grammar question

Yes, TriciaF, we're in Newcastle, well spotted! At the moment as others have surmised, my DIL is the kids' main carer as they're very young and their dad works long hours. The kids in their school mainly speak as they do so I'm the only role model of what is known as RP (Received Pronunciation). However, I do agree about dialect being part of what makes us British and don't want to be stuffy and over-pedantic. Equally I don't want my grandchildren to be looked down on in later life. They're a pair of bright little buttons with good manners and I would hate anyone to think they're not good enough just because of the way they speak.
I think you have all made helpful and interesting comments. Thank you.

Gran5up, you make the point that the language is English, but just think about how many people worldwide speak it as their mother tongue.I'm not surprised people in Scotland think of mince pies as meat pies and that they use different words from those outside Scotland to describe things. Australians, Americans, as we know use different words - sidewalk, elevator to name two from the U.S. Condensing the geography somewhat, people in the North have their local words for things as indeed do the Welsh, Cornish and so on. And thank goodness for that. I recall an Irish lady referring to her child's go- kart, which meant pushchair, or today's buggy. To me a go-kart was something else. I hope these regional usages never die out and if we don't understand we can always ask.

Mince pies (the fruity ones) were meat pies at one time. The spices and fruit were added to make them festive for Christmas, and later the meat was left out.

"London English" was only one variety of English. It became the standard version as the South-East became more and more dominant, and particularly as communications improved. The regional variations are closer to the original language.

"Outwith" is the opposite of "within".

Where does everyone stand on Chelsea buns and Bath buns? A friend insisted to me that I was wrong in calling the rolled-up ones with fruit in them Chelsea buns and the ones with little sugar-lumps on top Bath buns. She thought they should be the other way round. "That's what we call them up here," she said. I lived a lot closer to Chelsea (and Bath) than she ever had, so I think I was right.

Ah it's the important difference between crumpets and pikelets that really matters.

According to this site you are right about Chelsea buns, Elegran.

I know I am right - I have made enough of the damned things - but it is good that you agree.

Elegran - you are definitely correct about Chelsea and Bath buns. I have eaten both in my time and as I live in the W. Country I know a Bath bun when I see it.

In my part of the world we call a crumpet a pikelet. I don't personally call them pikelets because I originally come from Dorset where they are called a crumpet but I'm sure they are the same thing.

I had a photo from my American cousin showing what she thought was a typical English tea. The tea cosy was correct but the cakes on the cake stand which she described as crumpets were definitely scones.

I love Bath buns, I have made both. I think the shops that sell them are to blame, they often get it wrong. I know they did when they used to write their own signs on the display stands.

Pronunciation imo should be consistent.....if you say 'haitch' when the spelling of the letter H is 'aitch' then you should also (logically) say - for example - bacon and heggs or happles and horanges. If there is no H in the spelling, why would you add one? Check the dictionary, there really is not an aitch in H. I think it is confusing because that's the sound it makes, in English.
Bath buns and Chelsea - irritating when mixed up but delicious on their own or together! Never understood the diff between pikelets and crumpets. I have always said 'skonn' as opposed to 'skohn' but have been pulled up for being 'common' more times than I can remember so I'm prob not snobby! We just get used to saying things a certain way in different parts of the country. Silent or unpronounced letters (Warwick, Gloucester etc) are accepted as part and parcel of English but adding letters in where they do not exist is incorrect.

Sorry to nitpick, but there is actually an H in 'aitch'!

I think aitch should, in fact, be spelled haitch and aspirate when pronounced. I wonder why we don't? Is there a word for all our alphabet letters? Come to think of it I can only think of that letter. Would we refer to the letter bee, or kay? I know the Greek alphabet has words for its letters but if one exists in English I haven't seen it.
Mummsmags I don't know where you live but in the South east it is definitely scon, so you'd be correct round here. I call it scone with a long o, and I think that's down to my Irish mother,s influence. Nobody has so far pulled me up though!

Ans

'Didn't used to' on R4 half an hour ago, Winifred Robinson. What happened to 'used not to'? I was almost as irritated by that as by the smug CEO she was interviewing eulogising his bottled water ...

Thank you, granjura, for being so gracious in your reply to my comments about switching accents according to one's environment. I still maintain that it is not necessary to alter one's accent just to please people with a dialect, local accent or merely a sloppy accent.

You ask where I am from. I am from the south of England and speak what used to be called the Queen's English. This does not make me a snob. But what would make me a snob would be a miserable attempt at aping those with different accents from mine (e.g. a Cockney cabbie, a Yorkshire lass, a Dorset farmhand etc.).

As for correcting grandchildren, I think it's fine to help them with grammar, spelling and pronunciation. I've been doing this for years and the children never take offence. Indeed, they would be surprised if I didn't give them a few words of grandmotherly advice every now and then, and their mother (our daughter) doesn't mind a bit.

thanks jack- there is a big difference between 'aping' in a condescending way- and adapting naturally if you go and live somewhere long term. Have you evere lived, say, North of Watford? I am a linguist, and I just can't help it- I absorb language, expressions, intonations, like a sponge. OH is from Surrey and like you, has RP pronunciation and never alters his speech- despite living in several locations in the Midlands. Partly due to personality perhaps. When I speak local French, I am not aping- this is the way I learnt to speak, with friends- even though I spoke a different kind of French at home.

I do wonder how mixed your family and friends are - as said, for all sorts of reasons- our friends are VERY mixed in background and education (although as said, OH's English never changes from RP- but he is a scientist, and until he met me, his friends and family were very homogeneous and all spoke with RP.

Forgot to say, and OH is no snob at all- despite his RP- so I certainly would not intimate that is the case.

re Aitch v. Haitch : I understand that in Northern Ireland one is Protestant usage and the other Catholic... English is littered with silent 'H's, as in 'hotel', 'honour' - mostly words derived from French (as in the US pronunciation of 'herbs').

So which religious group uses the incorrect 'haitch' ?

Minibags apparently speaks differently to her schoolmates than she does at home. Most, if not all her pals have quite strong west of Scotland accents. At home she hears a northern (short 'a' sounds) but otherwise unplaceable English accent and an almost not there southern Welsh accent. It makes perfect sense to me that she alters how she says things in order to fit in better, as she sees it. I should think it must be quite useful to be able to imitate various accents. Actors must have to do it quite a lot. Talent I call it.

Young people are commonly very good at using different 'registers' when they mix with different groups. i am sure we have all done it to different degrees!

When I hear myself, on a recording for instance, I am always surprised at the sound of my voice! It does not sound like the 'me' I hear!

When I hear myself on my answering service message, I sound more Scots than I think I do. My DSs don't think I sound Scots at all, but they were brought up in various parts of England and never adopted any specific accent - their speech is very much RP. I know my accent isn't specific to any one area of Scotland, but once across the Border, it gets stronger and I use more dialect words. 50 years away from my homeland and I've kept my identity. My English granny, born and brought up in Leicester, never lost her accent, although most of her adult life was spent in Scotland.

@Anya - I think it was the RCs, although I'm not certain of it.

An expression I've heard a few times recently, probably American, is, instead of "from the beginning" they say, "from the get go." it does sound odd, but our language is full of Americanisms isn't it?