Pretty but misty, you can't see very much
August 28, 2022 1:16 PM Subscribe
On 27 August 1961, a BBC reporter interviewed four Australians boarding a ship in Melbourne for Tilbury, Essex, about what they expected to find in England. The answers included Tudorian houses, dirty petticoats, the world's last remaining class society with drawing-room manners and a population of neuter men and their suety womenfolk sitting in the fog eating crumpets. (SLTwitter)
I would love to see a follow-up interview with these people some years later. I wonder if the second lady did manage to bag a suave, sophisticated Belgian or Italian or something better than the rough-handling Aussie blokes and neuter Englishmen that would otherwise have been her lot.
posted by acb at 1:23 PM on August 28, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by acb at 1:23 PM on August 28, 2022 [2 favorites]
When I went to England for the first time (in 1988/I was 12), I will admit to being mildly disappointed that everyone's hair was less interesting than I'd been led to believe via years of unsupervised access to new wave music videos.
posted by thivaia at 2:20 PM on August 28, 2022 [28 favorites]
posted by thivaia at 2:20 PM on August 28, 2022 [28 favorites]
When I went (2000??) one of the high points was discovering that all the London techies I knew from online had strong opinions about hedges and gardening in general. Not so of Seattle techies at the time.
I did not get pub etiquette at all and I think some of the answers I got about it were polite fictions and I didn’t figure them out either. I was a lout, I’m sorry.
Dirty petticoats! But hems were already short! So this doesn’t mean street-muddied, it’s unwashed undergarments? Brutal.
posted by clew at 2:49 PM on August 28, 2022 [2 favorites]
I did not get pub etiquette at all and I think some of the answers I got about it were polite fictions and I didn’t figure them out either. I was a lout, I’m sorry.
Dirty petticoats! But hems were already short! So this doesn’t mean street-muddied, it’s unwashed undergarments? Brutal.
posted by clew at 2:49 PM on August 28, 2022 [2 favorites]
Damn! Unintentionally the greatest diss track in the history of recording.
posted by rodlymight at 2:51 PM on August 28, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by rodlymight at 2:51 PM on August 28, 2022 [1 favorite]
Do you suppose the film it was recorded onto travelled on the same ship? They wouldn’t have the experience of disembarking into a crowd that had seen the criticism, but it might have been broadcast soon after they got there. Ouch.
posted by clew at 2:55 PM on August 28, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by clew at 2:55 PM on August 28, 2022 [1 favorite]
Given that they filmed the ship's doors closing as it departed, probably not. It's plausible that the BBC had the budget to courier their footage on one of the BOAC flights along the multi-hop “kangaroo route” from Australia to London, though, in which case the interviewees could have expected a stern, hushed tutting.
posted by acb at 3:15 PM on August 28, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by acb at 3:15 PM on August 28, 2022 [1 favorite]
Dirty petticoats! But hems were already short!
Perhaps in the antipodean imagination, Britain was forever in the Victorian era, with only minor modifications; presumably the horse-drawn cart had been replaced by the Morris Minor or something, though people still dressed with an old-fashioned propriety that the colonies could but imperfectly imitate.
Mind you, this was in 1961, a few years before (I think) Jean Shrimpton outraged Australian public morality by showing up to the Melbourne Cup wearing a miniskirt. London hadn't yet begun to swing, and while those stereotypes weren't correct, they weren't completely off the mark either.
posted by acb at 3:23 PM on August 28, 2022 [5 favorites]
Perhaps in the antipodean imagination, Britain was forever in the Victorian era, with only minor modifications; presumably the horse-drawn cart had been replaced by the Morris Minor or something, though people still dressed with an old-fashioned propriety that the colonies could but imperfectly imitate.
Mind you, this was in 1961, a few years before (I think) Jean Shrimpton outraged Australian public morality by showing up to the Melbourne Cup wearing a miniskirt. London hadn't yet begun to swing, and while those stereotypes weren't correct, they weren't completely off the mark either.
posted by acb at 3:23 PM on August 28, 2022 [5 favorites]
There’s so many levels to this. It’s provincial shitkickers from post-war Australia dumping on the English (still a national pastime) but pay attention, it’s 1961, and they’re all doing the reasonable thing and leaving Australia for England
posted by Fiasco da Gama at 3:32 PM on August 28, 2022 [13 favorites]
posted by Fiasco da Gama at 3:32 PM on August 28, 2022 [13 favorites]
Also, their accents probably sound more RP than the average Londoner's at the time.
posted by acb at 3:34 PM on August 28, 2022 [5 favorites]
posted by acb at 3:34 PM on August 28, 2022 [5 favorites]
It's honestly really not that foggy here.
posted by EndsOfInvention at 3:38 PM on August 28, 2022 [6 favorites]
posted by EndsOfInvention at 3:38 PM on August 28, 2022 [6 favorites]
"But gossip must see its characters
in black and white, equip them with
sins and motives easily conveyed in
the shorthand of conversation."
-George Smiley. A Call For the Dead. 1961.
posted by clavdivs at 3:41 PM on August 28, 2022 [4 favorites]
in black and white, equip them with
sins and motives easily conveyed in
the shorthand of conversation."
-George Smiley. A Call For the Dead. 1961.
posted by clavdivs at 3:41 PM on August 28, 2022 [4 favorites]
Wasn't it a few years before the laws restricting the use of fireplaces* would be passed, meaning that London was still beset by the occasional pea-souper smog?
* which, incidentally, the more deregulationist Tories are pushing to repeal as a solution to the energy crisis, allowing pensioners to keep warm by burning furniture and old books.
posted by acb at 3:43 PM on August 28, 2022 [1 favorite]
* which, incidentally, the more deregulationist Tories are pushing to repeal as a solution to the energy crisis, allowing pensioners to keep warm by burning furniture and old books.
posted by acb at 3:43 PM on August 28, 2022 [1 favorite]
Sort of - the film was recorded after the Clean Air Act of ’56, but before the extensions to that Act of ’68.
posted by Morfil Ffyrnig at 4:03 PM on August 28, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by Morfil Ffyrnig at 4:03 PM on August 28, 2022 [1 favorite]
Australian speech question.
Is there a linguist's answer to why, for somewhere so large, Australia doesn't have regional accents? (or is that true?)
I'm familiar with the Cultivated (Cate Blanchett) vs. Broad (Steve Irwin) vs. General (pick a Hemsworth) accents, as signifiers of socioeconomic class and urban/rural etc. Farmer vs TV news presenter, posh types vs bogans, etc.
But I've never quite understood how, say, Perth and Melbourne can sound the same, being a continent apart. How'd that happen?
(Or have I been misinformed, and Adelaide vs Darwin is actually like Texas vs Minnesota and I just don't hear either in the movies?)
posted by bartleby at 4:15 PM on August 28, 2022 [4 favorites]
Is there a linguist's answer to why, for somewhere so large, Australia doesn't have regional accents? (or is that true?)
I'm familiar with the Cultivated (Cate Blanchett) vs. Broad (Steve Irwin) vs. General (pick a Hemsworth) accents, as signifiers of socioeconomic class and urban/rural etc. Farmer vs TV news presenter, posh types vs bogans, etc.
But I've never quite understood how, say, Perth and Melbourne can sound the same, being a continent apart. How'd that happen?
(Or have I been misinformed, and Adelaide vs Darwin is actually like Texas vs Minnesota and I just don't hear either in the movies?)
posted by bartleby at 4:15 PM on August 28, 2022 [4 favorites]
Well, wasn’t the Great Smog just nine years before, killing 4000 people? So I could see that being something that might make a lasting impression.
Also please note that I originally mistyped it as the Great Snog. Which would have perhaps been a lot more fun and a lot less deadly.
posted by mochapickle at 4:26 PM on August 28, 2022 [13 favorites]
Also please note that I originally mistyped it as the Great Snog. Which would have perhaps been a lot more fun and a lot less deadly.
posted by mochapickle at 4:26 PM on August 28, 2022 [13 favorites]
@bartleby
I know two twin sisters from Adelaide, one who grew up in the city with a "cultivated" accent and one who grew up in the bush (ie regional town) who has a strong ocker accent.
For the most part nationwide, even locals can't distinguish accents other than a broad "city" or "country", and even that is quite grey. I suggest there is a noticeable first nation / indigenous accent also.
posted by chmmr at 4:36 PM on August 28, 2022 [2 favorites]
I know two twin sisters from Adelaide, one who grew up in the city with a "cultivated" accent and one who grew up in the bush (ie regional town) who has a strong ocker accent.
For the most part nationwide, even locals can't distinguish accents other than a broad "city" or "country", and even that is quite grey. I suggest there is a noticeable first nation / indigenous accent also.
posted by chmmr at 4:36 PM on August 28, 2022 [2 favorites]
I've seen it claimed that in Victoria there are the beginnings of a regional accent, with some vowels being flattened (i.e., “Melbourne” is pronounced a bit like “Malbourne”), though am not sure I've seen any evidence of this.
New Zealand has its own accent, mostly characterised by vowels having moved around (i.e., “check-in luggage” sounds like “chicken luggage”), though given the distance between Western Australia and the east coast and the sparseness of the interior, it's surprising that the coasts of Australia haven't diverged more.
posted by acb at 5:20 PM on August 28, 2022 [4 favorites]
New Zealand has its own accent, mostly characterised by vowels having moved around (i.e., “check-in luggage” sounds like “chicken luggage”), though given the distance between Western Australia and the east coast and the sparseness of the interior, it's surprising that the coasts of Australia haven't diverged more.
posted by acb at 5:20 PM on August 28, 2022 [4 favorites]
When my son went as a teen he was unsettled the first time someone asked if they could ‘bum a fag’.
posted by MtDewd at 5:23 PM on August 28, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by MtDewd at 5:23 PM on August 28, 2022 [2 favorites]
My experience is nowhere near as ribaldly amusing, though I was slightly taken aback by pretty much everyone in the UK asking me if I was alright. Eventually I accepted that “are you alright?” (often abbreviated to “'aight?” or some variant thereof) was a standard vernacular greeting in the UK, a bit like “how’s it going?”, and not any indication that I appeared to be distressed.
posted by acb at 5:33 PM on August 28, 2022 [6 favorites]
posted by acb at 5:33 PM on August 28, 2022 [6 favorites]
Sometimes I read old cozy mysteries from the UK where Australians, particularly Australian women, show up as unpleasant caricatures -- too brash, overdressed, brazen. I like to see that the stereotypes went both ways.
When I first visited the UK as a teen in the '90s, I was taken aback by how rude or downright nasty people could be in public, to strangers who might have done something wrong or might just be from another ethnic group. Pop culture had given me the idea that British people apologized all the time. Later in life, I realized that the rudeness was actually a sign of a healthier society -- one with workers' rights and the reasonable expectation that nobody is going to get shot in public.
posted by Countess Elena at 5:42 PM on August 28, 2022 [6 favorites]
When I first visited the UK as a teen in the '90s, I was taken aback by how rude or downright nasty people could be in public, to strangers who might have done something wrong or might just be from another ethnic group. Pop culture had given me the idea that British people apologized all the time. Later in life, I realized that the rudeness was actually a sign of a healthier society -- one with workers' rights and the reasonable expectation that nobody is going to get shot in public.
posted by Countess Elena at 5:42 PM on August 28, 2022 [6 favorites]
Also, their accents probably sound more RP than the average Londoner's at the time.
The accents were what jumped out at me, too. I feel like the same footage taken today would not sound like this at all.
posted by Dip Flash at 6:29 PM on August 28, 2022 [5 favorites]
The accents were what jumped out at me, too. I feel like the same footage taken today would not sound like this at all.
posted by Dip Flash at 6:29 PM on August 28, 2022 [5 favorites]
The dirty petticoats was my favorite part of this. And listen: I have also seen the Oberon/Olivier "Wuthering Heights" more than once at very impressionable age. It's just a bummer you didn't get to spend your adolescence with Kate Bush on the stereo.
posted by thivaia at 8:47 PM on August 28, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by thivaia at 8:47 PM on August 28, 2022 [1 favorite]
When I was visiting London I decided to find a random pub in the East End just so that I could say "a pint of bitter please!" So I did, and the reply was, "What, do you want a beer or something?"
Thus ended my attempts at English stereotyping.
posted by Pyrogenesis at 11:08 PM on August 28, 2022 [6 favorites]
Thus ended my attempts at English stereotyping.
posted by Pyrogenesis at 11:08 PM on August 28, 2022 [6 favorites]
Brit here. First time I went to New York, I went to a midtown bar and asked (in what I fondly imagined was a New York accent) for a "Boddulabud". The barman sprang to attention and replied "Right ho!" in his best imitation of RP English. I concluded that my attempt to pass as a native had failed.
posted by Paul Slade at 12:15 AM on August 29, 2022 [19 favorites]
posted by Paul Slade at 12:15 AM on August 29, 2022 [19 favorites]
There are regional Australian accents, but they're subtle, as they haven't had nearly as long to localise as in Britain, and national broadcasting has acted as a brake on divergence. However, if you say "skewl" or "pewl" for school/pool you're probably from Sydney, if you say "hwat" for "what" you're probably from Melbourne, and if you're from Tasmania like me you'll definitely say "graph" with a short A, unlike most of the mainland. My mum and her family are from Sydney, and I've also lived in Canberra and Melbourne. Haven't had as much exposure to Adelaide and Perth accents, but whenever I meet someone from Perth I can tell something is different.
Having lived away from Oz for twenty years, what I notice too is how younger Aussies' accents are shifting over time. "Uh-stray-a" wasn't a thing when I lived there, it was "uh-strail-ya". When I compare them with older people in my life... yeah, big changes. Hardly surprising—my closest uncle growing up was born a hundred years ago.
posted by rory at 1:05 AM on August 29, 2022 [10 favorites]
Having lived away from Oz for twenty years, what I notice too is how younger Aussies' accents are shifting over time. "Uh-stray-a" wasn't a thing when I lived there, it was "uh-strail-ya". When I compare them with older people in my life... yeah, big changes. Hardly surprising—my closest uncle growing up was born a hundred years ago.
posted by rory at 1:05 AM on August 29, 2022 [10 favorites]
Watched the clip at last, and that's hilarious. That second woman... phew. The rest are pretty unexceptional in comparison, really. A shame that the last bloke's prediction about the demise of the British class system was so inaccurate; not only that, Australian egalitarianism has taken a big hit since the '60s, too.
But compared to Australia, Britain is foggy and misty and cold. The winters of 1961 and 1962 were both cold, the latter especially: "The winter of 1962-63 was one of the coldest Britain has known. After a week of catastrophic, lung-clogging smog in early December in which many hundreds of people lost their lives, snow began to fall on Boxing Day 1962 … and did not stop for the next ten weeks. With blizzards, treacherous ice and temperatures lower than minus 20C, at times the entire country was paralysed." The coldest temperature on record in Melbourne was −2.8°C, way back in 1869.
posted by rory at 2:22 AM on August 29, 2022 [6 favorites]
But compared to Australia, Britain is foggy and misty and cold. The winters of 1961 and 1962 were both cold, the latter especially: "The winter of 1962-63 was one of the coldest Britain has known. After a week of catastrophic, lung-clogging smog in early December in which many hundreds of people lost their lives, snow began to fall on Boxing Day 1962 … and did not stop for the next ten weeks. With blizzards, treacherous ice and temperatures lower than minus 20C, at times the entire country was paralysed." The coldest temperature on record in Melbourne was −2.8°C, way back in 1869.
posted by rory at 2:22 AM on August 29, 2022 [6 favorites]
Anyone interested in the influx of young Australians into London in the early 60s could read Clive James' second volume of memoirs Falling Towards England. His contemporaries included Germaine Greer, Barry Humphries and Bruce Beresford, all listed under pseudonyms in the book. Probably best to read the first volume, Unreliable Memoirs, about his childhood in post-war Sydney, beforehand. Partly for context, partly because it's ridiculously funny.
posted by Grangousier at 2:57 AM on August 29, 2022 [6 favorites]
posted by Grangousier at 2:57 AM on August 29, 2022 [6 favorites]
and if you're from Tasmania like me you'll definitely say "graph" with a short A
On a tangent, I was surprised to find that in England (well, London at least), “data” is pronounced “day-ta”; before moving to the UK, I thought that was an Americanism, and the Proper Queen's English could be no other than “dah-ta”, as it is pronounced in Australia (and possibly nowhere else).
posted by acb at 8:48 AM on August 29, 2022 [1 favorite]
On a tangent, I was surprised to find that in England (well, London at least), “data” is pronounced “day-ta”; before moving to the UK, I thought that was an Americanism, and the Proper Queen's English could be no other than “dah-ta”, as it is pronounced in Australia (and possibly nowhere else).
posted by acb at 8:48 AM on August 29, 2022 [1 favorite]
and the Proper Queen's English could be no other than “dah-ta”, as it is pronounced in Australia (and possibly nowhere else).
Mainland Australia, presumably. Yep, I grew up saying "day-ta" (after all, my home state is Tas-may-nia and not Tas-mah-nia). Also, my 1982 copy of the Macquarie Dictionary has "day-ta" as the primary pronunciation, "dah-ta" as secondary. Regional variation and a shift over time.
posted by rory at 10:01 AM on August 29, 2022 [2 favorites]
Mainland Australia, presumably. Yep, I grew up saying "day-ta" (after all, my home state is Tas-may-nia and not Tas-mah-nia). Also, my 1982 copy of the Macquarie Dictionary has "day-ta" as the primary pronunciation, "dah-ta" as secondary. Regional variation and a shift over time.
posted by rory at 10:01 AM on August 29, 2022 [2 favorites]
You wouldn't believe the feathers I ruffled over the pronunciation of sloth. (Well, it's YouTube, so you probably would, but anyway.)
posted by rory at 10:04 AM on August 29, 2022 [3 favorites]
posted by rory at 10:04 AM on August 29, 2022 [3 favorites]
There's a lot of fun with the word 'garage' which I've heard pronounced four distinctly different ways since being in England. I've also seen people get into arguments over the pronunciation of the letter 'H' but I think this is in part, a Midlands thing.
Don't get me started on Nike, Adidas and Omega.
posted by Ms. Moonlight at 10:04 AM on August 30, 2022 [1 favorite]
Don't get me started on Nike, Adidas and Omega.
posted by Ms. Moonlight at 10:04 AM on August 30, 2022 [1 favorite]
@ bartleby
Australia the landmass is large, but my understanding is the places that people actually live are quite small.
posted by Nec_variat_lux_fracta_colorem at 10:06 AM on August 30, 2022 [1 favorite]
Australia the landmass is large, but my understanding is the places that people actually live are quite small.
posted by Nec_variat_lux_fracta_colorem at 10:06 AM on August 30, 2022 [1 favorite]
Building on rory's comment about the time needed for regionalization of accents -- it's worth noting that Australian English hasn't even had as long to regionalize as in North America. Colonization by English-speaking settlers started nearly 200 years later there.
posted by EvaDestruction at 12:22 PM on August 30, 2022 [3 favorites]
posted by EvaDestruction at 12:22 PM on August 30, 2022 [3 favorites]
Haven't thought about Alan Whicker in forever. Great voice!
posted by I'm always feeling, Blue at 2:39 PM on August 30, 2022
posted by I'm always feeling, Blue at 2:39 PM on August 30, 2022
That's true. Maybe I'm just assuming North American style immigration and settlement patterns.
Like the source of that Great Lakes 'Oh, Ja!' accent is from a bunch of Finns and Swedes finding "Forests on top, iron mines underneath, a half meter of snow in between? We'll take it!" and settling there in sufficient numbers to change the tune of the local music a bit.
I'm projecting when I assume that it would be natural for Australian Place X to have randomly received a double dose of settlers from Northern Ireland in the mix, and 50 years later everyone in the area has picked up a faint Belfast vowel sound or something.
Maybe I should mark it down as a job well done by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation keeping everyone synchronized for a century? There's still the drift over time, where people on TV & radio now don't sound like they used to; but it seems like both groups sound like everyone else did on the transcontinental broadcasts of their time.
posted by bartleby at 2:54 PM on August 30, 2022
Like the source of that Great Lakes 'Oh, Ja!' accent is from a bunch of Finns and Swedes finding "Forests on top, iron mines underneath, a half meter of snow in between? We'll take it!" and settling there in sufficient numbers to change the tune of the local music a bit.
I'm projecting when I assume that it would be natural for Australian Place X to have randomly received a double dose of settlers from Northern Ireland in the mix, and 50 years later everyone in the area has picked up a faint Belfast vowel sound or something.
Maybe I should mark it down as a job well done by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation keeping everyone synchronized for a century? There's still the drift over time, where people on TV & radio now don't sound like they used to; but it seems like both groups sound like everyone else did on the transcontinental broadcasts of their time.
posted by bartleby at 2:54 PM on August 30, 2022
Bartleby—the thing about Australia is that in terms of invaded-settler colonies, in comparison with the USA, it's just not very big, and not very old. Australia now has roughly the same number of people in it as the NY metropolitan area; in 1961 before mass-migration it was tiny. I'll believe that Americans can distinguish between a New York and a Jersey accent, but I know I can't. I can pick a country NSW accent from a Sydney one, but a foreigner? No chance.
The other thing about the people on this broadcast is that they absolutely sound like the ABC broadcasters of the 1960s, who in turn were imitative, by policy, of the BBC received pronunciation. That's because it's likely they were all relatively educated, well-off young people (who by definition, in 1961, wanted to leave Australia ASAP). The accents of working people would have been noticeably different, and broader. Class and recent-migrant background are still the only significant English accent markers here.
posted by Fiasco da Gama at 5:29 PM on August 30, 2022 [4 favorites]
The other thing about the people on this broadcast is that they absolutely sound like the ABC broadcasters of the 1960s, who in turn were imitative, by policy, of the BBC received pronunciation. That's because it's likely they were all relatively educated, well-off young people (who by definition, in 1961, wanted to leave Australia ASAP). The accents of working people would have been noticeably different, and broader. Class and recent-migrant background are still the only significant English accent markers here.
posted by Fiasco da Gama at 5:29 PM on August 30, 2022 [4 favorites]
Australia now has roughly the same number of people in it as the NY metropolitan area
Aw, you're selling yourself a few million short there, depending on how you define metro area. Think big!
Australia has about the same population as Texas today (+/- 25 million); it was about the same in 1960 (+/- 10 million).
Modern Brisbane is about the size of Houston. Adelaide's the size of Dallas.
I wouldn't fault anyone's ear for not being able to tell which Texas city accent was which.
But they're not 2000 km apart like Brisbane and Adelaide. That's the impressive bit to me - taking the population of Texas, spreading it out over an area larger than the 48 contiguous US states, but everyone still sounds the same.
But then again I'm imagining migration-cluster events. Like Thatcher closes the mines in the 1980s and a sizeable portion of Newcastle fucks off to go dig coal in Australia instead; resulting in a mining region that sounds a bit Geordie today. But it seems that never happened, or was remediated by the combined power of the BBC and ABC.
posted by bartleby at 8:01 PM on August 30, 2022 [1 favorite]
Aw, you're selling yourself a few million short there, depending on how you define metro area. Think big!
Australia has about the same population as Texas today (+/- 25 million); it was about the same in 1960 (+/- 10 million).
Modern Brisbane is about the size of Houston. Adelaide's the size of Dallas.
I wouldn't fault anyone's ear for not being able to tell which Texas city accent was which.
But they're not 2000 km apart like Brisbane and Adelaide. That's the impressive bit to me - taking the population of Texas, spreading it out over an area larger than the 48 contiguous US states, but everyone still sounds the same.
But then again I'm imagining migration-cluster events. Like Thatcher closes the mines in the 1980s and a sizeable portion of Newcastle fucks off to go dig coal in Australia instead; resulting in a mining region that sounds a bit Geordie today. But it seems that never happened, or was remediated by the combined power of the BBC and ABC.
posted by bartleby at 8:01 PM on August 30, 2022 [1 favorite]
I've also seen people get into arguments over the pronunciation of the letter 'H' but I think this is in part, a Midlands thing.
I think it's more a case of generational shift there. I'm over 60 now, I've spent my whole life in the south of England, and until about 20 years ago I hardly heard anyone pronounce this letter as "haitch" rather than "aitch". Just about everybody under 40 seems to pronounce it that way now, no matter where they live in the UK or (always important over here) where they fit into the class system. I've no idea why this happened - a change in schools? media influence? - but it grates on my ear every time I hear it.
There's no right or wrong in any of this, of course, just shifting usage and my own preference for the pronunciation I grew up with. I'd love to know what caused the change, though.
posted by Paul Slade at 12:51 AM on August 31, 2022
I think it's more a case of generational shift there. I'm over 60 now, I've spent my whole life in the south of England, and until about 20 years ago I hardly heard anyone pronounce this letter as "haitch" rather than "aitch". Just about everybody under 40 seems to pronounce it that way now, no matter where they live in the UK or (always important over here) where they fit into the class system. I've no idea why this happened - a change in schools? media influence? - but it grates on my ear every time I hear it.
There's no right or wrong in any of this, of course, just shifting usage and my own preference for the pronunciation I grew up with. I'd love to know what caused the change, though.
posted by Paul Slade at 12:51 AM on August 31, 2022
"New Zealand has its own accent, "
Just to be absolutely clear in case incorrect inferences are made by the unlearned, New Zealand is an entirely different country separated by 4000km of the Tasman Sea. (About 2500 miles for those odd people using antiquated measurements). There are strong social, geographical and historical reasons why we don't talk like Australians.
Having said that, given that the main islands of NZ are rather prosaically called the North Island and South Island in English, occasionally we enjoy referring to Australia as the West Island.
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 2:48 AM on August 31, 2022 [5 favorites]
Just to be absolutely clear in case incorrect inferences are made by the unlearned, New Zealand is an entirely different country separated by 4000km of the Tasman Sea. (About 2500 miles for those odd people using antiquated measurements). There are strong social, geographical and historical reasons why we don't talk like Australians.
Having said that, given that the main islands of NZ are rather prosaically called the North Island and South Island in English, occasionally we enjoy referring to Australia as the West Island.
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 2:48 AM on August 31, 2022 [5 favorites]
I've spent my whole life in the south of England, and until about 20 years ago I hardly heard anyone pronounce this letter as "haitch" rather than "aitch"... There's no right or wrong in any of this, of course, just shifting usage and my own preference for the pronunciation I grew up with. I'd love to know what caused the change, though.
My hunch is that you can blame influence from the US, where everyone's been saying "aitch" for at least a few decades longer than that.
posted by nebulawindphone at 6:05 AM on August 31, 2022
My hunch is that you can blame influence from the US, where everyone's been saying "aitch" for at least a few decades longer than that.
posted by nebulawindphone at 6:05 AM on August 31, 2022
This reminds me of an anecdote I heard, which is probably many decades old.
Man 1 (Cockney accent): “Oi've got an orrible eadache”
Man 2 (RP, air of superiority): “Then perhaps you should take an aspirate”
posted by acb at 6:11 AM on August 31, 2022
Man 1 (Cockney accent): “Oi've got an orrible eadache”
Man 2 (RP, air of superiority): “Then perhaps you should take an aspirate”
posted by acb at 6:11 AM on August 31, 2022
You wouldn't believe the feathers I ruffled over the pronunciation of sloth yt . (Well, it's YouTube, so you probably would, but anyway.)
posted by rory at 10:04 AM on August 29 [3 favorites +] [!]
I know this as the pronunciation preferred by Brother Maynard and his sect, in their reading from the Book of Armaments on the Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch.
posted by late afternoon dreaming hotel at 11:33 AM on August 31, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by rory at 10:04 AM on August 29 [3 favorites +] [!]
I know this as the pronunciation preferred by Brother Maynard and his sect, in their reading from the Book of Armaments on the Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch.
posted by late afternoon dreaming hotel at 11:33 AM on August 31, 2022 [1 favorite]
the West Island
And once again, Tasmania gets left off the maps.
posted by bartleby at 11:58 AM on August 31, 2022 [3 favorites]
And once again, Tasmania gets left off the maps.
posted by bartleby at 11:58 AM on August 31, 2022 [3 favorites]
"It's a starting off point for the Continent."
oh snap! burn!
posted by soakimbo at 4:45 PM on August 31, 2022 [2 favorites]
oh snap! burn!
posted by soakimbo at 4:45 PM on August 31, 2022 [2 favorites]
The UK was a starting off point for the Continent for me as well. Though it took me 14 years in the UK to move abroad, by which time I had acquired British citizenship.
I guess in both cases, the UK was outside of the EU.
posted by acb at 3:30 PM on September 1, 2022 [2 favorites]
I guess in both cases, the UK was outside of the EU.
posted by acb at 3:30 PM on September 1, 2022 [2 favorites]
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posted by kickingtheground at 1:21 PM on August 28, 2022 [6 favorites]