h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: RP - Received Pronunciation - A657560
Author: Spaceman Spiff (MP) - AggGag Ish 42 - Our Final Answer! Out now in The Post! - U185155


Hi all,

This was one of my early efforts at something for the guide. I had been reading lots of 'language-based' entries in the EG and stumbled upon Theanthrope's English language project.

That's for me, i thought and got to work on a few entries.

This has come back up recently in relation to 'Movie villains with Brit accents' and i was reminded of my early entry.

So, here it is. It's not finished but I haven't re-read it so i can't remember what's wrong with it.

perhaps someone here will have some advice.

ta in advance
spiff

Advice? on this one?

Get it out of here and into PR

The only thing I spotted was a missing space after a link...

prescriptive approachto

apart from that it's excellent


whisky

Thanks for that, Whisky,

anything you could see that might be usefully added? I was never sure it was finished, at the time. I don't want to go over the top, either, though.

i seem to recall there was some dissent in a thread at the time...

*goes off to look*

* Comes back from reading the original thread *

Hmm, it did seem to get a little heated there for a while. But I can't see any lasting problems coming out of that thread... IMHO you've the correct definition of RP, adding examples might complicate things a little (do you really want to get into trying to add a lesson in phonetics to the entry )

My personal opinion is that it's fine as it stands

yes, I tend to agree with you.

I think i'll leave it here for a while anyway. There are bound to be some interesting comments from one or two WW 'regulars' that will either encourage me to go straight into PR or add/revise other stuff first.

I thought that 'coining' or at least first recorded occurrence of the term at the end of the thread was worth including, for instance.

thanks for the vote of confidence.
spiff

Hi Spiff

It's hard to read an entire article about pronunciation without ever saying what the pronunciation is! I know it is impossible to describe pronunciation in writing, but for someone who doesn't know RP, this article won't actually tell them what it sounds like.

I don't like the way you've made the phrase "standard pronunciation of British English" in bold with italics on some of the words. It is unclear which words you are emphasising.

You might like to mention the last bastion of RP: the BBC World Service, where all announcements are still made in RP.

Hi Gnomon, thanks for commenting here

i know what you mean... but i was reminded of this piece while reading Theanthrope's current entry on Hollywood Villains with British accents in PR.

On that basis, i think most people *can* recognise the RP accent, even if they don't *know* that it can be described as an 'RP' accent, or recognise the term itself. I think the best way to illustrate the accent is by offering a reference point; thus the whole 'BBC English' 'posh accent' thing.

gotta

back later

I'm glad to hear that you gotta witch, but what has that to do with anything?

Not Terry-Thomas! Trevor Howard, yes. Dirk Bogarde, certainly. But T-T was a caricature of the RAF type - chocks away, old chap. Jolly good show. I pranged the blighter. etc etc. That is not what I understand by RP.

By the way, why does Estuary English link to Peer Review

>Modern RP can be described as "the speech of educated people living in London and the southeast of England and of other people elsewhere who speak in this way."

This suggests that RP is the speech of educated people in Lond and SE and uneducated people elsewhere, who speak in RP. Not very helpful!

I think the essence of RP does not lie in geography. There are lots of accents in London, Kent, Essex etc which are not RP. People who speak RP are likely to have gone through higher education and to be at least middle class. You just try talking like that on a building site! Remember Ian Carmichael with Peter Sellers in the film 'I'm All Right, Jack'? A satire that illustrates the point beautifully.

This leads me to my main point, which is that RP is not just about pronunciation. Try speaking some cockney talk or building site chat in RP and you'll see what I mean. RP suggests a certain kind of content. It suggests grammatical accuracy. It suggests a well-thought-out clarity of expression which is possibly, but not necessarily, based on a classical education.

The connection with Public Schools is simply that they used to be the only places where the sort of educational background necessary (I submit) for RP was obtained. With the advent of the state-run Grammar Schools for the brightest children of the poor, RP became more widely available.

What I am trying to suggest here is that the essence of RP is not so much a regional accent. It is a system of thought, discipline, attention to the rules of grammar, and both the ability and the willingness to communicate clearly and unambiguously, which finds its 'objective correlative' in a clarity of pronunciation.

By the way, the French I learned at school was definitely Paris French, as I soon found out when I travelled to the Midi!

Hi Bels,

thanks for your comments, I'll go through with some reactions p-by-point:

>>
Not Terry-Thomas! Trevor Howard, yes. Dirk Bogarde, certainly. But T-T was a caricature of the RAF type - chocks away, old chap. Jolly good show. I pranged the blighter. etc etc. That is not what I understand by RP.
<<

Yes, good point. TT's OTT is more what I have (iirc) characterised as 'ultra-RP'.
Although I agree that T Howard has a cracker of an RP on him, I actually think your example of PSellars and ICarm in 'I'm alright, Jack may provide a better illustration.



>>
By the way, why does Estuary English link to Peer Review
>>

er...



>>
>Modern RP can be described as "the speech of educated people living in London and the southeast of England and of other people elsewhere who speak in this way."

This suggests that RP is the speech of educated people in Lond and SE and uneducated people elsewhere, who speak in RP. Not very helpful!
<<

Do you really think it suggests that? I don't...

In fact, it is about the best definition I have seen. It doesn't mean that 'no-one not born in that area can possibly speak RP, obviously. It does imply that RP is a pronunciation of English that is uncommon among the poorly educated (a point you seem to support in later comments). ie 99% of people who actually speak with an accent very close to RP *have* been fortunate enough to attain a reasonable level of education.

This is not intended as a value judgement on non-RP speakers; it is a state of affairs.
besides, as i hope i make clear in the entry, there are reasons some may 'shun' RP and even feel a certain 'disdain' for RP speakers as 'toffs'.



>>
I think the essence of RP does not lie in geography. There are lots of accents in London, Kent, Essex etc which are not RP. People who speak RP are likely to have gone through higher education and to be at least middle class. You just try talking like that on a building site! Remember Ian Carmichael with Peter Sellers in the film 'I'm All Right, Jack'? A satire that illustrates the point beautifully.
<<

ok, i'm with you up to a point here. The geographical connection stands, though, because speakers of RP from other regions are 'accepting' RP as the standard and imitating it.

make sense?



>>
This leads me to my main point, which is that RP is not just about pronunciation. Try speaking some cockney talk or building site chat in RP and you'll see what I mean. RP suggests a certain kind of content. It suggests grammatical accuracy. It suggests a well-thought-out clarity of expression which is possibly, but not necessarily, based on a classical education.
<<

No, I can't agree that 'received pronunciation' is not "just about pronunciation"! You see my point? It specifically *is* just about pronunciation. It is a form of phonetic 'norm' for the English language. It needn't remain so. But in linguistic terms, it is.



>>
The connection with Public Schools is simply that they used to be the only places where the sort of educational background necessary (I submit) for RP was obtained. With the advent of the state-run Grammar Schools for the brightest children of the poor, RP became more widely available.
<<

once again, i'm with you up to a point. I'm not checking on this, but i think i talk about the pub school system at least initially in terms of the development of RP.

nonetheless, in the 60s the divide was still pretty wide between successful grammar school students in universities and the traditional 'old school tie' element among the student body. Not that i was there, you understand.

today, it can be said that the proportion of the population speaking something really very close to RP are ever more sharply increasing.

but if you're a masters graduate working on a doctoral thesis, born and bred in Leeds, you're not gonna suddenly rhyming grass with a**e! People'd call you a soppy bar steward!

there's a key point about RP - as much as anything, it is about how vowels are pronounced, and in that sense there is a very real north/south divide, with RP being geographically south of the line. And indeed, if you travel far enough west, all kinds of vowel changes start to crop up. You're moving away from SE England, and phonetically speaking, away from RP.



>>
What I am trying to suggest here is that the essence of RP is not so much a regional accent. It is a system of thought, discipline, attention to the rules of grammar, and both the ability and the willingness to communicate clearly and unambiguously, which finds its 'objective correlative' in a clarity of pronunciation.
<<

I agree, not an accent. I agree, all those elements are often true of RP *speakers*.

however, RP remains specifically a prescriptive norm, primarily for use in the study of pronunciation and phonetics. Often as a kind of 'control' for experimental purposes; in research into Cornish and the phonetic differences of the West Country regional accent, for example.



>>
By the way, the French I learned at school was definitely Paris French, as I soon found out when I travelled to the Midi!
<<

tell me about it. Mind you, I live in Alsace, and that presents its own difficulties, believe me.

thanks again for the feedback, I hope I'm not simply refusing to accept that my entrenched views are hopelessly invalid. I'm usually ok with accepting and adapting, but I'm not sure i'm with you on a lot of this.

I remain open to argument, naturally.

cya
spiff

very minor update to fix the link. I think i'll drop both of those into the WW too, as they were kind of written together.

I also left in Terry Thomas (for the time being; on the basis that's it's always nice just to bring that bastion of old-style OTT 'Englishness' to mind ) and actually added a couple of other possible exponents of RP: Trevor Howard as per Bels suggestion and sir Dicky Attenborough. This last one i thought a rather good one for those who don't like old films and may not be familiar (alas, to have to reflect that so few of the population of the Uk below the age of 30 may be familiar with Trevor Howard and David Niven!); the big knight can be recognised as the would-be benevolent multi-millionaire creator of the now infamous (er... need i say fictional?) Jurassic Park and thus a key figure in that milestone in popular youth culture of the past ten years that began with that movie.

did i mean to start gibbering on about all that? no, just mentioning the slight changes.

no need to re-read - that is the extent of them.

cya
spiff

That's ok, spiff, I really don't want to get into a long and boring discussion about this. You go with how you feel about it. Mind you, I do know quite a few grammar school people who went to Oxbridge in the 60s. I guess we have a different Weltanschauung on this, you and I. I've been to Strasbourg - is that Alsace? The canals are very pretty.

Still waiting for you to get back to me on the genocide thing at A834383. You promised/threatened a long post on that.

indeed. I was just talking about that entry with a RL friend this w/end. I shall make good my threat. Although, not very much really 'constructive' stuff for you, just some reactions, really.

as to this RP question, i'm not sure it's a weltanschaung thing; i really don't equate public school or even 'class' with 'intellect' in any way.

it's just that while there are social questions involved with RP-speakers, RP itself has a relevance outside of that. It has a value as a linguistic reference point.

I want to try to avoid giving it a value beyond that. I believe a host of other factors come into it that vex the question.

incidentally, i don't find any discussion on these subjects boring.

cya back at the Armenia piece soonest
spiff

Nice entry Spiff , and I too have a few comments to make on the discussion between yourself and Bels...

"Not Terry-Thomas! Trevor Howard, yes. Dirk Bogarde, certainly. But T-T was a caricature of the RAF type - chocks away, old chap. Jolly good show. I pranged the blighter. etc etc. That is not what I understand by RP."

TT could be seen as a caricature, but having spent a short time in the Air Training Corps during the early 70s, I met a few 'RAF types' like him and I thought of them as being more of the 'ultra-RP' that Spiff talks about, rather than a caricature. I have a tape here at home of that well known childrens radio broadcast... from the 40's or 50's I would guess, where the female announcer is asking the little darlings to shut their eyes while she hides their balls - "They may be high up, or they may be low down near the ground. You don't know where I'm going to hide your balls", and after they've found them is heard exhorting the kiddies to "...run around and toss them in the air." Her accent (early BBC announcer) isn't far off RAF English. Neither is that of Celia Johnson in 'Brief Encounter'. I think the RAF 'chocks away' type is simply ultra-RP with extra testosterone. I'd leave TT in Incidentally, 'Brief Encounter' might be an ideal example for the entry, of a film to watch if anyone wants to hear perfect RP.

"the speech of educated people living in London and the southeast of England and of other people elsewhere who speak in this way."

I'm quite happy with that description.

"I think the essence of RP does not lie in geography. There are lots of accents in London, Kent, Essex etc which are not RP. People who speak RP are likely to have gone through higher education and to be at least middle class. You just try talking like that on a building site! Remember Ian Carmichael with Peter Sellers in the film 'I'm All Right, Jack'? A satire that illustrates the point beautifully."

RP may not be a geographical accent today, but if that's how and where it originated, then it once was. However, when Scottish lairds and Irish baronets speak with an accent indistiguishable from a BBC news reader or the royal family, it can no longer be geographical.

"This leads me to my main point, which is that RP is not just about pronunciation. Try speaking some cockney talk or building site chat in RP and you'll see what I mean. RP suggests a certain kind of content. It suggests grammatical accuracy. It suggests a well-thought-out clarity of expression which is possibly, but not necessarily, based on a classical education."

I think RP is principally about pronunciation, but over time has developed its own accepted colloquialisms - just listen to Test Match Special, especially before Johnners died. And that's a perfect example right there - putting 'er(s)' on the end of a word. How many people know that 'soccer' is an RP colloquialism which has become a commonly used word? You have rugby football - 'rugger', and you have association football - 'soccer'.

And I agree with you Bels that RP is principally (but not exclusively) about how vowels are pronounced.

It was once explained to me (by a PR-speaker) that PR is called PR because one has to receive it. Other accents are picked up by a child from local speakers of the region - they're absorbed. The child doesn't know that it's learning how to speak, it's just following everyone around it. Aquiring an RP accent however is an active process rather than a passive one. It has to be taught. Unless you're completely surrounded by other RP speakers of course, and have no contact with the hoi polloi. That must be extremely rare though - even in aristocratic houses there would always have been servants who don't speak RP and with whom a child would have had plenty of contact and opportunity for 'contamination'.

PR? I meant... oh, you know. Gimme a break, I haven't even had my brekkers yet geezer. And try picking all the accents out of that

I think this is one entry that would really benefit from links to sound clips! There's at least one Radio 4 page that should be helpful - the one I noticed was about URP (the 'Upper-class' version) at
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/routesofenglish/storysofar/posh.shtml

I think it might be worth searching the rest of BBCi - if there aren't sound clips here, I doubt if you'll find them anywhere else!

Azara

hi all,

thanks for those comments Gosho; the debate continues. I'm wondering whether to open that aspect of it to peer review, actually. I think this is down to getting other views, now, rather than WW type stuff.

Thanks for that link, Azara. Good idea about using the beeb sound files to give examples. I listened to some of those Routes of Eng progs, actually. Most interesting. And some outrageous accents!

maybe just tonight in the WW and then i'm going to PR with this.

thanks for all the comments and debate.
spiff

I like Azara's idea about sound clips!

Best example of RP that I can think of - Rimmer in Red Dwarf. Not the vocab, though...

Is it worth comparing and contrasting with "the Queen's English", which is another expression that's used to describe standard English?

Also, I think it's probably a bit easier for non-native speakers to pick up regional accents. Thinking of footballers, Jan Molby had possibly the most scouse accent in the entire world by the time he left Liverpool, and Peter Schmeical has certainly more than a hint of Manc about his accent.

Otherwise... great!

Otto

You definately gotta put in that link Spiff Thanks Azara, it brightened up my whole day listening to those clips

"Surrey"
"Sorry?"
"Surrey"
"Sorry?"
"Surrey... as in Earl orv"

Gosho. Lamar, as in Duke orv

Here's some sound clips 4u

[Unsuitable link removed by Moderator] Florence Nightingale

[Unsuitable link removed by Moderator]Queen Mum

[Unsuitable link removed by Moderator] The Queen

[Unsuitable link removed by Moderator] Thatcher

Bels