Territorial varieties of English pronunciation - Дипломная работа

It may be well to state that every national variety of the language falls into territorial or regional dialects. Dialects are distinguished from each other by differences in pronunciation, grammar and vocabulary. We must make clear that, when we refer to varieties in pronunciation only, we use the word «accent».1 So local accents may have many features of pronunciation in common and consequently are grouped into territorial or area accents. In Britain, for example, Yorkshire, Lancashire and Cheshire accents form the group of «Northern accent». We must admit, however, that in most textbooks on phonetics the word «dialect» is still used in reference to the regional pronunciation peculiarities, though in the latest editions both in this country and abroad the difference in terms «dialects and accents» is generally accepted. As we see, those terms should be treated differently when related to different aspects of the language. It is, however, true that there is a great deal of overlap between these terms. For certain geographical, economic, political and cultural reasons one of the dialects becomes the standard language of the nation and its pronunciation or its accent - the received standard pronunciation. This was the case of London dialect, whose accent became the «RP» («Received Pronunciation») of Britain. English was originally spoken in England and south-eastern Scotland. Then it was introduced into the greater part of Scotland and southern Ireland. In the 17th and 18th centuries it was brought to North America (mainly from the West of England). Later in the 18th and 19th centuries English was exported to Australia, New Zealand and South Africa owing to the colonial expansion. A flow of emigrants who went to invade, explore and inhabit those lands came mostly from the south-eastern parts of England. English became wide-spread in Wales at about the same time. Welsh English is very similar to southern English, although the influence of Welsh has played a role in its formation. Then in the 20th century American English began to spread in Canada, Latin America, on the Bermudas, and in other parts of the world. Thus nowadays two main types of English are spoken in the English-speaking world: English and American English. According to British dialectologists (P. Trudgill, J. Hannah, A. Hughes and others (61, 78) the following variants of English are referred to the English-based group: English, Welsh English, Australian English, New Zealand English; to the American-based group: United States English, Canadian English. Scottish English and Irish English fall somewhere between the two being somewhat by themselves. On the whole this division seems rather reasonable and the «English» types of English will be treated first in this book, though it is safe to say that English, Welsh English, Scottish English and Northern Ireland English should be better combined into the British English subgroup, on the ground of political, geographical, cultural, psychological unity which brought more similarities than differences for those variants of pronunciation. To our regrets, the lack of space gives us no chance to describe all the territorial and national variants of English pronunciation. 2.2 English-based pronunciation standards of English 2.2.1 British English As was mentioned before, BEPS (British English Pronunciation Standards and Accents) comprise English English, Welsh English, Scottish English and Northern Ireland English (the corresponding abbreviations are EE, WE, ScE., NIE). Table 1 British English Accents English English Welsh English Scottish English Northern Ireland English Southern Northern Educated Sc. Eng. Regional Varieties 1. Southern 1. Northern 2. East Anglia 3. South-West 2. Yorkshire 3. North- West 4. West Midland 2.2.2 English, English In this chapter we are going to look in greater detail at the Received Pronunciation (RP) and at the regional non-RP accents of England. Roughly speaking the non-RP accents of England may be grouped like this: 1. Southern accents. 1) Southern accents (Greater London, Cockney, Surray, Kent, Essex, Hertfordshire, Buckinghamshire); 2) East Anglia accents (Lincolnshire, Norfolk, Suffolk, Cambridgeshire, Bedfordshire, Northamptonshire, Leicestershire; 3) South-West accents (Gloucestershire, Avon, Somerset, Wiltshire). 2. Northern and Midland accents. 1) Northern accents (Northumberland, Durham, Cleveland); 2) Yorkshire accents; 3) North-West accents (Lancashire, Cheshire); 4) West Midland (Birmingham, Wolverhampton). It has long been believed that RP is a social marker, a prestige ac-cent of an Englishman. In the nineteenth century «received» was understood in the sense of «accepted in the best society». The speech of aristocracy and the court phonetically was that of the London area. Then it lost its local characteristics and was finally fixed as a ruling-class accent, often referred to as «Kings English». It was also the ac-cent taught at public schools. With the spread of