My first work trip to the UK was my first trip to the UK period.<p>After clearing customs, I managed to get the rest of the way through the airport, through “the tube”, onto a train to the midlands, a taxi ride, and checked into my hotel with hardly any talking.<p>The front desk person dutifully told me that the restaurant was closed, but room service available (this is pre door dash, et. al.).<p>I got to my room and unpacked, with the TV playing in the background, as was my way back then and now. I did some stretching, and then decided to order some dinner.<p>I picked up the phone, dialed the room service number, and after I was greeted by a pleasant “Room Service?” I immediately felt my body wanting to reply with terribly Monty Python voice of American’s trying to sound British.<p>I couldn’t stop myself. I could just feel it wanting to happen.<p>So I hung up.<p>Confused, and somewhat alarmed because I had 3 days of corporate training to perform and that’s not going to go well if I have an accent trying to break out of me like a teenage boy’s voice breaking uncontrollably, I turned off the TV and tried practicing talking.<p>Even alone in my room, it took me a few minutes to try and get it under control. I grew up moving quite a bit between places with people from all over, so I don’t, myself, have a particularly stable accent. It was especially true when I was younger.<p>I finally worked myself up to remake that call to room service, and I managed to force myself speak with a right proper American accent…
In a normal country, this sort of post could be liquidated with a comment like "People often do not grow up, and keep using playground-bullying jokes. News at 11."<p>But - the UK is deeply and relentlessly classist. Accents are one of the instruments that ruling classes use to keep the hoi polloi "in their place". So this issue gets highlighted routinely - and there has been a real effort to address the problem, particularly by Labour governments (starting with the Blair ones) and particularly in state-controlled media.
oi hent had that praablem boh. I cun talk loike I do at hum, withoout much hoohar.[1]<p>I have lost my "cuntree" accent, because that shit is a far bigger impediment to getting a job than actual class. (and in some cases race, but thats more complex)<p>but, for those who are outside of the UK and want to understand, its hard to translate. There are three things that you are judged on here in the UK, and they are all sort of related to class:<p>o Your clothes<p>o your attitude<p>o your accent<p>All of these are proxies for class. The most important thing to be aware of is that race is not normally a signifier for class. to use a recent example:<p>Rishi, our new prime minister, is posh as fuck. Posher, but not by much, than Liz truss. However less posh than Boris, as he is a no fooling aristocrat.<p>If we compare Rishi to Priti Patel, former Home secretary, who is middle-middle class at best. The differentiator is accent, not wealth. Rishi is richer than the king, but thats not why he's posh.<p>That is not to say that race is not a factor. its just nowhere near as big of a thing as it is in america.<p>The advantage is that you can change your class, its much harder to change your race. However your class at the time of your birth leaves an inprint/set of habits that are difficult to overcome. I do know someone who was raised on a london estate with a strong SAAAAAF LAAANDEN accent, who now is a QC/KC (senior lawyer) and has a received pronunciation accent. It wasnt until I met her parents and sister that I realised how much she'd changed.<p>[1] <a href="https://youtu.be/Feb-CdHBXc8?t=114" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/Feb-CdHBXc8?t=114</a> Although the mum has quite a soft central norfolk possibly norwich accent.
For better or worse, the prevalence of US media and the "melting pot" effect of larger cities is gradually flattening out British accents and slang. But at the same time, the country also runs on prejudice and going to the right school. (Rishi Sunak is celebrating the achievement of being the first UK PM from a minority background - he went to one of the <i>less popular</i> Oxford colleges <a href="https://cherwell.org/2022/10/25/diversity-triumphs-uk-finally-has-pm-from-lincoln-college/" rel="nofollow">https://cherwell.org/2022/10/25/diversity-triumphs-uk-finall...</a> )
I would not be surprised if the issue of accents being a discriminant (positive or negative) was common everywhere.<p>In France we have a "standard" accent (the one you hear on TV or on the national radio) which corresponds more or less to Paris and the surrounding regions. Someone speaking with this accent is "neutral".<p>We then have an accent that is not related to a region but to the kind of neighborhood called "cité" with large buildings with working class inhabitants (and immigrants). It puts you either in the "homies" category, or in the "touch luck to find a better job" one. People who come from these places, when they want to move up with jobs, will aggressively work on loosing this accent.<p>Finally, there are the regional accents that are not very visible outside of the region. The southern one is very distinctive and a northern one has been made famous by the movie "Welcome to the Sticks". They tend to vanish if you come from these regions but live/work away from it because there is a gradual move towards the "neutral" accent. people who use it, however, are not really discriminated (this is rather a folklori accent), but you do not hear it much. there are exceptions such as one of our prime ministers.<p>Then there is a specific posh accent which has strongly fallen out of fashion and people who were raised with it actively try to use the "neutral" one as well.
In my experience, there's a cohort of middle-aged British men out there who absolutely cannot help but demonstrate their "oirish" accent as soon as they are in Ireland or meet an Irish person. It's a bit weird but I try to take it as an endearment.<p>That said, Irish people tend to be very fond of accent mimickery too.
If you want to understand how messed up the UK class/accent system is and how damaging for all sides, there's an episode of below deck med. It plays out between a private school chef and a northern stewardess.
I am astonished by what I am reading in the comments. I've been living in the UK for almost 6 years now and not a single time I've felt I've been judged or mistreated because of my accent or even my lack of language skills the first year I was here. Worth mentioning that I definitely don't look like I am native (I am from Africa). Worth mentioning too that I have not been living in a bubble, exposed myself to a short set of interactions. Mind boggling.
> They said those with northern English or Midlands accents were more likely to worry about the way they spoke.<p>> Many of those who were mocked for the way they spoke admitted anxiety over their future career prospects because of perceived prejudiced attitudes.<p>The biggest concern for northerners regarding their future careers is the continued and unchecked concentration of power and wealth towards London and other major cities. Their accent is close to the least of their worries.
I'd like to know more about UK accents. From what I hear, during colonization of North America, UK spoke similarly to how US speaks now, but since then US accents stayed somewhat the same, while UK accents drifted a lot. Apparently, at a certain time in history, in UK, it was posh to speak differently. Was that a form of classism?
I find this article amusing because the clue is right there in the name.<p>Received Pronunciation is just that, received.<p>You can learn it, in fact it has been and continues to be taught both in schools, in elocution lessons, and in educational videos online.<p>I sincerely doubt that this is a purely UK based phenomenon. The example that comes to mind is the stereotypical "black man with white accent" from US sitcoms. I don't know how that works in the real world, but I'd feel fairly confident in placing a bet that there aren't many white collar CEOs who sound like they're from the hood.
This is getting traction because the London media class has noticed people taking the mickey out of their adoption of the vocal fry from their New York brethren. They don't want regionals laughing at them.<p>It's vitally important that Southerners keep talking in silly accents. It's useful to spot people who are going to try to steal your stuff using emails.
I'm working class as f - raised to communicate with a strong regional accent, using regional slang, combined of course with at least one or two profanities per sentence. I view the phase, "what's up, dickhead?" as friendly way to greet a friend.<p>I don't know anyone in my family who works a middle class job. You're either unemployed or postman around here. Growing up my school was so bad you were lucky to leave with a few GCSEs. In general you were far more likely to leave with a kid or a smoking addiction.<p>My whole adult life has been a learning experience. I remember first being confused when people mocked how I spoke in university. It wasn't just one or two people either, literally everyone I spoke with would comment on how I spoke.<p>In terms of work, I'm not sure how it's impacted my ability to find work, but I don't think it's helped. Several years ago when I was still learning how to not be working class I had an interview in which I was asked a question I knew I knew the answer to, but just couldn't quite recall. I said something like, "fuck, I know this but can't remember". I didn't swear consciously, it's just automatic, but the interviewer lost it and terminated the interview on the spot saying I was wasting his time. That really upset me as I was having a hard enough time finding work as it was.<p>At one point in my career I ended up working for a start-up incubator in London which was interesting. Everyone there was unbelievably well spoken and while at that point I was starting to get good at not coming across as working class I did get comments whenever we'd go out drinking because I'd temporarily find it difficult to speak proper. Not nasty comments or anything though - they were all really nice - but people obviously noticed and were confused why someone in real life was talking like they were on Jeremy Kyle.<p>I think the hardest part of it is having to self-censor my sense of humour because what I deem offensive or unacceptable is completely out of whack with those I work with. My humour seems to be quite mean which I think is normal for working class people. Like I can joke about literally anything with school friends, but I have to be very careful with jokes at work. Calling someone a gayboy as a joke for doing something a bit gay is unacceptable for example. I also don't seem to know when people are being mean. Middle class people tend to be very easily offended and will hold in their feelings so it's hard to know if you're offending them. I'm not used to that. Growing up people would speak very plainly with each other so that's by far the hardest part for me.<p>I think I'm quite an extreme example of this class divide though. I'm also not sure what the answer is. I judge people who speak like myself force more harshly than anyone I work with. Unlike people I work with I know people from my background are generally trashy.
Yeah, of course. This doesn’t come as a surprise to anyone who’s heard how some of these people talk.<p>Ridiculous accents and the mockery of them are a proud British tradition.