Re: O Level English : Thu Nov 29, 2012 5:32 pm  

cod'ead wrote:

What about the spoken word, especially 'bath'?

Why do some people insist on referring to it as a 'baath', when they'd never dream of sending anything on a 'vaan' or cooling themselves with a 'faan'?

Grammar is one thing we can all get right, regional accents are another matter. As a northener who has lived most of his adult life in the south, I'm used to the 'baaarth' pronunciation, of course. Perfectly understandable. However, when folk occasionally challenge my northern pronunciation of the word, I ask them to take the 'Lady in Red' ( worst song ever written, BTW ) test.

Pronounce the following two lines consistently:

I've never seen so many men ask you if you wanted to dance
They're looking for a little romance, given half a chance

Re: O Level English : Thu Nov 29, 2012 7:26 pm  

El Barbudo wrote:

Having been corrected by tb and now creeping back into this conversation ... may I just divert attention to my BBC-bee-in-my-bonnet again (look at all those hyphens tb !).

Why listen to him? With regards to hyphens, he put out a style guide that is incorrect. People will think they are correct because of who he is. It's a bit like those lazy journos referring to wikipaedia for facts. They're presume it's correct because of what it is.

Re: O Level English : Thu Nov 29, 2012 7:58 pm  

Rooster Booster wrote:

Why listen to him? With regards to hyphens, he put out a style guide that is incorrect. People will think they are correct because of who he is. It's a bit like those lazy journos referring to wikipaedia for facts. They're presume it's correct because of what it is.

TBH after that borderline-iliterate drivel, I'm more inclined to accept grammar lessons from tb

Re: O Level English : Thu Nov 29, 2012 10:12 pm  

Why. Will he put a full stop at the end of your sentence? I'm not the one writing style guides matey.



Ah, there you are. Jostling for a position of superiority over posters again.

How superior you must feel. Must be hard.

Re: O Level English : Fri Nov 30, 2012 12:11 am  

What I want to know is whether or not the OP has an inferiority complex (which would not be difficult to understand), given he does not use a capital "B." Does that mean he does not consider himself "proper", like what his literacy isn't, innit?

Re: O Level English : Fri Nov 30, 2012 8:35 am  

Asgardian13 wrote:

Grammar is one thing we can all get right, regional accents are another matter. As a northener who has lived most of his adult life in the south, I'm used to the 'baaarth' pronunciation, of course. Perfectly understandable. However, when folk occasionally challenge my northern pronunciation of the word...

The best response is to challenge right back.
There is a widespread view, in the South East, that anyone who speaks with an accent that is not a South-Eastern accent, is thought of as someone "with an accent".
The approriate challenge is to respond that, yes, of course one has an accent, but so does everyone.
This does not often go down well but hey-ho.

Worse than challenge are the infrequent but ill-advised attempts to mimic one's accent, especially when they get it so wrong.

Although most of us will know accents we like and accents we don't, no accent is intrinsically better than any other.
Also I think that, these days, the notion that a South-Eastern accent is to "speak nicely" is waning, thank goodness.