20 British Accents in 1 Video

Today I'm gonna give you a whirlwind tour of the United Kingdom in 20 different

accents. You watch.

Questions to it's comedy. Do you want a wee bag.

With it? It's hard to beat the northerner. This is so.

Rude. At the Golden Globes, I met Jennifer Aniston. I love you.

I'm the best mc in the country.

And all. No they're not. They are. I bet you any money they are.

I'm a massive fan of the dictionary. They're quite important things.

I'm gonna match each accent with a famous person,

show you a clip of them speaking,

and then I'll teach you one pronunciation feature of that accent so

that you can identify it more easily.

I just want to take a quick moment to thank Lingoda for sponsoring this video.

Later on,

I'm gonna show you how you can study English from your own home and get 100%

cash back on your English course fees.

An important thing to note as we go on this tour is the accents are very fluid.

We use umbrella terms like a northern accent or a southern accent.

But what we are really doing is grouping a bunch of accents together because

they share similar pronunciation features. Indeed,

accents don't just change from city to city or from town to town.

They can change from person to person.

So an approach that many linguistic experts take is to instead talk about there

being an accent continuum, where as you move through the country,

accents change and evolve and join at the edges.

Now I've picked out 20 British English accents that I wanna look at,

but as I say, there are many,

many more. We're gonna start with received pronunciation or RP

as it's also known,

It's an accent associated with education and privilege. Now,

it doesn't have a set geographical location,

but it is associated with London and the south-east of England. But as a result,

you can be an RP speaker from anywhere in the UK.

It was once the only accent you would hear on the BBC. And even to this day,

British English dictionaries use it as their default setting.

Now I've broken it down to three separate varieties. Now,

let's start with the Queen's English spoken by. Yeah, her Majesty, the Queen,

and other royalties.

Can't look down to read the speech.

You have to take the speech up because if you did, your neck would break.

Would it fall off?

An emphasis is put on clarity with every sound being articulated in its fullest

form. No drop Ts here, ma'am. There's a tightness in the jaw.

The queen's lips are quite close together,

and the vowel sounds are articulated at the front of the mouth.

One pronunciation feature that we find in the Queen's English is the use of the /ɔː/ sound

instead of off /ɒ/. So the queen says,

'off' not 'off'. 'Take your filthy shoes off'.

This is not an accent you'll hear far beyond the walls of Buckingham Palace,

but if you are curious to hear more, then you can watch the TV series

'The Crown'. We move on to Conservative RP, which is similar, the queen's English,

but perhaps not quite as rigid and formal.

Now it's traditionally been an accent associated with positions of power.

So if I think back to all the prime ministers of my time,

they all have conservative RP.

Brexit, health farmers, in lots of ways, we'll be able to cut to bureaucracy,

find new markets for UK produce lamb, beef, uh,

dairy, produce cheese overseas.

Now,

one feature that divides RP and southern accents from northern English accents

is the /ʌ/ sound. In RP you have /ʌ/ and /ʊ/

whereas in the north of England, it's just, /ʊ/. So Boris Johnson says, cut.

But in the north of England, that would be 'cut'.

There's also a more modern version of RP called Contemporary RP.

Speakers still place a high value on articulating sounds clearly,

but there is an acceptance that speed of communication is more important than

accuracy. So in Contemporary RP,

you might drop a T or you might use a contraction.

Whereas in Conservative RP or the Queen's English, that's less likely to happen.

Uh.

They, some, some of some people are quite surprised that, oh my God,

we actually thought you were a robot. No, I'm no, no, no human.

I'm human <laugh>.

Um, one surprising feature is the use of the /h/ huh sound.

Now in most British English accents, actually it's not used,

but in RP it is used. And you hear Gemma Chan there saying,

human not umen, as it might be in other British English accents,

you'll notice that her jaw isn't as rigid as the other two RP speakers.

Her mouth is slightly more open and the vowels are a little bit wider,

and she articulates her vows a little bit further back in the mouth.

Other speakers of contemporary RP include Emma Watson, Daniel Radcliffe,

and Ed Sheeran. Right. Let's have a look at the accents of London. Now,

as I've already said,

you'll find received pronunciation in London and the south-east of England.

You'll also find Cockney, the traditional working class accent of London.

Originally it was found in the east end of London,

but now you were here it throughout London,

and as people have moved out of the city,

you'll find it in surrounding counties like Hertfordshire, Essex, and Kent.

You watch Question Time, it's comedy.

We're you no clearer when Jeremy Corbin explained

No, I ain't got a clue. No one knows what it is.

It's like this mad riddle that no one knows what it is, right?

So what's happened to that t*** David Cameron who called it on? Let's be fair!

I think you're referring for a former Prime Minister. Yeah, but how comes he can

scuttle off. He called all this on mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Yeah. Yeah.

He has. Now there are many interesting features of a Cockney accent.

The classic one that probably, you know, already is the glottal T.

So that's when you turn 'water' into 'water', or 'daughter' into 'daughter'.

Now, Danny Dyer uses another feature that I find really interesting.

He uses the vocalization of the dark L. So with the word

'called', we're using a dark l /l/.

But he vocalizes it so it becomes 'called'. Uh,

he also says 'riddle' right?

Not 'riddle' 'riddle'.

To me it's like almost like a /w/ sound.

So 'tall' becomes 'tall,' uh, 'ball' becomes 'ball'

Now you also notice that the vowel sounds articulated with a wider mouth, right?

So it is ball, tall, right? It's like that. Okay,

so wider vowel sounds. Now if you wanna dive deeper with the Cockney accent,

then I suggest you throw Danny Dyer's name into YouTube. Check out any clips

with him speaking, or you can check out the long running British soap,

East Enders.

Next we're gonna look at Multicultural London English or MLE as it's also known.

Personally, I find this the most fascinating,

but it doesn't get as much attention as other accents. Now,

that could be because it's quite a new accent.

It's sort of evolved in the last 30 to 40 years. As the name suggests,

this accent reflects modern day multicultural London.

It's spoken by London's young, multi-ethnic citizens.

It draws its influences from Cockney and also from the large immigrant groups in

the city like the Caribbean community and the South Asian community.

You put all those influences in one beautiful melting pot and you get.

MLE as as, as a rapper in the MCs.

You always kind of get the side of like, yeah, like I'm the,

I'm the best mc in the country, and all of that.

Like <laugh> and then <laugh> and then, but,

but a lot of the time you don't like, it's, it's, it is very heavy. Like it's,

the duty that I sometimes feel like I carry can feel overwhelming.

The one feature that we heard there from Stormy is the /d/ sound instead of

/ð/ so he says 'that' not 'that'.

Other speakers of MLE include Raheem Sterling,

the England football player and Akala.

And if you wanna watch a TV series with Multicultural London English,

then I recommend Top Boy on Netflix. And of course,

if you want to go deeper with this accent,

there's a whole section in my book dedicated to Multicultural London English.

Let's quickly skip east to the county of Essex where the accent is quite similar

to Cockney due to the large number of people that moved from the east end out to

Essex after the war. Now the two accents share many pronunciation features,

including those wide vowel sounds,

but Essex speakers tend to close off the ending.

For them to write that about our Essex girls. We are not happy, no.

So keep us in the dictionary, but please change the meaning.

And I think it should say, an Essex girl is smart, sassy,

fun and striving hard in life like everyone.

You can hear Gemma Collins there using that vocalized dark L on girls and

also that glottal T on about about.

If you wanna hear any more of the Essex accent,

there is only one place to go the TV series,

'The only way is Essex'

Eat Sleep Dreamers, I want to take a quick moment to talk about our sponsors.

Lingoda 2020 has been a terrible year for everyone.

So I want us to start 2021 the best way possible.

And Lingoda are here to help us.

They are an online language learning platform that I've been working with for

three years.

They help English learners develop their real conversational skills and build

confidence in their speaking ability.

But the best thing about Lingoda is they are offering 100% cash back on your

course fees. If you attend every single class, a hundred percent,

that's amazing. In addition,

you'll also get free access to an online Cambridge speaking test.

So how does it work? Well,

the sprint starts on the 15th of January, 2021,

and you can sign up until December the 28th. So there's the super sprint.

This is where you have to attend 30 classes per month for three months.

And if you can do that, you get 100% cash back on your course fees.

Now if that seems like a bit too much of a commitment for you,

you can do the sprint,

which is 15 classes per month for three months,

and you get 50% cash back on your course fees.

So if you have lots of time to dedicate to learning English,

you can do the super sprint. If you are juggling work or school,

they're perhaps the sprint is better for you.

Now you can do the sprint in English, German, French, Spanish,

or business English as well. Now both plans require a 49 Euro

deposit, but with my offer code win 18,

you get 10 euros off that deposit.

And if you're able to complete the super sprint or the sprint,

then you'll get your deposit back. But don't wait around guys,

cuz spaces on the sprint are limited. Okay? So click the link below,

go check it out, see if it's for you. Read the terms and conditions, okay?

I don't want you to overcommit to something and make sure this is right for you.

Classes are small, the teachers are experts in English,

and of course you can study anytime, anywhere, and I love that flexibility.

So start 2021 on the right foot,

sign up to the lingo sprint and take your English to the next level.

Make sure to hit the link below and use the offer code win 18. All right,

let's get back to the video.

Over in the west we have the beautiful counties of Somerset, Dorset, Devon,

and Cornwall, all with their own subtly different accents.

One famous exponent of the West Country accent is Hagrid from

Harry Potter.

The owl that delivered my release papers got all lost and confused.

Some ruddy bird called Errol.

One unique feature that you will hear with this accent is that rhotic R.

Now in most British English accents, it's non-rhotic,

so we don't use that R but in the west country that R is pronounced.

So car and far. This pattern is mirrored in the city of Bristol where

Rs are also articulated.

Oh, I'm such an aquarian and I can never let things go.

So we'll have a we'll talk and then I'll say, remember when you did this, this,

and this and this. And back in 1985 you did this <laugh>. So, um, yeah,

is that why you're single now? Probably.

You just broke up again recently, didn't you? No, he, um,

we ran off with another bird and then, um, <laugh>. Yeah. I got dumped again.

Did you hear how she said bird there? It was bird. Bird,

I would say bird. So, uh, sound.

But she pronounced that R bird. To hear more of the Bristolian accent,

I really recommend checking out a Goggle Box, and in particular Mary and Marina,

some fantastic characters. Moving into the middle of the country where you've got

Britain's second largest city, Birmingham, where the accent is Brummy.

Now it's known for its nasal quality due to the heavy industry that used to be there.

And also it's sing songy intonation.

So funny. But the last time, uh, I saw you was really,

really in 2002 and you were the first person to interview me.

Coming outta the house.

We couldn't find that clip. But don't worry,

I've found an amazing clip of something I'm gonna show you a little bit later.

Actually, shall I show it you now?

The way Allison Hammond says 'last'

there is a great indication that we are moving further north through the country

because these /æ/ and /ɑː/ sounds divide the country. So in the south of England,

you would have /ɑː/ it would be last,

but in the north of England it's last. And because Birmingham is in the middle,

it actually goes with the northern pronunciation. So it would be last.

So in Birmingham you would hear last bath and chance.

Other Brummy speakers include footballer, Jack Grealish and comedian Lenny Henry.

As we edge further north, we get to the East Midland cities of Derby,

Leicester and Nottingham. And because of their geographical location,

these accents sit somewhere between the Midlands and the North.

Let's just get some young plays in here who actually love playing for Arsenal.

Actually loved the shirt, love the badge,

and are actually prepared to die for it almost by going out there and as you

said, Michael, putting in tackles, I'm like, you know, just showing that they,

they, they, you know, that they care. I.

One feature that I found in Jermaine Jenas's accent is the diphthong /eə/

So he says he kind of elongates it and he sort of widens the mouth a little bit,

so it's kind of air. So it's uh, there, okay,

that's a bad impression. Let's get Jermaine to do it again.

And are actually prepared to die for it almost by going out there. As.

We move into Yorkshire

we encounter accents that are characterized by the squashing and

omitting of certain words and sounds.

So I'm going to the shop would be, I'm going t'ut shop.

Let's start with South Yorkshire and Louis Tomlinson.

Northerners probably are better than southerners. Southerners are great people,

but it's hard to beat the Notherner.

If you've seen Eat Sleep Dream English before.

you know that I love Louis Tomlinson's accent.

It's so rich with different pronunciation features.

One that I want to pick out the way that he uses /v/ on the th

/ð/ sound. So instead of Northerner,

it's Northerner instead of Southerner, it's Southerner.

Northerners probably are better than Southerner Southerner a great people,

but it's hard to beat the Northerner.

As we move to West Yorkshire, we've got Zayne Malik from Bradford,

and he elongates the diphthong /eɪ/ so he says 'stay' and

'way' and 'pay' rather than stay, way and pay.

So he loved, uh, uh,

like dressing up in suits and like wearing like specific tie,

doing a certain way.

Then if we moved to East Yorkshire, we've got Jenny and Lee from Goggle Box.

National Service can't get the masks. So how are we gonna get'em.

I've made one.

What out of?

Of, Hey, it's really clever and you don't need no sewing, no nothing.

It's like you can make it within a minute.

Right? Oh, you can make me one, then.

I'll show you. So here you can hear the elongation of another diphthong /əʊ/

it becomes 'no' and 'show' very typical of a

Yorkshire accent.

You'll also notice that that sound is articulated at the front of the mouth.

So no, and 'go'. If you wanna dive deeper with a Yorkshire accent,

then of course Gogglebox. Jenny and Lee are fantastic.

There are also two sisters from Leeds who have a fantastic accent. Of course,

Game of Thrones is a fantastic place to hear the Yorkshire accent as well.

If we hop over the Pennines we find two huge cities,

Manchester and Liverpool. Now, despite being only 30 miles apart,

their accents are very, very different.

Mancunian tends to be quite nasal and borrows lots of pronunciation features

from other northern English.

accents. You know, it's the, it's the first game. Um,

and I think the concentration and, and intensity that we showed today,

we have to take forward into the the next games. Also in the,

in the Premier League.

Here we hear Marcus Rashford using one of the most typical mancunian sounds,

and that's the /ɪ/ sound on words ending in Y. So he said, intensity.

''Intensity', not intensity.

So that sound in other words would be like 'city' and 'pretty'.

The accent in Liverpool is known as Scouse owing to a local dish

there served to sailors. Now,

it's an accent that has been heavily influenced by the Irish community that

settled in Liverpool in the 19th and 20th century.

Last time I was starstruck was at the Golden Globes. I met Jennifer Aniston.

This feature is uniquely Scouse. It's that fricative /k/ sound.

So she says, starstruck is that /k/, sound.

So in other words, it'd be like 'back' and 'book'.

Very different from any other British English accent.

Moving up to the northeast,

we find Geordie in the city of Newcastle and the surrounding area.

Now this has numerous pronunciation features that are different from anywhere else

So we changed it a Little Mix and we hated it at first. We were like, oh,

it's game over, our career's over, Little Mix. It's the worst name ever.

But now we absolutely love it and we wouldn't ever change it.

One really distinctive feature of this accent is on the words that end in -er and -or.

They are pronounced with an /æ/ sound, not an /ə/ sound.

So Jade says, over and ever,

not over and ever. Other Geordie speakers include TV presenters,

Ant and Dec, and Cheryl from X Factor.

And of course you can check out the TV show,

Geordie Shore. As we move over the border, we encounter numerous Scottish accents.

Perhaps the most recognizable accent is the Glasgow accent,

a personal favorite of mine.

It possesses wildly different vowel sounds to most accents in England.

And the R is tapped meaning that the tip of the tongue hits the alveolar ridge,

the roof of the mouth as you are articulating it. His actor James McAvoy,

with an example.

David Percival has gone feral. Uh,

I think he represents a breed of, uh,

operative who kind of gets way too seduced by the

environment instead of the job.

Other glaswegian speakers include legendary football manager Alex Ferguson and

comedians Billy Connolly, Kevin Bridges and Frankie Boyle.

50 miles east we find Edinburgh,

where it's said that the accent is a little bit softer than the accent of

Glasgow.

They literally go and hide and they stopped trying and they stopped competing

and they allow themselves to be shrunk.

A feature that we find here is the common use of the dark L.

So Shirley Manson here says, allow,

allow not allowed.

So it's a dark L not a light l on the L of allowed.

Another word would be like, look, look.

So it's coming from the back of the mouth with the tongue down rather than

'allow' at the front of the mouth. Scooting back down south and across the border

to South Wales,

we find an accent that is much more sing-songy in nature than other British

English accents. It's almost musical in its intonation.

And this is in part because of the influence of the Welsh language onto Welsh

English. It wasn't the nicest, it was, it was a,

it was quite a cheap B&B and uh, I think I was only,

I was the only resident.

So when I turned up the guy in like sort of tracksuit bottoms,

he was like right then. Uh, <laugh> you're in room number one ground floor.

A feature that can be found in South Wales is the doubling or extension of a

constant sound that comes between two vowel sounds. So Elis James here says,

bottom, bottom. Um,

I think about the word city, city, uh, again, terrible impression,

I apologize, but as you can hear,

it's a kind of doubling of that consonant sound.

That t sound that's very distinctive to the Welsh English accent. Finally,

let's hop over the Irish to Northern Ireland and Belfast in particular. Now,

this is one of my favorite accents in Britain. It has such character to it.

Northern Irish English is heavily influenced by Scottish English,

and that's due to the number of Scots that moved over and settled in Northern

Ireland as a result. There are many similarities between the accents.

Perhaps the most distinctive feature of Northern Irish English is the diphthong

/aʊ/ as in 'how'. Let's hear how Jamie Dornan says it.

I once tried to do a whole conversation with these builders who were working at

my dad's house by only saying 'boy's a dear' to them.

Right? Jamie Doan said, 'house'.

So it's a kind of slightly more closed, shorter sound, isn't it?

House. House. So 'how' would be 'how' and 'now' would be 'now'?

It's a very distinctive feature of the Belfast accent. I love it so much.

Let's hear Jamie Dornan say another phrase.

Like, how do, like how you doing? Like how, how, how are you? Basically.

In the comments below,

I'd like you to tell me which of the 20 British English accents you just heard

you love the most and why. Okay, put it into the comments below. Also,

tell me which one would you like me to do a longer video for?

I can deep dive into any of these accents,

which one would be most interesting for you.

But thank you so much for watching guys, and until next time, this is Tom,

the Chief Dreamer saying goodbye.