects are being diluted by the increasing movement of population. Certainly in North Essex the original dialect is mainly heard in the villages.
No idea what my dialect would be, born in York, lived in Middlesex, East London, Hertfordshire and for the last 50 years North Essex.

Linda Snell is posh, because she tries to sound different from what I'm sure is her natural voice!

Thanks pittcity I have just discovered mine is Estuary English rather than Kentish. I'd not come across the term but as I've lived in sight of the Thames Estuary all my life I guess that's what I am.

I've still got a slight Geordie accent (which helps when speaking french.)
One of my uncles was a sheep farmer in the Scottish Borders - he died not long ago aged 99! We stayed with them often, and I noticed he had a broad Northumbrian accent when chatting to the local shepherds. But when he was with the "hoi poloi" of the area he sounded very cultured. His farm belonged to the Duke of Northumberland, I was with him once when we met the Duke.
Yonks ago, I was only a young teenager.

For those who say they have no accent at all....everyone has an accent. Returning to Pygmalion, Professor Higgins was able to place people's place of birth, parentage,class, education and life experience from listening to the various vowel traces as they speak. An exaggeration perhaps! To we regional accent speakers, RP is easily identifiable as a particular way of speaking, although not perhaps from one area.

I have a softened Belfast accent. It indicates where I come from, but also my 'class'. People from N Ireland will recognise that it is different from the Ulster Scots accent mentioned previously. It is also the result of my mother's English parentage as all that side of my family were from Cheshire and Yorkshire so I was brought up having to make myself understood.

We do speak very quickly in N. Ireland though.

Has anyone noticed that RP speakers tend to have difficulty understanding regional accents? I wonder why that would be.