Talk:Estuary English

academics

This page really needs a section discussing how Estuary English is not universally accepted among academics. Some deny it completely, whereas others think it's misrepresented. My own tutor believes acceptance of the term is much more common amongst younger lecturers/tutors than older ones. Spuderoony 11:11, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

And since the younger tutors are likely more in touch with the language changes occuring in our society right now, they're more likely to be right, no? It may not be a unified entity, but it certainly exists as the broad set of trends which are noted in this article. BovineBeast 00:49, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

The more I read about estuary English the more i think it doesn't exist at least not in the way some try to explain it. The only possible use the term has IMO is as shorthand for the attempts at what they see as a more working class accent by celebrities and middle-class people faking it.

But if it's to be used to stand for a dialect/accent spoken unselfconsciously by average working-class people in South-eastern England half of the marker's I've seen mentioned to define it are don't in actuality exist. Non-pronuniciation of the 'h' at the beginning of words and the full glottal stop are from my knowledge (someone who grew up amongst working class people in the south east (20-30 miles from central London))as common in those people's speech as in full-on Cockney. Whilst the 'estuary' idea is that the 'h' is pronounced and there's sort of a semi-glottal stop.That from my personal experience is plain wrong. But if we're talking the language of minor-royals, MP's and pop stars slumming it yes the fake demotic they use WOULD include initial 'hs and weird sort of glottal stop. But in that case the term 'Estuary English' shouldn't be used for the genuine accent of the region and should if it's used at all remain solely a description for the modern affectation spoken by those I've mentioned above. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.135.152.123 (talk) 17:32, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

The above discussion makes what I think are important points about whether EE should really be considered an accent of English in the way that, for example, a Norfolk accent or a Birmingham accent is so considered. But in the article itself there is no suggestion that the status of EE might be dubious. If nobody objects, I would like to add to the article a short section summarizing the genuine doubts of some academics about the status of EE. RoachPeter (talk) 12:24, 17 November 2014 (UTC)

Not a Uniform Dialect

I think it's important to note that "Estuary English" (pronounced Esh-choo-ree in Estuary) is not a single uniform dialect and there are different variations used by different people, depending on both geographical differences and social class, I don't know of any reliable sources to qualify anything written about Estuary English but most of the information is based on observation and based on my own observations I've found that some people "adopt" Estuary in conversations while others speak it naturally, but on different levels, some people sound more similar to Cockney when speaking it while others are closer to RP. Angryafghan 19:34, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

A pet hate of mine is the use of the expression "Home Counties" accent to mean something used by the middle or upper middle class and verging on RP. This is no more the "dialect" of the Home Counties than it is anywhere else...at least half (?) of those living in the Home Counties would be working or lower middle class and speak in an Estuary or similar accent...and as is often the case in Home Counties towns these are likely to be the "real" natives to the particular town where they live. As they say if you want to find the original inhabitants in a south eastern locality look on the council estates. The south-eastern working or lower middle-class... surely the most downtrodden,ignored sector of English society? (and probably at least about 10 million strong) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.42.196.73 (talk) 23:24, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

Why Parklife?

Am I missing something, or is this article totally unrelated to Parklife?

Your right.

Correction - You are (or You're) right.

What an enlightening conversation.

chavspeak?

I think it's clear that many people, especially people who don't live in areas that speak estuary have a very biased view regarding the way we speak, I'm just as much a chav-hater as the rest of polite society but I also speak in an incredibly thick estuary accent/dialect, I'm not ignorant of how to speak RP and can do so if the social circumstance require it, though I prefer not to. It also does not mean I sound like a moron, for if estuary 'sounds' low-intelligence then by that logic so does every non-standard accent or dialect of the language, but we never hear people say the welsh dialect sounds moronic, or the brummie accent sounds moronic do we? Also I must raise a question - who exactly says that estuary is 'clear as mud and flows freely'? I'd assume probably only the person who added that to the article. Seek100 02:06, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

I'm in complete agreement. Frankly, the majority of people who say it sounds 'stupid' are middle-class people with some kind of superiority complex. Estuary English is my native dialect and I'd appreciate it if people didn't denigrate it as if it was some kind of inferior one. Ask any linguist and they'll tell you that no dialect is 'better' than another. Estuary English is just as fit for purpose as any other dialect. BovineBeast 00:47, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

I'm in cautious agreement. My natural accent is Estuary or Cockney but as I now live in NZ I speak RP because people understand me better. When I'm back home, I go back to Estuary. Language is about communication, therefore a good accent is one that communicates clearly. Also, a lot of middle class people speak with an Estuary accent so it's not a class thing either. And was the chav hating comment really necessary? 125.239.207.41 04:16, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Promoting Equality?

although i do not adopt "estuary english" in any situation, i do think that those who speak it naturally are seen as more equal because it is people from a wider range of social backgrounds which use this dialect rather than the traditional received pronouciation which is now more associated with the upper classes, and also northerners cant say that all southerners talk like posh toffs anymore, if anything they have been outdone because estuary english is a much less attractive accent than some northern accents - Angryafghan 16:51, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

I think that northerners are a bit muddled about this. On the one hand they talk about a "southern accent" meaning a "posh accent". On the other hand they would never claim that cockneys "spoke posh". Ask someone from the north how a Millwall supporter speaks, and he's hardly likely to reply "posh". But they would not deny that Millwall is in the south. Bill Tegner 22:42, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Then there is the phenomenon of certain Northern English modes of pronunciation being more close to RP than Estuary (ie the demotic of the South eastern working classes). IE the way people from Yorkshire etc would say "computer" with a well enunciated "com" when someone speaking estuary would say "c'mputer. Similarly until reason Yorkshire/lancs person would have been closer to RP in relation to glottal stops than non-middle class south easterners. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.42.196.189 (talk) 21:43, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

"face" as [aɪ]?

I think the diphthong in "face" is not [ʌɪ] but [aɪ]. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 202.161.26.139 (talk • contribs) .

You'll need some evidence to back that up. Wells says that the "face" diphthong can be [ɛɪ], [ɐɪ], [ʌɪ], or [æɪ], but I've never seen any source that's said it's [aɪ]. --Lazar Taxon 23:54, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

[aɪ] for /eɪ/ would be more Aussie. If you look at this chart, you'll see what I mean. They transcribe it as /æɪ/, but the phonetic reality is more like a fully front, fully open [a] onset (as you can see on the chart), giving [aɪ]. Thegryseone (talk) 23:17, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

FACE as [aɪ] is rare and most likely restricted to few dialects. --89.79.88.109 (talk) 13:39, 24 August 2012 (UTC)

Social Implications of Estuary English

I believe this article may benefit a little from the social class aspects of estuary english? If there is any agreement here on the matter I shall go ahead and write up a section? But I thought I'd double check first as it may not nessessarily be to everyones taste? --WikipedianProlific^(Talk) 22:11, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Use of The Glottal Stop

This article states: (but never as a glottal stop between vowels, as in Cockney or in southern dialects, e.g. "water"). First I should point out that the main article on the "Glottal Stop" contradicts the last part of the sentence, I would also like to point out that I live in Essex and am surrounded by people who pronounce "water" /wɔːʔə/ with a glottal stop and unpronounced "r". Angryafghan 16:45, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

spread to North Britain (removed)

Removed following:

Estuary English definitely is on the rise, arguably replacing old standard dialects such as Scouse even in the North of Great Britain.[1] This is contradicted by [2] and [3] which see it as a Southern phenomenon.

It is not clear that this is the case, and the inclusion of contradictory media links seems to be original research. -- Chris Q 08:39, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

I would say as a matter of opinion (due to lack of research into the accent) that EE is restricted to the south east, particularly in Essex, which could be the centre of the accent, in counties further out such as Norfolk and Kent only certain aspects can be heard. Nevertheless it is without a doubt a real accent and rapidly replacing the traditional old essex accent, which sounds slightly like an East Anglian accent though not as pronounced and of course the dialect is absent. Angryafghan 16:51, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

since when is norfolk in the south east...its as much part of the north as the south east! ie not in either —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.254.173.35 (talk) 12:44, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Why the use of the term North Britain - North Britain is Scotland but this obviously means Northern England (which isnt really north Britain). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.42.196.189 (talk) 21:35, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Moved from article

(Estuary English) "uses words from American English and Australian English."

The citation was requested almost three months ago([4]). --194.145.161.227 00:17, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Australian Interrogative

I'm no linguistic expert, but I think there's an aspect of Estuary called "the Australian interrogative", which involves stressing the final words of a statement and seeming to phrase it like a question. Any comment? Bill Tegner 22:48, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

The Australian speech 'pattern' you refer to, the raising of the voice at the end of a sentence has long been a characteristic of many teenage Australians and related more to shyness or hesitancy. Some adult Australians slip into this pattern when stressed, for example when suddenly interviewed by a film crew, or when talking on the phone in a stressful situation. It may sound like an interrogative but is more of a 'developmental' phase that many, but not all young Australians go through, like acne!! --MichaelGG 05:54, 16 August 2007 (UTC) Brisbane.

Timescale

Has anyone an idea when the phrase "Estuary Accent" was first used? Bill Tegner 22:48, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

broad A

"A broad A in words such as bath, grass, laugh, etc". Is it supposed to mean ash? agnus 18:36, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

No, it's the open back unrounded vowel IPA: ɑː LDHan 19:04, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

How could this be cited as one of the features of Estuary English and its features distinct from IPA? The broad A has always been standard for such words in IPA.

I don't think it says that it's distinct from RP (I think you mean Received Pronunciation not International Phonetic Alphabet), but rather that rural working class accents in the south east did not have the "broad A" until relatively recently. LDHan 00:18, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

I grew up in Newcastle on Tyne, and of course we pronounced 'grass' and 'path' with the short unrounded a. To us, Southerners were saying "Graahrs" and "Paahrth". To elaborate on this: to a Geordie grass rhymes with hat rhymes with path rhymes with flat. However listening to Prince Harry on TV recently, his a's would have done any young man in Sunderland or Gateshead proud!--MichaelGG 05:59, 16 August 2007 (UTC) I've lived in the north (Yorks and Lancs) for many years now but still speak with a broad estuary accent and have noticed that Northerners tend not to be able to do the long "a" like a working class south easterner. Two Northern girlfriends of mine adnmitted this...if they tried they ended up speaking the "a" (in grass etc)in the over enunciated way of the south-eastern upper middle class...a sound completely different than the long "a" of the estuary speaker or Cockney.It's very difficult to describe the difference in the written word but very obvious if you hear it.

The use of the word "southerners"by Michael G above is a bit misleading...I presume he means the long "a" as spoken by people from the south east as people from the south west who retain the true West Country accent dont say words like grass, castle or bath with a long "a" but with an "a" sound different from both the south east or north but nearer to the short "a" of the latter. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.42.196.73 (talk) 23:17, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

The Diphthong in "Coat"

Can the diphthong in the word "coat" be realized as [ʌʊ] in Estuary English? 208.104.45.20 (talk) 06:54, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Yes, of course. Though the first element is more front than cardinal [ʌ]. --89.79.88.109 (talk) 20:39, 18 August 2012 (UTC)

So is it kinda [ʌ̟ʊ] ? With the first element being backer than [ɜ] ? Because it seems to me that it is. YanisBourgeois (talk) 19:06, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

Bad-lad Split

Is there a bad-lad split in Estuary English? 208.104.45.20 (talk) 02:22, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

no -- Q Chris (talk) 10:31, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

England

I've noticed that the way English people pronounce, well, England, is different from the way Americans pronounce it. How would the English pronunciation be written phonetically? 208.104.45.20 (talk) 03:58, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

I have no clue what difference you are having in mind, but might it be that (some?) Americans (sometimes?) pronounce England without the [g], i. e., [ˈʔɪŋlənd] instead of [ˈʔɪŋglənd]? Wiktionary, however, does not mention any such difference, nor any other. Merriam-Webster lists both pronunciation variants, but does not attribute the difference to regional variation – in fact, it does not explain nor even comment on the difference at all. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 23:09, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

In EE either way, it's [ˈʔɪŋglənd] ('inglund'). — Preceding unsigned comment added by Teh.cmn (talk • contribs) 18:02, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Sound files?

Some sound files comparing Estuary English to Received Pronunciation would be very welcome. - Jmabel | Talk 22:38, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

If you want sound files go here or here. There might be some examples on the first Web site. Click on "Dorset" in the second Web site I gave you, then click on "Skater Talk" or "Harry's Words". I would just call it "Southeastern English". I realize Dorset is in the southwest of England, but who knows if those two guys are actually from there. I'm pretty sure Harry isn't because he's "at uni". However, I assure you that the way these two guys speak is what people mean when they use the term "Estuary English". Thegryseone (talk) 00:29, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. I am interested for myself, but mostly felt that they'd be an improvement to the article. - Jmabel | Talk 04:09, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

The two sound files currently in the article (recordings of Ricky Gervais and Russell Brand) are good-quality recordings taken, I think, from broadcast material. But there is no supporting evidence to justify their presence in an article on Estuary English. Can anyone find expert confirmation that these are EE speakers? Note that all speakers listed as RP speakers in the Received Pronunciation article are named with citations. RoachPeter (talk) 12:05, 27 December 2021 (UTC)

Broad A

I've removed the following passage: "This [broad A] is often seen as the litmus test of a South East accent, but it has only spread to rural areas of the South East in the last forty years.". It is uncited. Wells, writing in 1982, said Accents of English, p. 335: "In a broad local accent of the south ... glass is [glɑ:s ~ gla:s]". The map on the next page shows that he considers this to apply to all parts of England that would be considered to belong to "the South East". Google Books link.

Grover cleveland (talk) 06:39, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

ORIGINS OF THE PHRASE "ESTUARY ENGLISH" It would be interesting for someone to do some research to trace the genuine origins of the rather pompous phrase "Estuary English". As I remember it, the starting point was the word "Strine", which is the Australian accent, its title being derived (obviously) from the fact that Australian is pronounced 'Strine by Australians. This is such a brilliant word that jealous English folk wanted to have a similar word for their accent, particularly the accent of South East England (SEE). SEE is so totally dominant in the UK that other regions call the BBC News the SEE News, and the accent might well have been dubbed SEE-lingus or c----lingus. Instead, a would-be wit did a bit of reverse engineering and invented the English version of Strine, which he dubbed "Estuarine" and tried to link, rather weakly, to the Thames Estuary. Some pedants, failing to see the joke, then expanded this to "Estuary English" and have tried to make an academic subject out of it. I do not have the references to cite for this sequence, but it is undoubtedly the way it happened. A researcher looking for the facts could find them in the Daily Telegraph/Times/Daily Mail/Spectator without having to dig any deeper, I'm sure.

As for the "Australian Interrogative", has no one ever travelled into our heathen backwoods of East Lothian or Fife? In those districts, every statement is pitched as a question, usually ending unnecessarily in "ken?" or "eh?".Thistlejacket (talk) 10:36, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

What funny discussions. The made-up joke word "Strine" was in the title of a humour book "Let Stalk Strine", and since its publication the term "strine" is occasionally used as a humourous name to describe the Broad Australian accent (never the much more common General Australian accent.) I guess by "Australian Interrogative" you and the commenter above mean High Rising Terminal? It is not really Australian. The claim in the UK that younger UK speakers started speaking like that due to the influence of Australian soap operas seems very faulty by the way and has no references. See the comments on that page (those "younger" UK Neighbours viewers will now be in their early 40s. Are they still speaking with a High Rising Terminal these days? Also, Australian television has been consistently dominated by US TV programs since 1956, but Australians still aren't speaking with American accents.) Format (talk) 19:33, 18 August 2010 (UTC)

What is RP?

As in 'it may eventually replace RP'? Jandrews23jandrews23 (talk) 20:23, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Received Pronunciation. Thegryseone (talk) 21:04, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

The Queen "has shifted her accent slightly towards what is called Estuary"

I've remove this sentence from the article: Australian scientists have found, in researching Queen Elizabeth's anniversary speeches that even she has shifted her accent slightly towards what is called Estuary.

The sources cited: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/1080228.stm http://www.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,4108610-103690,00.html do not make any such claim. All they say is that the "Queen's accent is moving towards the standard accent of southern England, away from the cut-glass "upper-crust" accent of the 1950s". The "standard accent of southern England" here is middle class speech not Estuary English, i.e. she has moved towards standard RP from "marked" (old fashioned) RP. 92.40.136.224 (talk) 13:16, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

And whats "Southern English" (don't you mean SOUTH EASTERN english) because the dialect spoken in the south west is hardly similar - or is this just another example of the arrogance towards the rest of the country of which many accuse us from London/the South East of?

And in addition to that i agree wit the above poster when he or she says the idea of the queen speaking estuary is crap she just speaks a slightly less extreme RP. in the south east the working/lower middle class generally speak an estuary type accent whilst the rest (middle-middle class upwards speak that which replaced RP as do the middle-middle upper middle classes from the rest of England with maybe a short 'a' in Yorkshire for instance to slightly differentiate certain parts of the country).This mode of speach having precisely nothing to do with an article on Estuary English. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.162.91.91 (talk) 21:06, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Give me a break. "Shifting one's accent slightly towards what is called Estuary" (actually, only her vowels have been demonstrated to shift in the Estuary direction) does not mean the same as "talks Estuary" at all. If she's shifting away from RP, she can very well shift towards (not into) EE at the same time, and in fact that is exactly what was found: the "standard accent of southern England" is not Estuary English, but intermediate between RP and EE, so the contradiction you are reading into this is not there. Here's a dime, go buy a clue. Get some bloody reading comprehension. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 23:26, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Estuary and RP

For non-English readers, this article would be immensely more informative if it would be better structured. At the moment, it reads very much like a random list of aspects found in Estuary English, while a systematic comparison between RP and Estuary would make it understandable to all of those who aren't from the London area.Jeppiz (talk) 14:03, 20 March 2010 (UTC)

Three Two issues

T glottalisation

The article states the pronunciation of water as wa'er is common in EE. However, I think for EE this trait is generally limited to final t is words like not, with medial t glottalisation being largely confined to the London working class.

If you mean RP, then you are right. If you mean EE, you are wrong, at least according to T-glottalization. Intervocalic (medial) glottalisation is a feature that's excluded from RP only, and final glottalisation is even possible in RP these days. Cockney features are apparently on their way up and have progressed farther than you (and seemingly, many other people) are aware, or willing to admit. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 23:59, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Tag questions

I thought these were standard English. My first class teacher at grammar school, whose pronunciation was distinctly RP, devoted quite some time to getting them right, telling us it would be rather impolite if you left them out. Even a textbook from the 1950s I consulted included tag questions. So I think they are perfectly acceptable in RP. Steinbach (talk) 11:02, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

I've found out what the problem was: the person who inserted the point did not understand what "confrontational question tags" are, or at least provided wrong examples. I've removed them and added a link to explain what is really meant here. It's exactly about not getting them "right", but intentionally employing "inappropriate" (asymmetrical, nonstandard) ones. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 23:47, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Vowels

There used to be a description of the vowel pronunciations in this article, but it was deleted, apparently by its originator. That's quite unfortunate as a source was given for the data. Now there is nothing about the (phonetic) vowel realisations left. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 00:47, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

I've restored it and will try to expand it even more. — Peter238 (v̥ɪˑzɪʔ mɑˑɪ̯ tˢʰoˑk̚ pʰɛˑɪ̯d̥ʒ̊) 04:57, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

London accent

I don't see that this article is the place for a description of the London accent; if it was, it would need to be a lot more detailed than this brief note. My main concern is the use (twice) of the term "mild" to refer to an accent that is relatively close to RP. Mildness is not a concept that can be used meaningfully in describing accents. I would like to see this section removed. RoachPeter (talk) 10:15, 11 November 2014 (UTC)

Removed. — Peter238 (v̥ɪˑzɪʔ mɑˑɪ̯ tˢʰoˑk̚ pʰɛˑɪ̯d̥ʒ̊) 18:54, 11 November 2014 (UTC)

Features

The claim made in the item "Replacement of [ɹ] with [ʋ]" is not supported by published evidence. Cruttenden (2014), for example, states the opposite. RoachPeter (talk) 17:17, 13 November 2014 (UTC)

You can always reword it according to what Cruttenden (2014) writes. Remember about WP:Be bold, especially when editing/removing unsourced stuff. — Peter238 (v̥ɪˑzɪʔ mɑˑɪ̯ tˢʰoˑk̚ pʰɛˑɪ̯d̥ʒ̊) 23:30, 13 November 2014 (UTC)

Sources needed

We need sources for the following:

• /ɔː/ realised as [o̞ː] (= [ɔ̝ː]) or [oː]. Przedlacka (2001:42) transcribes it as [ɔː], which is definitely not the correct value (too open).
• /ɒ, ɔː/ realised as [ɞ], [ɵː]. You can hear it in Alex Rawlings' speech. He doesn't always use this pronunciation, but it definitely does occur. — Peter238 (v̥ɪˑzɪʔ mɑˑɪ̯ tˢʰoˑk̚ pʰɛˑɪ̯d̥ʒ̊) 05:15, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

Pronunciations Pointless

We don't need the pronunciations of estuary here as they're already on the page for estuary. Meemo16 (talk) 11:12, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

Removed. — Peter238 (v̥ɪˑzɪʔ mɑˑɪ̯ tˢʰoˑk̚ pʰɛˑɪ̯d̥ʒ̊) 07:38, 19 January 2015 (UTC)

Ricky Gervais, working class!!??

Are you having a laugh? How on Earth is Ricky Gervais an example of a working class accent from Berkshire? Just because he was once working class doesn't mean his is now and I can tell you working class people in Berkshire do NOT sound like him!

London Regional General British

I'm not happy abut this new name being given equal status with the name Estuary English in the first sentence of the lead of this article. LRGB is the recent creation of one writer (the only refs are to his book and to a web page of his university department), while the term Estuary English has been in widespread use for decades. Would it not be possible to use the immediately following section about the name of EE (which is currently only about abbreviations for names already introduced), introducing the term LRGB and perhaps summarizing Cruttenden's arguments in favour of its adoption? I think that would more accurately reflect the status of the new name, and it would follow what is done in the Received Pronunciation article, where there is a separate section to cover alternative names. RoachPeter (talk) 09:10, 18 May 2015 (UTC)

Agreed. I have flagged it as a possible Neologism. -- Q Chris (talk) 09:21, 18 May 2015 (UTC)

Moved it below and made it clear that only Cruttenden uses that term. I think that is enough to remove the tag. Peter238 (talk) 09:32, 18 May 2015 (UTC)

Status of EE as a genuine English accent

Given the continuing scepticism among many specialists on English pronunciation about whether EE should be treated as an accent of English, I propose (unless opposed) to take the last para of the "Features" section and move it into a new section (probable title "Status of Estuary English as an accent of English") just before the "Features" section. RoachPeter (talk) 17:53, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

  (The above proposal has now been carried out). 

  The lead section says that Wells "criticised the notion that the spread of language from London to the south-east was anything new". I can't find any such statement in the document referred to. The statement doesn't really mean much in the context of EE anyway. Wells does say that London has been the source of linguistic innovation for centuries, but again that is, I think, too general to be relevant here. Remove?  RoachPeter (talk) 09:05, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

Australian accent

Can someone add in links from old Kentish accent - Dickens era - from Thames and Medway - that formed origin of modern Australian accent. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.152.7.91 (talk) 13:49, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

EE vs. RP

This was asked for by a fellow non-Brit before, but that was seven years ago (above). So I'm asking it again. To most of us, Estuary English would sound pretty much like "RP with glottal stops". Also, many readers won't be aware of the main characteristics of RP at all. Maybe the list of features could be split into "features shared with traditional RP" (like broad A) and "distinctive features" (like the glottal stop). Just an idea. Thank you.

Meaning of 'Features'

It isn't clear whether the 'Features' section is intended to be confined to features that differentiate EE from RP. If it is, then it should not include features like non-rhoticity, which are found in RP and many other English accents. As to the 'board'/ 'bored' distinction, I can't offhand think of any English accent in which these two words would NOT be distinct.109.149.91.214 (talk) 14:57, 20 February 2018 (UTC)

Use of Labiodental R

I think it would be worth mentioning as a feature that in place of the more common /ɹ/ many speakers of EE (such as myself) will use /ʋ/ instead. I know that it's on the page for the Labiodental Approximant but I think it should be here and on the page for the Cockney dialect where it's mentioned in passing. I don't have any sources but I see it IRL. Thank you.

Apyrrypa (talk) 23:19, 25 January 2021 (UTC)

Mesolect

The acrolect in southeastern England is probably best defined: it is Standard British English with Received Pronunciation. The basilect is arguably the Cockney dialect, at least in London, and presumably Multicultural London English in some quarters. I'm not sure if traditional dialects are still spoken in Kent, Essex, and other counties of southeastern England at all. So, couldn't Estuary English be equated with the mesolect – at least in parts of London? In places where traditional dialects have fallen out of use, however, Estuary English can be described as simply the basilect, or as both basilect and mesolect (the original basilect having disappeared). As a mesolect emcompasses all points in the continuum between acrolect (the standard language, especially its most formal register – as far as it is actually in use) and basilect (the variety considered most remote from the standard and least prestigious which is used in a certain place), it's not a problem that Estuary English isn't a coherent accent and varies from place to place. Is my understanding of the situation correct?

Perhaps it could even be said that Estuary English basically encompasses all substandard varieties of British English that are considered native to southeast England now – the main exception being the distinctive Multicultural London English sociolect –, contrasting only with Standard British English. This situation can be compared to Germany, where traditional dialects (both long-standing local dialects and regional koiné dialects arisen through dialect levelling), regiolects (based on Standard German, though with distinctive regional colour and interference from traditional dialects), and the standard language (or spoken varieties very close to the standard language) all co-exist, although in many regions traditional dialects have more or less disappeared and heterogeneous regiolects contrast only with a largely (though, as Werner König has shown, even in Germany not completely) uniform standard language, the regiolects acting as "neo-dialects". --Florian Blaschke (talk) 16:05, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

Infobox

I don't think the infobox is appropriate here. The infobox template used is designed for a language, not an accent. Consequently, we get a branching diagram tracing EE’s ancestry through English right back to Indo-European, as though EE was a daughter language derived from English instead of an accent of present-day English. We are told, rather unnecessarily, that its writing system is “Latin (English alphabet)”. About the only potentially useful bit of information in the infobox is that there are 8.6 million speakers of EE, a factoid that is unsupported and completely unverifiable. May I suggest that the infobox be removed? RoachPeter (talk) 16:01, 23 December 2021 (UTC)

@RoachPeter: Agree, and  Done. –Austronesier (talk) 16:07, 23 December 2021 (UTC)

PS: Maybe we need to restore the IPA warning ("This page contains IPA. Without proper rendering, IPA can be hurtful to your eyes, please consult the following pages or your local physician etc."), but I don't know how to place that template. –Austronesier (talk) 16:10, 23 December 2021 (UTC)

Done. Nardog (talk) 18:51, 23 December 2021 (UTC)

Lodge (2009)

The “Features” section, item on /əʊ/ (GOAT), quotes Ken Lodge’s 2009 book A Critical Introduction to Phonetics as stating that “Estuary /əʊ/ may be pronounced [ɑːɪ] or [ɑːʏ̯̈], with the first element somewhat lengthened and much more open than in RP and the second element being near-close central, with or without lip rounding.” Lodge does not say this in the cited work. In addition, a vowel diagram purporting to be from Lodge’s book (p. 175) is reproduced showing the direction of travel for this diphthong. This doesn’t correspond to the diagram in the Lodge reference, and I wonder if the quotation and diagram come from somewhere else. To begin with, Lodge is not talking about (and doesn’t mention) Estuary English - he is, rather, talking about possible Australian influence on British English vowels. In his 2009 book, he says that the alternative vowel glide corresponding to RP /əʊ/ is [ɑəᵻ] or [ɑəʏ]; the diagram shows the former. Can anyone explain this apparent misquotation? RoachPeter (talk) 09:01, 24 December 2021 (UTC)

@RoachPeter: The information was added here by User:Peter238, an editor who stopped contributing to WP in 2016.

The only thing in the source that comes closest to Estuary English is "some young speakers, mainly from the South-East of England (p.175)". But to equate this with Estuary English is OR. And so is the unexplained change of the [ᵻ]-part of the diphthong to [ɪ̯̈]. Maybe it's based on Lodge's statement that the final element is pronounced "with or without lip rounding", so based on a literal reading of the IPA trapezoid you would expect [ɨ ~ ʉ] (or [ɪ̈ ~ ʏ̈]), but not Lodge's pair [ɨ ~ ʏ]. –Austronesier (talk) 10:30, 24 December 2021 (UTC)

I have removed the misquotation and related diagram. RoachPeter (talk) 14:47, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

Sound files

I have commented above that, useful though it is to have illustrative recordings, the two recordings given in this article are labelled as EE without any supporting citation. That seems to me to make the use of them a case of OR. If nobody can come up with a suitable citation I believe it is necessary to remove them. RoachPeter (talk) 14:51, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

Features

The "Features" section of this article has a number of weaknesses. One is that the material does not seem as if it would help an uninformed reader to understand how to recognize EE as distinct from Cockney or RP. An anonymous contributor to this Talk page has earlier pointed out something of the sort (see 'EE vs. RP'). Only at the end of "Features" do we get two points of difference from Cockney that could be thought of as diagnostic. To start the section by saying that EE is non-rhotic, and that is exhibits "intrusive /r/" is not very informative. Some of the later items in this section seem more diachronic than synchronic, as if the article were describing the emergence of an accent rather than the characteristics of an existing one: there is material on "vowel changes", "yod coalescence", "vowel splits". I feel this whole section needs rewriting to explain firstly where present-day EE stands, phonologically, between contemporary RP and Cockney, and secondly what phonological processes are claimed to have taken place in the emergence of EE. RoachPeter (talk) 15:13, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

Traditional rural Estuary English

It's hard to see what this section has to do with the Estuary English described in the rest of the article. Even if the section is thought to be relevant, the opening sentence contains this: "Older rural dialects were once mainly confined to Kent and the north and the east of Essex". As it stands, that is nonsense - older rural dialects were found all over the country. RoachPeter (talk) 08:58, 29 January 2022 (UTC)

@RoachPeter: True, this wording is my shoddy synthesis of different sentences from other articles. My intention was to give those looking for older rural Southeastern accents a single place to land, and this seemed the best place, especially if no particular features can be distinguished other than moribund rhoticity. Other suggestions? Wolfdog (talk) 00:45, 30 January 2022 (UTC)

Also, you may want to check the more robust description of these same dialects here. Wolfdog (talk) 03:09, 30 January 2022 (UTC)

Estuary English, RP, and SSBE

Recent academic literature widely uses the terms Estuary English, Received Pronunciation, and Standard Southern British English. Is there any academic consensus on where one ends and another begins? Should this page, Estuary English, also cover SSBE for the limited and reader-friendly purposes of Wikipedia, or is there some dangerous slippery slope in doing that? Do we need to begin a third page for the latter? Perhaps editors (I think of RoachPeter, for instance) might have some thoughts on the topic. Thanks! Wolfdog (talk) 21:28, 28 May 2023 (UTC)

This is a very difficult area to make sense of. The three terms (RP, SSBE, EE) are not equivalent. I would start from the viewpoint that there are two different aims: one is to satisfy the need for an agreed standard pronunciation that can be used in language teaching and in general descriptive accounts of the phonetics of English, and the other is to provide a framework for describing the social and geographical variation found in English pronunciation in England. For the former, RP as defined by Daniel Jones worked fine in the 19th and early 20th century but is now widely rejected; attempts to find a substitute that people can agree on have been largely unsuccessful. (In my own case, I have always felt that the BBC offers a remarkably consistent pronunciation that is useful as an accessible standard as long as it's understood that I am only talking about English-born newsreaders and announcers on serious radio channels like Radio 4 and Radio 3 and some TV channels. But many writers on the phonetics of English think this idea is worthless). For the latter, I have found it very useful to read a paper by Sidney Wood where possible successors to RP such as EE are discussed in relation to Southern British English. RoachPeter (talk) 10:25, 29 May 2023 (UTC)

Thanks! The Southern British English and Estuary English boundary seems fuzzy even for Wood, though he certainly makes a distinction between these two and RP. SBE (and, again, Estuary?) has a less diphthongized MOUTH and a wider diphthong in GOAT, while RP has the opposite: a more diphthongized MOUTH and a narrower diphthong in GOAT. The implications I glean from his piece are his views that: Southern British English is the most all-encompassing variety (though it's hard to see how West Country dialects would fit under that label, having various distinct vowels and, I believe, not necessarily the Southeast's defining TRAP-BATH split), and (here I'm really conjecturing) Estuary English is one subtype falling in the middle of a spectrum between the most popular Southern British English (which I take to be Cockney) and the most standard/educated Southern British English (RP). Wolfdog (talk) 15:27, 30 June 2023 (UTC)

SSB(E) (note that Standard Southern British English is not the same as Southern British English) is the successor of RP, at least that's how Geoff Lindsey defines it. So it's basically "younger RP", if you want to use a really broad definition of 'young'. What defines SSB is a vowel shift from [e̞ æ ɐ ɒ ɔː ʊ] to [ɛ a ʌ ɔ o̞ː ɵ ~ ɘ] and modified starting and ending points of [iː uː eɪ ɔɪ aɪ] to [ɪi ʉu ~ ɨu ɛi oi ɑi] (MOUTH is also slightly fronted to [au], from RP [äʊ ~ ɑʊ] and GOAT can be [əʉ ~ əɨ]). Some of the changes resemble cockney, some don't (apart from LOT, the shift makes the short vowels DIFFERENT from cockney which largely retains the older RP pronunciation). Some of those shifted vowels also appear in RP; [o̞ː] is definitely an RP pronunciation. But most don't. Wells describes the shifted THOUGHT as an increase of rounding (older [ɔː] vs. "newer" [ɔ̹ː]) rather than any significant increase of height (and open-mid → mid, or the other way around (in the case of DRESS) is not terribly significant). And Lindsey says on his blog that SSB THOUGHT is somewhat more open than German /oː/ but they're still close to each other.

SQUARE and often also NEAR are monophthongized to [ɛː ɪː] (alternatively, NEAR acquires a close starting point: [iə], but this is probably a disyllabic [ɪiə]), while CURE often merges with THOUGHT, GOOSE + COMMA or plain GOOSE (before /r/). The wholly-holy split is variable, depending on the background of the speaker - but most have [ɔu] before a dark L: [ɡɔuɫ] 'goal'. In RP, the starting point is always central. All of the diphthongs end higher in the mouth, especially before pauses and before other vowels: buy is pronounced [bɑi], not [bɑɪ] which is a cockney/Australian pronunciation, but buy two of them can be [ˈbɑɪ ˈtʉu ə ðəm]. Similarly, sight can be pronounced [sɑɪt]. In RP, they're always lax, even before other vowels (that's where smoothing comes from). But FLEECE and GOOSE can't lax (they'd clash with NEAR and CURE as close-mid monophthongs), they monophthongize instead to [i] and [ʉ] (hence RP [iː], [uː] - also not lax).

The lot-cloth split is completely undone, HAPPY is always tense, the trap-bath split is optional (depending on the background of the speaker) and many instances of the weak KIT vowel merge with COMMA. Also, there's a possible strut-comma merger for speakers with a Welsh/Northern background. Sonorants are less often syllabic in SSB than in RP, so that sudden can be [ˈsʌdən], rather than RP [ˈsɐdn]. You should read English after RP for a more detailed description. The phrase-final schwa is [ə], not the [ɐ] of cockney and some RP speakers. There's some th-fronting and L-vocalization, which are not a part of RP. T-glottalization is possible before word-initial vowels, at least for speakers with a London background (and word-finally for most speakers: not a lot [ˈnɔʔ ə ˈlɔʔ ~ ˈnɔt ə ˈlɔʔ]).

Estuary English is watered-down cockney modified towards SSB. It features the THOUGHT split, which is neither SSB nor RP and can (but doesn't have to) feature more conservative DRESS, TRAP, STRUT, LOT, FOOT, SQUARE and NEAR so that they sound a bit more like 'driss', 'trep', 'strat', 'laht', 'fort', 'square-uh' (without the linking R) and 'knee-uh', so your typical cockney/Australian values (discounting minor differences). As in those dialects, the final schwa can be very open: [ˈkɒmɐ] and so can the ending points of SQUARE and NEAR: [skwɛɐ, niɐ]. NEAR starts high [i] when it's diphthongal and can be disyllabic [ɪiə ~ ɪiɐ]. All three can be heard from (some) RP speakers, but with a lax onset of NEAR: [ɪɐ] and without a possible disyllabic pronunciation. CURE often disappears in favor of THOUGHT or GOOSE + COMMA (or just GOOSE). The starting points of FLEECE, GOOSE, FACE and GOAT can all be lowered and/or centralized: [əi, əʉ, æi ~ ɐi, ɐu] and MOUTH can start higher in the mouth: [æu], retaining the contrast with GOAT. All of these are non-standard (both non-SSB and non-RP) pronunciations. I'm not sure about diphthong offsets, but they can probably be lax in the pre-pausal position, as in cockney: [bɑɪ]. And PRICE can begin with a rounded vowel: [ɒɪ], which is another difference between EE and SSB. This, AFAIK, is not even a cockney pronunciation anymore, but some EE speakers use it anyway.

There's probably more L-vocalization and possibly more TH-fronting than in SSB. Intervocalic t-glottaling is possible even within the same word. The trap-bath split is categorical as in cockney: bath can be [bɑːf ~ bɑːθ] but not [bæf] etc. and the STRUT-COMMA distinction is always present (compare [əˈlɑːdʒɐnˈtɑidiˈɹʉum] 'a large untidy room' vs. [əˈlɑːdʒ(ə)nˈtɑidiˈɹʉum] 'a large and tidy room'. In SSB, this can be [əˈlɑːdʒ(ə)nˈtɑidiˈɹʉum] for both).

So, basically, SSB is the higher end of the continuum, whereas cockney is the lower end. Estuary English is something in-between the two. RP is the predecessor of SSB. Multicultural London English (which has replaced cockney in some (many?) places in London) is a mixture of EE and Jamaican English, and, AFAIK, it has about the same prestige as EE (lower than SSB, higher than cockney - mostly because of the vowels).

Southern British English is, to me, Southern England English - that is, any dialect of England English that has the foot-strut split. Both SSB and RP fulfill that definition, but RP is more definitely southern than SSB, in which STRUT can be equal to COMMA and the trap-bath split is optional. Sol505000 (talk) 16:52, 30 June 2023 (UTC)

References