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Jonnie Robinson, Curator, English accents and dialects, British Library Sound Archive, writes:
The first two speakers here demonstrate the wonderful hybrid accent that's typical of many first and second generation members of the Anglo-Caribbean community. Influences from the local Sheffield accent can be heard in their pronunciation of the vowel sounds in words such as up, run and stuff and pass and class. Listen also to their pronunciation of the vowel sounds in words in the following two sets: oh, don't, go, so, home, no, over and know and night and like.
However, they also clearly use features of speech more associated with a Caribbean English accent, such as using a sound for words with <th> in them, as in the following statements: they start to run, they're not thinking, "look at that boy over there", stuff like that and dressed the same way that you dress. Intriguingly, however, one speaker uses a feature known as TH-fronting - the pronunciation of <th> as a sound in words like thing. Listen carefully to the way he pronounces the phrases six foot three, they're not thinking and I think he's mean. This is a phenomenon that appears to be on the increase among younger speakers in a number of urban areas throughout the UK. Perhaps more importantly, though, the whole rhythm of speech and general voice quality is subtly modified by both speakers on occasions to reflect characteristics of Caribbean dialect, especially in the phrase doing a bad act.
The use of the tag-question innit in the statement they start to run, innit is particularly interesting. We use tag-questions, such as don't you, couldn't he, wasn't it and so on, at the end of statements to confirm that a listener has understood what we're talking about or to invite them to confirm or dispute something we've just said. In Standard English, however, a tag-question refers back to the subject of the previous clause and thus this statement would be rendered they start to run, don’t they. The origin of the all-purpose tag-question innit has variously been ascribed to use among the British Caribbean community or the British Asian community, although it also has links with some traditional dialects, particularly those in the south-west of England. Whatever its origins it's certainly increasingly used by young speakers throughout the UK regardless of ethnic background.
This combination of traditional Caribbean features, alongside aspects of local Sheffield speech, mixed with markers of modern urban British youth produces a particularly fascinating contemporary dialect.
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