Talk:Received Pronunciation/Archive 1

message: The following extract strikes me as being rather odd:
> Received Pronunciation makes sure to enunciate every consonant distinctly,
> except for the r consonant, which is not pronounced when it immediately precedes
> a consonant (as in cart)
I speak 'Standard English', and I pronounce the r in cart. Is Wikipedia suggesting that I should be pronouncing it as "cat"?
::No, obviously not.  Pronouncing the "r" in "cart" means making a sound like the initial sound in "ring" just before the "t".  That is how most English-speaking people pronounce it, and it is definitely not RP, i.e., in RP one does not pronounce the "r" in "cart" (and, of course, one also does not pronounce "cart" like "cat"; the vowels are pronounced differently). Michael Hardy 21:59, 11 Oct 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: If you speak received pronunciation you will change the vowel sound (so it won't be like "cat", but the "a" will be like that in "palm"), but you won't pronunce the "r" like they would in Scotland, Ireland or most of the USA. Some English regions, particularly in the West country do pronunce the "r", but not RP. You might be so used to changing the vowel sound that you think t is pronucing the "r"! -- Chris Q 16:13, 5 Oct 2004 (UTC)
replies: text:  You might say the description "pronouncing the R" is a bit of a value-judgement and is American POV. Maybe it  should be emphasising/de-emphasising the R. To my (English, non-RP) ear a lot of Americans on TV say things like "I was struck with horrr when I looked in the mirrr". 
Andy G 18:46, 11 Oct 2004 (UTC)
replies: text:  I don't believe so. I think if you got a non-English speaking phoneticist to transcribe the RP English pronunciation of "cart" into IPA/SAMPA they would put [kA:t], without an "r" sound. -- Chris Q 06:37, 12 Oct 2004 (UTC)

text: Also the l in words ending in "lk" is not pronounced, so "stalk" and "stork" are homophones [stO:k] /st?:k/.
I don't think this is right. Presumably the <L> is pronounced in bilk, bulk, elk, hulk, ilk, milk, silk, and sulk, right? And there aren't any dialects where the <L> is pronounced in stalk, are there? I think the relevant point here is that words that end in <ALK> have same rhyme as words that end in <ORK>, .i.e. [?:k], whereas in rhotic dialects, the former end in [?:k] and the latter end in [?ɹk]. Thus the following are homophones: balk/Bork, caulk/cork, Falk/fork, stalk/stork, talk/torque, whereas they aren't in rhotic dialects. Can someone who speaks RP verify this? Nohat 05:48, 1 Nov 2004 (UTC)

text: You are correct that in RP it is the "alk" words that sound like "ORK" where the L is not pronounced. My wife is Texan and does pronounce the "l" in stalk. -- Chris Q 08:18, 1 Nov 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  What do you mean? 

message: I don't think this is correct. Even assuming that by SE people are not referring to the 'Estuarine' and 'Cockney' accents, with their dropped "H's" and "R'" etc., and instead are referring to Public School English from the SE,(without pausing to consider whether that is any different from Public School accents anywhere else in the UK) there are in my view much better and more likely candidates for the development of modern RP.
It is reasonable to presume that the Public School system tried to emulate that which it perceived to be the accent of the Royal family, or 'Queen's English', and that this may well have formed the initial model,I wouldn't argue with that, but I would contend that modern RP reached it's present form via another route entirely.
It seems to me that, RP has evolved in response to the requirements of modern technology.  Recordings, Radio, Film and finally TV.  Of these I believe Film has been probably the most influential.
If you consider the cast of actors who epitomise the development of standard English aka RP, a common factor is that they have mostly been non-English and have had to undertake elocution lessons in order to ply their trade.  Some examples are:-
Scots: Patrick MacNee (Steed in the Avengers), Ronnie Corbett, Alasdair Simms (who actually was an elocution teacher himself before making it in film), James Robertson Justice, Roy Kinnear, David Niven, Ian Bannen, Ian Richardson, Ronald Fraser, Richard Wilson, Brian Cox etc.
Irish: Patrick McGoohan, Pierce Brosnan, Peter Otoole, The McGanns, Richard Harris etc.
Welsh: Stanley Baker, Richard Burton, Anthony Hopkins, Philip Madoc etc.
It is those (or their elocutionists) who have created the international perception of the stereotypical Englishman.
Paradoxically, actual Englishmen in Films tend to be either ex Public School types (luvees) like Ralph Richardson, Michael Hordern, John Gielgud etc. whom American directors love to cast as butlers for some reason, OR they tend to be 'working class lads' Like Michael Caine or Albert Finney etc. neither of those two types habitually use RP although the 'working class' English actors can usually put on learned RP as well when required.
I think the truth of the matter is that Public Schools, SE or otherwise, are the ones moving towards the media honed RP and not vice versa.
:I don't think that RP is the "public school" accent, there is a definite difference in vowel sounds. I was brought up in Surrey, and have a definite RP accent, despite going to a state comprehensive school, something that I frequently get ribbed about now I live in Yorkshire. Younger people in the same part of Surrey now appear to speak with more Estuary English intonations, so it may be changing, but at the moment I think it is fair to say that RP is a SE accent, though not "the accent of the SE". -- Chris Q 07:17, 7 Jan 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  RP is SE? 

message: Are R's pronounced as Ws normally under RP?
Buzzie 20:49, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)
:No. R's are pronounced as R's, or not pronounced at all, as RP is a non-rhotic dialect. -- Chris Q 07:23, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: See rhotacism#orthoepy for the mispronunciation. Joestynes 10:15, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  R's pronounced as Ws? 

message: Surely that depends on how one pronounces 'ah', and therefore isn't a terribly good example? Dan100 17:25, Apr 9, 2005 (UTC)
----
Could someone break up this 76-word mindbender of a sentence:
:It should also be noted that while the rejection of this so-called elitism reflects the predominant intellectual fashion to such a degree that alternative points of view are unlikely to be expressed in the media or academia as they are likely to be countered with aggressive dismissal rather than considered argument, there are still many people in the United Kingdom who privately endorse the concept of a preferred accent for educated people.
::I fixed it by removing it, and the following sentence, because besides being overly wordy and almost meaningless, it's an POV assertion that isn't supported by any kind of evidence. Nohat 23:12, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  'ah' and 'class' 

message: I've added a phonology section, largely based on the similar section at General American.  I think this makes the last section "Speaking with Received Pronunciation" (which strikes me as containing a lot of dubious assertions) largely redundant, but I haven't done anything to it yet.--JHJ 10:01, 30 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Phonology section 

message: I've removed this line:
 There are also the triphthongs /aɪə/ as in fire and /aʊə/ as in tower.
These are not triphthongs. They form two syllables each, not one (that would be e. g. Mandarin -iao in syllables like liao, miao...). They are just random collisions of a diphthong and a following monophthong.
David Marjanović       david.marjanovic_at_gmx.at       00:14 CET-summertime       2005/8/7
:It really depends on the phonological analysis. In many analyses, fire is a single super-heavy syllable. Nohat 03:51, 10 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Pronouncing Dictionary doesn't give a syllable break in fire or tower, so I have restored the disputed line. Nohat 03:54, 10 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Triphthongs 

message: It seems odd to refer to Fowler as the Fowler's Modern English Usage - or is this a specific reference to the 1965 version? Guyal of Sfere 09:49, 14 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Typo or convention? 

message: American and British English pronunciation differences mentions the invasive R which is not mentioned here.  How much overlap is there between these articles?  MaxEnt 22:03, 6 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Invasive R 

message: "Queen's English" redirects to this article, which, however, does not mention the term. If "Queen's English" is indeed a synonym to RP, please add a note to the article, otherwise clarify. Thanks. Simon A. 10:36, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: "Queen's English" is effectively a dialect, RP is an accent. They're not the same thing. --Arwel (talk) 10:43, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Does the term Queen's English refer to the concept of the crown and country being one ie. the language of the country. Another use is the Queen's Highway, ie a raod controlled by the crown/ country. In all the articles I have read there hasn't been a definition of the origins of the term. Ozdaren 14:57, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: No, "Queen's English" refers to the type of English used by the Queen - an upper-class dialect. -- Arwel (talk) 16:40, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

text: That's interesting, the English people I know in Australia speak of it as being the 'English of the Realm' as opposed to the English Betty Windsor speaks. That's always been my Antipodean understanding as well. Any further support from Australian or New Zealand users? Ozdaren 22:43, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Queen's English 

message: For such a famous topic, this page is surprisingly short. And no sound samples! Rmhermen 01:39, 31 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: And also RP is historically quite recent isn't it, yet I don't think there's anything about the birth of RP in the article. It just says "has been the prestige British accent", but not for how long.
Cameronlad 17:25, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Expand 

message: This page states the following:
:Before World War II, Received Pronunciation had  as a phoneme; this sound has since shifted forward to . Despite this change, the symbol  is still used (Roca & Johnson 135). This may be due to both tradition as well as the fact that other dialects retain the older pronunciation.
How true is it? Should it be reported here?
Ciacchi 15:39, 20 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Partly true but misleadingly written. The RP phoneme  is typically pronounced as a centralised vowel somewhere between the cardinal vowels  and . 84.70.242.118 11:53, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Open-mid back unrounded vowel]] 

message: Under Characteristics, it says "A word that ends in th would usually pronounced as ending in v rather than f, as is the case in much of the South." Beg your pardon? Sounds like rubbish to me, because (a) in RP surely th does not become f or v, and (b) I can think of no justification for the implication that -th at the end of a word is generally voiced. I think this can be deleted - but I'd like to be sure before I do so. Any thoughts? Snalwibma 08:27, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree. I've deleted it. Adrian Robson 10:10, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Words ending in -th 

message: Can someone knowledgeable on this topic add an explanation of the origin of the term itself?  From whom or what is the pronunciation "received"?
Thanks.
GilHamiltonII 19:07, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I tried looking this up just now; the overall consensus seems to be that the word 'received' is taken to mean 'Generally adopted, accepted, approved as true or good. Chiefly of opinions, customs, etc.' (from the Oxford English Dictionary). There is a draft article which looks at the history of the term in greater detail. I'm not confident enough to edit the article based on this much - if anybody has a proper, cited article, that'd be a whole lot better, imho. Gaurav 10:20, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Origin of the term 

message: I made a minor edit to clarify that RP is not venerated in books on phonology, or dictionaries, published outside the Commonwealth. My revision was reverted; so, rather than get into a revert war, I take it to the collective wisdom of our fellow editors. Does anybody not agree that RP is not the standard used in U.S. dictionaries, for example? --Orange Mike 01:28, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I am inclined to agree with you (ex: Merriam Webster's pronunciation of aluminum).  This also bring up a problem, RP is an "accent not a dialect" yet is listed in the dialog navigation box as a dialect. -Ravedave 02:50, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Guess what, the most prestigious presses for phonology-related publications are located in Britain, and the use Received Pronunciation overwhelmingly. Other systems, like Estuary English or General American, have still not caught up. "Anglocentric"? What rot, many American phonologists enjoy the use of RP as well. CRCulver 04:06, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Do you have a source either way? I can't understand why American publications would use a British accent. -Ravedave 04:15, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Because popular resources on phonology, like many produced by Cambridge University Press, are just as popular in the U.S. as in Britain. CRCulver 04:18, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  But they are British publications and use British English, correct? Do you have an example of an American publication that uses RP? I am not trying to be difficult I really am just trying to figure this out. Any opionion on the accent/dialect issue I mentioned above? -Ravedave 04:31, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  If you have to "figure this out", then you apparently have no training in the subject and really should reconsider editing this article. CRCulver 04:58, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  You apparently are unable to support your argument and are needing to use an ad hominem attack. I am changing back to Orangemikes version unless you can provide a reference, or participate in decent conversation.  -Ravedave 05:11, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

text:  I don't follow your reasoning here, Culver. American dictionaries do not use RP. RP is used in English works on some topics because they are written in England, not because it has some sacred status. The article as written implies otherwise. What on Earth do you mean by "many American phonologists enjoy the use of RP as well"? They don't affect its use, if that's what you imply, nor give it any special place of honor. Indeed, its existence is more often a subject of mockery (or an occasion for Monty Python quotes). --Orange Mike 05:17, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

text: Any phonological work focus on a specific dialect, which is the object of investigation. I can also add that, at least American dictionaries, have American pronunciation, not British.--201.14.22.38 01:55, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Anglocentrism 

message: * BBC Learning English - Pronunciation tips - English Pronunciation guide from BBC - with sound.
* BBC Radio 4 - Most presenters have the Received Pronunciation accent, streaming audio and podcasts are available.
I have added those, but someone removed them (without giving any justification), I will not re-insert them as I shan't go into an edit war. 
I think it is a good idea to keep them, as they provide plethora of sound examples.  The "learning english" link, has examples for all of the RP's IPA symbols, with sound, and minimal pair drills. Radio 4 is one of the bastions of RP in the BBC, and it is unquestionable of relevance, since RP is also know as BBC English. It is probably the most representative link we could ever find.
--201.14.22.38 01:43, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I would agree that they seem to be useful links (particularly the first) , and I can't see why they were deleted -- Q Chris 16:00, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  BBC Links 

message: Received Pronunciation was also sometimes referred to as the Queen's English, because it is spoken by the Queen
Presumably, in the past, RP was known as the King's English when a king was on the throne, and the Queen's English when a queen (e.g. Queen Victoria) reigned. The phrase is not specific to Queen Elizabeth II (currently the Queen), as the article implies. 217.155.20.163 12:45, 8 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Queen's English" is not specific to the present Queen 

message: I have just reverted a fairly substantial edit, because it (a) deleted the reference to Fowler and (b) made the wholly unjustified claim that RP = "proper English". No doubt there is scope for improving and tightening the intro, but I don't think this edit helped. Snalwibma 08:18, 2 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Lead paragraph 

message: Please see my blog (11 July 2007) for some criticism of this article: http://www.phon.ucl.ac.uk/home/wells/blog.htm
80.229.29.30 21:25, 10 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Above comes from John Wells, Emeritus Professor of Phonetics in the University of London, and lead author of a numerous amount of writings on the subject of English pronunciation (see http://www.phon.ucl.ac.uk/home/wells/). Jalwikip 11:49, 11 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Received Pronunciation 

message: Nil Einne 16:29, 23 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Dying out? 

message: "Queen Elizabeth II speaks a rare form of English"
Anyone care to explain this strange and vague assertion? She speaks RP, which is not "rare". Flapdragon 09:33, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  a rare form of English 

message: I don't agree with this statement in the first paragraph.  English taught to non-native speakers is rarely RP.  Most learners of English learn from 1) a non-native speaker who is unlikely to speak RP and would instead speak with their own accent however close to RP that might be, or 2) native speakers.  In the present day native English speakers are always taught to teach how they say and so if they speak with a northern accent, an east-anglian accent or an American accent then this is the form of pronunciation they teach.  217.200.200.54 21:43, 22 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  "usual accent taught to non-native speakers" 

message: "True" RP makes use of intrusive 'r' but other versions of RP do not. However, linking 'r' must ALWAYS be made. Thus "China and Japan" need not have an 'r' sound between the first two words (though it really should) but "before I left" MUST have an 'r' sound between the first two words unless there is a pause between them. That is because "I" starts with a vowel sound. However, "before she left" would have no 'r' betwen the first two words since "she" begings with a consonant sound. I've even heard BBC pronunciations involving INTERNAL intrusive 'r' such as "drawring" for "drawing". Also, while intrusive 'r' is required between a word ending in 'a' or 'ah' and a word beginning with vowel sound, it is not used by all RP speakers between a word ending in 'aw' and a wording beginning with a vowel sound. JC Wells, for example, will pronounce "Christina Onassis" as "kristinerunasis" but will pronounce "Law and Order" as "lawandawde" rather than "lawrandowde". I can't reproduce the proper pronunciation symbols so I tried to transcribe the pronunciation as best as I could.
Incedentally, I speak "Upper-RP", when I want to and tone it down when I feel it to be necessary. I can speak General American but cannot properly imitate any regional British accent because most of them sound so f*****g weird! If you're not going to use RP, then GenAm is your next best bet (assumimg you can pull either or both of them off). In its nicer forms, GA sounds much nicer and more "educated" and "refined" than some of the trashy working class UK accents which are so far from RP that they may as well not even be British. Of course, American English has its "Brooklynese" (which is primarily used in certain parts of the NYC metro area) and the Southeastern accent which can make one sound like a dumb hillbilly or a Southern belle depending on how thick the drawl is.—Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.244.43.233 (talk) 8 December 2007
:And how does this relate to the wikipedia article on RP? Do you have any suggestions for improvements to the article? Snalwibma (talk) 11:32, 8 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Suggestion: the article should note that using this a "posh" way of speaking and can be offensive or off putting to some (most?) people in England.  For example, if you talk like that in a pub, it gives the impression you're trying to emphasise your upper class upbringing (or pretend to have had one), thus trying to distance yourself from the "ordinary" folk.  Gronky (talk) 01:10, 30 August 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: This whole section (on the talk page) is complete dross and has no place in the discussion here. If you have something to add, add it and sign your comments!Jimjamjak (talk) 11:04, 29 January 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  linking 'r' and intrusive 'r' 

message: :this edit adds information that contrasts the part of the article where it states 
"In unstressed syllables occurring before vowels and in final position, contrasts between long and short high vowels are neutralized and short [i] and [u] occur"
:I'm assuming that the Trudgill (2000) is arguing that the sound in happy is  but we've got an inherent contradiction as Roach (2004) says it's .  Which is right?  — Æµ§œš¹ [aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi] 21:38, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Free variation? It sounds like happy tensing. --Kjoonlee 14:29, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: In words like anything and anyone the vowel often is not tensed.  I've noticed that it varies. Thegryseone (talk) 00:42, 2 October 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Contradiction 

message: I think this article should concentrate more on phonetics as opposed to just phonology.  Otherwise it seems as if RP is no different from General American. 208.104.45.20 (talk) 22:03, 16 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Yeah, good point.  There is some phonetic information but we could certainly expand on this.  — Æµ§œš¹ [aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi] 22:20, 16 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  This Article 

message: I run a language school and I can tell you that no modern EFL books push one particular pronunciation over others. All the CDs which come with them include a wide variety of different accents, to avoid the problem described in the article that they don't understand real English speakers unless they modify how they speak. The greatest single influence on how the students speak is the teacher. As they usually have several, they end up speaking something close NRP (which is how most of the young, educated people who teach abroad speak.).  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.212.16.30 (talk) 09:31, 21 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  English as a foreign language 

message: There are two tripthongs down already.  Should there not be a third?  I believe that the R.P. pronunciations of cure and pure should be represented with the  vowel.  Is this not a tripthong?  I think that  counts as a vowel in I.P.A., but am not 100% sure on this.  Epa101 (talk) 08:43, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Generally, in English  doesn't count as part of a vowel nucleus.  This is why  is not a diphthong in English.  — Æµ§œš¹ [aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi] 18:23, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: The article mentions  and , though they are commonly monophthongized.  I suspect that sources don't mention the others because the schwa is syllabified.  My Oxford dictionary transcribes layer as ; the stress mark means that it has multiple syllables.  Interestingly fire and shower also exhibit syllabification but hour does not.  — Æµ§œš¹ [aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi] 06:08, 23 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: A couple of points - this may be a bit of swimming against the tide, but could we have the spelling 'diphthong' and 'triphthong' in this discussion, as that is the traditionally correct spelling? I would like to support expanding the list of triphthongs to five as suggested above, as they are usually all listed together in contemporary accounts of RP. I take the point that the different triphthongs may behave differently in terms of syllabification. RoachPeter (talk) 09:42, 4 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: That seems fine with me. — Æµ§œš¹ [ãːɱ ˈfɹ̠ˤʷɪ̃ə̃nlɪ] 11:41, 4 May 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Tripthongs 

message: It would be helpful to have an audio file for this article, demonstrating what Received Pronunciation sounds like. I don't understand phonology, so this article is basically useless for people like me who want to learn what it actually sounds like. Perhaps it could even double as a Spoken Article file. -kotra (talk) 23:37, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Audio file? 

message: I have provided a reference for Gladstone.  I moved the tag to Baldwin seeing as I do not have a reference close to hand.  I remember reading that he retained some Midlands pronunciations, and still said bath with the old short a.  One book that definitely mentions that it is the Ey Up Mi Duck!  The Dialect of Derbyshire book, which has some erudite chapters on linguistics as well as humour.  I don't suppose that anyone has a copy close to hand?  Epa101 (talk) 22:03, 30 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Gladstone and Baldwin