Variety of British English Suitable for Students - Assignment Example

1. Introduction English is undeniably an international language (McKay, 2002, p. 5) that is not only spoken in the countries where English happens to be the first language e.g. Britain, US, Canada, and Australia, but is also spoken by a considerable population in the countries where it is a second language e.g. India, Pakistan, and UAE etc. Use of English in different countries with different cultures has led to the creation of many different varieties of English. A variety can be defined as a specific linguistic system or a distinctive kind of English that is shared by a specific community or group of users. The different varieties of English are not divided by sharp lines since a vast majority of people speak more than one variety simultaneously without clearly distinguishing between or respecting the boundaries of the different varieties. Nevertheless, varieties are described in terms of the frequent use of a particular variety along with its linguistic properties by a particular group. The different varieties are identified along these lines by the types of usage, social groups, or geographical groups. 2. Background Varieties of the English Language There are a lot of varieties of the English language; British English, African American English, Canadian English, Australian English, and Indian English to name a few. There are also many varieties of English within these varieties that differ from one another depending upon the differences of regional cultures within the countries. Some of the broader varieties are discussed as follows: African-American English African-American English is a linguistic variety of English that is also known as African-American Vernacular English (AAVE), and Black English (BE). Three theories primarily describe the sources of the African-American English, namely Decreolized Creole, the Unified Theory, and the variety of Southern States English (ic.arizona.edu, 2001). According to the decreolized creole theory, the origin of African-American variety of English can be traced back to a pidgin developed among the slaves that belonged to different linguistic backgrounds. The pidgin gradually evolved into a creole and over the time, decreolized so as to sound like English. Unified theory’s proponents propose that African-American English is a combination of the Southern States English and the West African languages. African-American English is also thought of as a form of Southern States English. Canadian English For all the speakers of English, Canadian English is an under-described variety. Canadian English has not been immensely acknowledged in the popular dialectological literature in terms of a homogenous and distinct variety of English. Some scholarly research proposes that if Canadian English is classified as a variety, this would result in evaporation of all its unique traits. Lilles (2000) denies the existence of a distinct Canadian English saying that Canadian English is mythical as a notion and has been fabricated to reinforce the Canadian identity in a fragile way. Lilles (2000) talks of a lack of orthographic and phonological standardization of the Canadian English, Canadian vocabulary’s paucity, and the traces of regionalisms linked with different areas of the US. British English Since language has continuously changing all over the world in general and within Britain in particular, it is speculated that Estuary English (EE) that is an accent that has been established relatively newly might replace England’s traditional educated accent of Received Pronunciation (RP) (Wells, 1998). According to Rosewarne (1984), Estuary English is spoken by people who belong to the social middle ground. However, there is a whole range of common features among the accents that are more prevalent in England. Most of the varieties of British English exist of a continuum and do not have any non-fuzzy and unbreakable boundaries. Varieties of British English Varieties of British English can be categorized in different ways so as to include the varieties with respect to the variation of formality, dialect, and accent. Varieties of British English with respect to formality With respect to formality, there are two fundamental varieties of the British English, namely the British Slang English and the Standard British English. They are described as follows: British Slang English British slang is the informal language that is associated with a particular social class. Slang English has been spoken in Britain since the 16th century. Slang English keeps changing all the time as new phrases and words are added that become mainstream when they are used frequently. Certain slang words are used all across Great Britain whereas others are used in particular regions. For example, “knackered” that means “exhausted” is used throughout the Britain whereas the nations of Scotland, England, Northern Ireland and Wales have distinct slang word. There are many varieties in London slang including the rhyming slang. Standard British English The Standard British English is the variety of British English that is formal and is used for academic purposes and in all kinds of professional writing in Britain. It is taught in the schools in Britain and when defined more narrowly, in Southeast England. Although use of English in Britain has never been regulated by any formal body, yet the British schools have been teaching a quite rigid model of this variety of English since the 18th century. Standard British English is infrequently referred to as Received Pronunciation (RP)’s synonym. Varieties of British English with respect to dialect There are three basic varieties of British English with respect to dialect including regional, social, and historical variety. They are discussed as follows: Regional dialect Most people are readily aware of regional dialect. People speak and write differently depending on the region they belong to. Regional dialect is amongst the aspects of language variety that are studied the most (Crystal, n.d., p. 203). The main British rural dialects have been explored in detail particularly from phonetically. The regional variation is typically linked with variation in the way language is spoken. Social dialect The social backgrounds that people belong to have a long-lasting and powerful impact on the type of language they use in their daily life. Certain general markers of linguistics of class occur irrespective of which region people may belong to. For instance, “distinctions can often be pointed out in terms of the choices we make in the use of words referring to particular concepts – such as how we address people or say farewell to them, or how we refer to various meals, relations, or the toilet” (Crystal, n.d., p. 204). Historical dialect Historical variation is the third variation of British English with respect to dialects. English spoken by people clearly indicates their historical association with regions and their social backgrounds. The English language cannot be entirely restricted to the one that is spoken today, and must be allowed to be associated with its earlier states. The interface between the English and its preceding forms is hard to determine, yet certain earlier states of English can be included legitimately. The Elizabethan English and the Modern English cannot be talked about in exactly the same terms. Examples of the historical variation include the use of “thee” for “you”, and “thy” for “your”. Varieties of British English with respect to accent With respect to the variation of accent, there are four basic varieties of British English that include the Received Pronunciation (RP) English, Cockney English, Estuary English, and Queen’s English. They are discussed below: The Received Pronunciation (RP) English RP is actually associated with no country of Great Britain except for England. However, RP is not spoken in any specific region within England. Since it is conventionally considered to be an educated variety of British English, it is generally spoken by the upper middle and the upper class citizens of England. RP is defined more sociologically than geographically. Traditionally, RP has been typically associated with certain professions including diplomats, stockbrokers, and barristers. Till the 1970’s, RP was considered as an announcer accent on the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) television, which is why, RP is also referred to as “BBC English”. RP is characterized by the prevalence of intrusive r. The sound of “r” is inserted at the end of every word that ends with a non-high vowel provided that the next word starts with a vowel. For example, “I saw it” is spoken as “I saw[r] it”. According to Trudgill (1999), the intrusive r’s development is amongst the results of r-lessness in the more modern dialects of the British English. Cockney English Cockney stands for London accent’s basilectal end and can be thought of as the broadest variety of the local accent of London (Wells, 1982). Cockney is traditionally spoken in specific areas within London. The term Cockney is used for both the accent and its speakers. The Cockney English is usually thought of as amongst the broadest varieties of the English of Great Britain that epitomizes the accents of the working class Londoners and also of other areas in its diluted form. The soap “East Enders” shown by BBC provides a good example of Cockney English in the accents of the characters. Cockney’s voice quality typically involves the chest tone instead of a head tone which is why it is equated with sounds that are rough and harsh and lack the velvety smoothness of the accents of Mayfair or Kensington that are spoken by the people in the upscale London areas. Estuary English (EE) The term “Estuary English” (EE) was coined by David Rosewarne, a British linguist in the year 1984. EE is defined in terms of a “variety of modified regional speech [that becomes] a mixture of non-regional and local south-eastern English pronunciation and intonation” (Rosewarne, 1994). Wells (1998) sees EE as the educated counterpart of Cockney English. EE bridges the gap between RP and Cockney English and hence unites the different classes of the SE England. The term Estuary speaks of the commencement of this dialect in the region along the River Thames of London as well as its estuaries. There are certain variations within Estuary English and the speakers of this variety of British English display a mix of the general RP phonemes and London phonemes (Rosenwarne, 1994). Queen’s English Generally, Queen’s English is associated with the Royal Family of Great Britain. However, there is difference between the dialect of the older members of the Royal Family and its younger members. The English spoken by Princess Margaret and the Queen Mother is the conservative RP as can be found in the old British films. The Royal Family’s younger members including Prince Edward’s, and the late Princess Diana’s accents were more like advanced RP than the traditional accent. The pronominal use of the word “one” in place of “I” is stereotypically linked with the upper class in general and with the Royal Family in particular. Both the members of the Royal Family and the people associated with it frequently use “one” in place of “I”. 3. Context This paper discusses which variety of British English is suitable for students that are second language learners in relation to debates on English as an international Language. The setting is a classroom of students learning English in the UK. There are two separate classes; one for the students of lower intermediate level and the other for the students of intermediate level, with a total of 12 students in each class. The class is conducted five days a week from Monday through Friday in the evening for two hours. The students form a heterogeneous group in the class in that the students belong to different age groups. Most of the students are older people in their mid/late 40s and some are in their 50s. There are also few young students in their early 20s. The students have different motivations for learning English. While most of the young students want to learn English for the academic purposes, many older students are trying to develop competency in spoken English to be able to communicate better and integrate into the society. There is also an older student from Spain who has been an English teacher in Spain but has come all the way to the UK in order to comprehend and be able to adopt the native English way of teaching the students, because the accent of a teacher of English language plays a fundamental role in his/her ability to teach (Norton, 1997, p. 423). Presently, the students speak different varieties of English and in different accents. Some of the older students attempt to change their identity by trying to speak in the RP accent whereas the young students generally speak more slang. 4. Variety of British English suitable for the students Saying that languages modify and evolve into different varieties over the passage of time is commonplace (Aitchison, 1981). The view that language should be unchanging and constant forever is now discredited thoroughly particularly amongst the language teachers and the linguists. Greenberg (1964) and Halliday, MacIntosh and Strevens (1964) said that the residents of countries where English is the first language could not claim ownership of English any more as the local varieties were evolving and would keep doing so. English, today, is the official language in the British schools as well as all public services. A vast majority of the newspapers in Britain are published in English. People’s exposure to English over the services of public broadcasting is considerable. Before proposing which variety of British English is suitable for the students, it is customary to enlist the individualistic and collective needs and motivations of the students participating in the course. Table 1 shows the motivations of the students of both classes, that they expressed in a survey that was conducted with them: Table 1: Motivations of students for learning English Class 1 Students Level Region of residence in Britain Motivation for learning English Status 1 Lower Intermediate London Academic Student 2 London Academic Student 3 London Academic Student 4 Manchester Academic Student 5 Manchester Professional Barrister 6 Manchester Professional Lawyer 7 Manchester Professional Teacher 8 Manchester Professional Teacher 9 Manchester Social Businessman 10 Nottingham Social Businessman 11 Nottingham Social Doctor 12 Nottingham Social Engineer Class 2 1 Intermediate London Academic Student 2 London Academic Student 3 London Academic Student 4 London Academic Student 5 London Academic Student 6 London Professional Diplomat 7 Manchester Professional Construction Manager 8 Manchester Professional Engineer 9 Manchester Professional Engineer 10 Manchester Professional Doctor 11 Nottingham Social Businessman 12 Nottingham Social Businessman Table 1 suggests that 37.5 per cent students want to learn English for academic purposes, and an equal percentage of students want to learn English for professional purposes, whereas only 25 per cent of the students want to learn English for such social purposes as being better able to communicate in the society and integrate more into the society. Keeping in view the needs and motivations of more than two-thirds of the student population, among the whole range of varieties of British English, the one that is the most suitable for all students in general and the young students in particular is Standard British English. A vast majority of the students have joined this course with an intention to learn the British English the “correct” way, which essentially means that they want to learn the Standard British English. While many students do want to learn different regional dialects and varieties of accents because of their residence in specific regions of Great Britain, there is hardly any student that wants to learn the British Slang language. Students think that use of slang language drives them away from the knowledge of the correct language, and its applicability is also very limited. While the Standard British English can be used everywhere be the purpose academic, social, or professional, slang language is suitable only for casual communication among friends. Besides, knowledge of slang language is secondary in terms of importance and is useful only after an individual has complete hold over the standard language. The accent that is most suitable for teaching the students in this course is the RP accent, with few students needing training in Cockney. The reason RP is the most suitable accent to be taught to the students is that RP is associated only with England. The fact that all three cities i.e. London, Manchester, and Nottingham where the students belong are located in England makes RP the most suitable accent for them. RP is also very suitable accent for this population of students because RP is considered an educated variety of British English. “The use of ‘Received Pronunciation’ normally implies a degree of education which need not be present for any of the other accents used in Britain” (Crystal, n.d. p. 204). The fact that most of the students want to learn English either for academic or professional purposes makes being taught the RP accent useful for them. In addition to that, RP is particularly suitable for the barrister and diplomat since RP is conventionally associated with these professions. Cockney is the second-most suitable accent to be taught to this population of students because Cockney represents the basilectal end of London accent and is the broadest variety of London’s local accent (Wells, 1982). Cockney English also happens to be one of the broadest varieties of the British English that not only epitomizes the accent of working class people in London but also of several other areas like Manchester and Nottingham in its diluted form. Standard British English with RP or Cockney accent is also very useful for the minority of students that want to learn English for social purposes primarily because they come from areas where RP and Cockney accents are easily recognized and facilitate communication among people. 5. Useful activities for the learners of English For learning accents The grammar and lexis of the dialect speakers reflects in the work of dramatists that write for TV and film, though that is not a very authentic data to illustrate the live use of dialect. Nevertheless, their work is instructive and is worth studying to inculcate a sense of the dialect speakers in the learners. Actors in the films and TV programs are not typical speakers. Rather, they get training in the speech sounds’ physical articulation so that they are able to articulate with more clarity using a variety of strategies including the distortion, amplification, or exaggeration of speech as it might occur naturally. Film studios frequently make use of expert phonologists or special coaches of voice to provide the actors with assistance in mastering a regional accent because of the importance of naturalistic authenticity in films and TV programs. A teacher can compare the apparently authentic and inauthentic accents in the films to promote learning about the real-life original among the students. Some examples of such dramas are “Heartbeat” and “Emmerdale”. In “Heartbeat”, the characters use a generic Yorkshire accent that reflects the regional dialect of Leeds or Bradford whereas in “Emmerdale”, characters tend to use the Lancashire accent (Moore and Rhodes, 2004). Although from the point of view of language students, the significance of such dramas is not huge particularly as evidence for the regional speech sounds, yet these dramas do convey a fair understanding of the inexact or mistaken ideas that people carry regarding the different forms of language or speech sounds. For developing competency in writing A very useful activity that students can be engaged in to develop their competency in British English is giving them passages to write. Writing is an extraordinarily useful exercise in the teaching of English as a second language because of the variety of benefits it offers. Firstly, creative writing inculcates the skill of thinking innovative ideas and reflecting the linguistic skills in the form of text. Creative writing is required by all students irrespective of their age groups or motivations behind learning English. For example, young students need the creative writing skills in order to perform well in the writing tasks that form essential components of such testing systems for English language as International English Language Testing System (IELTS). This has a direct impact on their academic career because the band students score in IELTS is one of the fundamental factors against which their skills are evaluated by the colleges and universities. Older students who want to learn English to integrate into the society benefit from creative writing because it not only engages them into the exercise of creative thinking that they essentially need to be able to better communicate, but also helps them remember the grammatical and lexical concepts that they have gained in the class. Students who want to learn English for the professional purposes like the one who has been a teacher in Spain would also benefit from creative writing because this exercise would inculcate the knowledge of the fundamentals of creative writing in him which in turn would enable him to better evaluate the performance of his students in Spain. For developing competency in spoken English Students’ ability to communicate in English can be developed a lot by engaging them in the exercise of recalling. For this, the teacher needs to show them clips of movies or dramas, and ask individual students to recall the information in particular ways. The teacher can develop different questions for different students so that information is not repetitive and so that every student makes his/her own effort to recall the information. For instance, one question can be about the theme of play, the other can be about the story, yet another can be about acting. This is a very useful and engaging exercise for the students because it not only provides them with an entertaining way of learning, but students also get the opportunity to learn to speak from one another as the students answer the teacher in front of the whole class. In addition to that, students also develop confidence to speak as they see one another making mistakes during the speech. They get this feeling that nobody is perfect and there is no learning without mistakes. 6. Conclusion There are many varieties of British English and the language can be characterized in different types. The variety of British English most suitable to teach this population of students is the Standard British English because of all the academic and professional advantages that it has to offer. The accent to go with this variety for this student population is the RP accent and the Cockney accent because the students live in the cities of England. Some useful activities that students can be engaged in to facilitate their learning is showing them movies and making them concentrate on the accent, giving them creative writing tasks, and showing them clips and asking them questions to have their skill of speaking English polished. References: Aitchison, J. (1981). Language change: Progress or decay? London: Fontana. Crystal, D. (n.d.). Style: The varieties of English. Retrieved from http://www.davidcrystal.com/DC_articles/Stylistics7.pdf. Greenberg, J. (1966). Sociolinguistic research in Africa. In A. Dil, (1971). Language, culture and communications: Essays by J. H. Greenberg (pp.46-74). Stanford: Stanford University Press. Halliday, M., McIntosh, A., and Strevens, P. (1964). The linguistic sciences and language teaching. Harlow: Longman. ic.arizona.edu. (2001). African-American English. Retrieved from http://www.ic.arizona.edu/~lsp/. Lilles, J. (2000). The Myth of Canadian English. English Today. 16.2(62): 3-10. McKay, S. L. (2002). Teaching English as an International Language. UK: Oxford University Press. Moore, A., and Rhodes, B. (2004). English varieties of the British Isles. Retrieved from http://www.universalteacher.org.uk/lang/britishisles.htm#top. Norton, B. (1997). Language, identity, and the ownership of English. TESOL Quarterly. 31(3): 409-429. Rosewarne, D. (1984). Estuary English: David Rosewarne describes a newly observed variety of English pronunciation. The Times Educational Supplement, 29. Rosewarne, D. (1994). Estuary English: tomorrow’s RP? English Today. 37, 10(1): 3-9. Trudgill, P. (1999). The Dialects of England. 2nd ed. Blackwell. Wells, J. C. (1982). Accents of English 2. The British Isles. Cambridge University Press. Wells, J. C. (1998). Estuary English?!?. Sociolectal, chronolectal and regional aspects of pronunciation: Symposium in Lund 9 May 1998. Read More