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English Accents and Dialects - Advanced Level English
English Accents and Dialects - Advanced Level English
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Is English one language? Or several? The answer to this question depends on how you define the
word "language". But however the word is defined, it is clear that English is a language with many
different varieties. Even within the United Kingdom there are different regional or social varieties
of English; worldwide there are very many more, some of them quite a long way from what is
known as standard English.
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the reply is negative, because of the word sorry, but the rest of the sentence may be incomprehensible. Mate, is
a slang word (in this context) meaning friend; the word I has disappeared from the answer; ain't is a general
negative form that can replace most negative auxiliaries (haven't, isn't, etc.), and any has become none, a
double negative. Sorry mate, ain't got none ! is the kind of sentence you might hear anywhere in Britain.
Most dialects are regional: for example there are several different dialects of English in Scotland. Many Scots
say things differently from the English: phonetically, as in the word go (with a monophthong) rather than go
[gəu], with a diphthong or hame instead of home. Sometimes grammar and words change too; many Scotsmen
say I dinna ken rather than I don't know, or couldna instead of couldn't, wee instead of little, or a lum instead
of a chimney. Scotland is a different country from England, and the reasons for its language being different are
not hard to imagine: but England itself has many regional accents and dialects. Northern English is different from
Southern English, but there again, there are many varieties of each !
There are obviously some general shared features: in most Northern dialects, the [ʌ] sound of southern
English becomes [u]: the word duck, in the North of England, rhymes with look. In many southern regional
dialects, other vowels change: the pronoun I may be pronounced [oi], rhyming with boy, and the short [ɔ] as
in fox becomes [a:], so making fox rhyme with Marx (as in many American dialects). While it is the vowels that
change most from one accent or dialect to another, some consonants change a little, especially the R which is
fully pronounced in some English and many American dialects. Compare standard English I'm a farmer with
Westcountry English Oi'm a varrmer!
Yes, it's all very complicated, and no one expects a student from another part of the world to understand all the
details ! Whole books have been written on the question ! What is important is that non-native speakers of
English realise that all these different varieties of English do exist, even within the United Kingdom. If you go to
England expecting everyone to speak "the Queen's English", you will get a big surprise ! Go expecting to find a
variety of accents and dialects, and you will find that they are easier to understand !
WORDS
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Level - Advanced
CEFR LEVEL: B2
IELTS Level: 5 - 6
Flesch-Kincaid scores
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60 - Plain English
Grade level: 9.3
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