Accents

Accents are the cause behind many debates. From George Osborne to the Beckhams no one is free from critique over how they pronounce words or more importantly why they have changed their accents. But why do we change our accents?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/apr/07/george-osborne-does-mockney-accent

"But that's normal, isn't it? You change the way you speak, usually without even noticing, because you assume the person you're talking to is better than you are. Imagine assuming the opposite! Dreadful! That's a level of confidence suitable only for racing drivers and the French. (Or "zee French", as I call them when I'm in France.)"  The author of the article has described the main reason why we change our accent, to aim for higher aspiration and to seem like you have a 'better' social standing.

The article also goes through the changes towards acceptance of accents, from Jeremy Kyles guests shouting that they should be accepted for who they are to TOWIE esque Facebooking. 

But why did Osborne decide to converge? The journalist puts it down to him being aware of how people dislike him ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLXFXIXOkjc go to two minuets in) as this clip from a 2007 comedy explains, abet riddled with hyperbole, how badly things can go wrong for politicians more specifically Osbourne. The reason for Osbourne is because he is embarrassed and self conscious of how he appeared, Beckham is more likely simply converging to make sure that he is understood. The difference between subliminal and conscious convergence. The theory behind this comes from Howard Giles and his accommodation theory (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communication_accommodation_theory)

  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rR_2Ro5lHrY   Here is the clip of the actual speech he made and compared it with a similar speech delivered in the commons, with comparisons of words such as "kind of" and "kinda" .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nXeRZNaGvEA    BBC's Paxman explains why people change their accents.

Child language stages

Year One:

• Crying
• Cooing
• Babbling

Year Two:

• One word
• Two word
• Telegraphic
  

Year Three:
 

By year three, children are effective language users: still needing to practice, still needing to develop additional lexis, but fundamentally with the building blocks for all future language use. At this stage they begin to crack the code of implied meaning: to understand that, sometimes, language contains messages which can seem to contradict their face value statements.

Year Four:
Children begin to develop and understanding that language carries a multiplicity of meanings, that it can be manipulated and that different audiences require different language use including variations in lexis and intonation. In other words, by year four, their use of language is purposeful.

Year Five:
This is the age that most children start school. So here we see a shift from spoken language as the complete focus to written language: learning to read. This shift towards literacy sees children beginning to make links between print and meaning.

Year Thirteen:

Some researchers believe that around this age, children's ability to acquire language may begin to decline. Lenneburg et al propose that there is a period during which children are predisposed to acquire language. They also believe that there is a ‘cut off' age (around 13 years) after which acquisition is not possible.

Some terms

Etymology: the study of word origins and meanings

Prosody: The patterns of stress and intonation in a language.

Adjacency pairs:  Two utterances that follow on from one another in a logical sequence. E.g. question and   answer

 

Deictic: A deictic expression cannot be understood unless the context of the utterance is known. Examples are ‘here’ and ‘there’.

The things I think about when I am unwell

A few weeks ago I was unwell and had time to think about a whole matter of things. One thing (and this really happened, I think I was slightly delusional as I felt compelled to try and figure this out)  that occurred to me is the cultural shift, particularly in fiction towards unmarried females and their role in the family.

The maiden aunt has changed faces over the last hundred years. No longer is she Great Aunt Sarah who comes over on birthdays and receives a lift to weddings.  She lost her sweet heart in the war and looked after mother for years afterwards. At a wedding she may have a glass of sherry and toast the couple, but after the obliged turn around the dance floor by a young male relative she is content to sit in the corner. Similar to Grandma she offers surprising words of comfort during hard times to a broken protagonist, being the right balance; familiar yet not as personal as a parent or friend.   

No, today she is Sara (no need for Aunt, she isn’t going to be told what her role is in life by anyone). She doesn’t have a partner as she is too busy with her career, and the implications are that even if she did settle down she would not get married. Her behavior and attitude is remarkably close to that attributed to males, but she is not quite a 'ladette'. She will interrupt others, not apologize for her input and empty adjectives will not be found in her vocabulary  . She visibly flouts language theorists, from Lakoff to Zimmerman & West without a second thought. And why should she?

Why has this change occurred may be asked, examples of her were not found in the sixties and seventies when feminism was, arguably, at its most visible peak. Mostly because of  social change, with public figures such as Dr Lucy Wolsey being open about not wanting to follow the traditional role of mother it has become more acceptable for other women to be honest about their choices. Because of greater acceptance by a larger proportion of society, she is no longer a "ball breaker" or labelled as vulgar for not talking in a 'ladylike' manner . It is simply accepted as being her personality.

The disappearance of Great Aunt Sarah marks the change in not only our society but also our language, showing how out of date some of the theories haunting lexis information hunters can be. Sara doesn't apologize for her language, why should we?

Useful links

Here are some interesting language articles that I have come across. Hopefully I should update this regularly!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-21518574
Article from BBC news about how our tense system effects our financial decisions

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-20332763

Internets impact on language

 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/3656080/Mind-your-language-it-matters.html

Language change and grammar

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationopinion/9966117/Text-speak-language-evolution-or-just-laziness.html

Text speak debate

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2011/dec/16/language-police-error-hunters-oliver-burkeman

Why do people correct each others language

http://www.guardian.co.uk/theobserver/2013/apr/20/debate-accent-david-victoria-beckham

Changing accents

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/the_queens_diamond_jubilee/9280753/The-Queens-English-changes-through-the-years.html

Queens English; how it has changed

Thank you Denmark!

Until recently I have avoided at all costs a certain kind a TV program, the European police drama. The sort that the middle aged are going crazy for. Often they come with short, dramatic or gloomy titles that promise a deary setting with characters wearing mute drab colours so dampen any high spirit that you might have upon tuning in. All of the critics give them high reviews and describe how they rush home to watch it with a bottle of wine -despite the fact that they proudly crow about how they have mastered iPlayer (as if to make up for the long standing joke of the 90's, having a VCR but not knowing how to use it).

But after watching Homeland (not European, I know but the groups slightly lesser American cousin. But perhaps that's just my taste) and loving it, I sat down to watch with my parents The Bridge. For once characters that just get on with the story, no token/pointless characters (you know the sort that I am talking about-there is one in every program) or female characters that have to be oppressed because they are women or men that have to be stupid .Or even the very worst, futile subplots about their family;they are in the middle of a divorce, their mother is a cougar that wishes to be known by the name Barry. Yes these things happen in real life and if perfectly pulled off with the right balance it can work. But all too often in England, it just doesn't. Perhaps because there is too much concern with pumping out enough episodes to hang on to ratings. It is possible for us to get it right. Look at Sherlock, less than ten episodes over nearly four years but as an audience we are more satisfied than the random failings of a fairly successful stand up who is given his own family sit com. Please. No more.

Again and again watchers say that they would prefer a four part decent drama than the poorly made dragged out things. Look at the BBC HYS section or the back of the Radio Times. Things are getting violent, and these are the moderated comments.

To be fair, when I started to type this post it was half way though 2012, its now spring of 2013. Britain has started to catch on, although I have not personally watched it ,many praise Broadchurch and we were getting the prime cuts of foreign tell. I have moved on to the delights of Borgen, and I am more than eager for the third series. The success of The Killing brought new life to our television but also to our opinions, we are starting to see how other Europeans live normally and that we are facing similar social and economic problems.  In an increasingly euro-septic country, its a reminder that we are not alone in our grievances and its being presented in the least aggressive format possible. And for this understanding (and for improving television) I will always be thankful to Denmark.

Language change

Okay language change; to break it down there are three main types of change. Grammatical change (so structural change), phonological change (how it sounds) and semantic change (meaning).

When new words enter our lexicon how they are created is a bit more complex as there are many different reasons or methods:

• Abbreviation: shortened word, "celeb" from "celebrity"
• Back formation: removing affixes, "vegeburger" from "beefburger"
• Blending: two or more existing words are merged. "Brunch" or "Wikipedia".
• Borrowing: word from a foreign language that becomes widely used, pajamas ,for example.
• Compounding: two or more words are put together (with or without a hyphen) e.g. bittersweet.
• Conversion: from one word class to another, "google" as a verb and a noun
• Eponym: new word from some ones name "Hoover"
• Root creating: words are made up entirely from scratch, often for phonological effect "blurb" or "dork"

Words can sometimes change semanticaly:

• Meaning extension: use becomes widened, "bird" used to simply mean only young bird
• Meaning narrowing: "nephew" used to apply to both genders
• Ameliorated: word gains positive associations
• Pejoration: gains negative status, "madam" or "mistress"

In spite of this some words have the status of "nonce" meaning that it has failed to catch on and has entered the deadpool of language. These are often the words that are created in response to current events so are only used as long as needed. Alternatively it may be a simple question of that the word was not phonologically pleasing enough or was not widely understood, for example "ConDems" to describe the current UK coalition government.