Chimley! I'm going to start saying "chimley".

It's presumably really spelt "chilmondeley".

Scarlett wrote:

Evolving wrote:

Scarlett wrote:

Evolving wrote:I am one of the few surviving pronouncers of "often" as "awphen", by the way (to pick up on an earlier post). My mother is the only other that comes to mind. I also say "lawst", "acrawss" and (of course) "awf". But our accents were preserved in a time capsule from the late seventies.

Are you, like, well posh?

I'm not sure we can be friends after this.

Evolving wrote:In one flat we lived on the top floor, and we had oil heaters in a couple of rooms, and an oil boiler next to the bathtub in the bathroom, which we would light when someone wanted a bath. When the oil was running low somebody would have to go downstairs to the shed in the back garden next to the mountain, where the oil was kept in a tank, and fill up a kind of watering can from the tank and bring it back upstairs.

Ah, that'll be a no then.

I'd reconsider. She had a mountain in her back garden.

Evolving wrote:Chimley! I'm going to start saying "chimley".

It's presumably really spelt "chilmondeley".

Actually there's often a b in there. In the chimbley.

jamest wrote:
I'd reconsider. She had a mountain in her back garden.

At the end of the garden. Where the fairies would otherwise have been.

One of my mother's cousins speaks like the Queen (lots of awff, lawst, etc). She had a very posh education & all her friends are either upper class or very well educated. She's not a snob in the slightest though - she just sounds like one.

Sadly they don't pay you for sounding like the Queen. Au contraire, in fact, these days.

Fallible wrote:

Evolving wrote:Chimley! I'm going to start saying "chimley".

It's presumably really spelt "chilmondeley".

Actually there's often a b in there. In the chimbley.

A bee in the chimley. Could be dangerous, when it finally finds its way out, frantic, angry and confused. And sooty.

Evolving wrote:Sadly they don't pay you for sounding like the Queen. Au contraire, in fact, these days.

She had a very good job in a senior position but she's retired now. I doubt her accent got her promoted though as she was a social worker in London!

Agrippina wrote:

Fallible wrote:

Agrippina wrote:I love the different ways the English pronounce words: "often" sometimes: "or-phen" other times "of-tin" we say "off-fen"

Most people here say 'offen' as well.

Then the "haitch" thing. We asked someone in York for directions and she told us it was next door to the "Haitch SBC" bank. Funny.

And what's with pronouncing the "g" at the end of words like "walking?"

It's only some people, and it's dependant on the regional accent. Southerners don't tend to do it, west midlanders and some northerners do, also some Welsh.

Which was why we found it odd. We'd only heard other people talking about its use, so it was strange to hear someone actually doing it.

Also some British people can't say "through" they say "true" instead. Rod Stewart does it.

My favourite British accent is Scottish. OMG I could listen to a Scot speaking forever. Love it.

I've never heard any British person not being able to say through. Some Irish people can't though. I'd say with a British person that's more likely to be a speech impediment. The most common issue with 'th' words here is people pronouncing it 'v' or 'f'- vem, vat, fought, frough, fink.

British meaning from the Isles. Rod Stewart does it in one of his songs, I forget which. Possibly the Celtic thing. It's quaint though.

Afrikaans-speakers have a problem with "th" as well.[/quote]

This post makes it look like Fall just loves the Scottish accent. I was going to invite myself down for a few days and talk and talk and talk and talk................

If it's a poshly accented bee it would also be snooty, one supposes.

My mum pronounces the letter j as "jaie" - rhymes with "eye". Think she got it off her mother who's from the Isle of Lewis.

I don't pronounce it like that, unless I'm reciting the alphabet. I don't remember my mum teaching me my ABCs but I guess this is evidence that she did.

All this offensive nonsense, by the way, about upper or lower class pronunciations and words, is what I dislike most heartily about England. You can't have a normal conversation without deciding whether to say "lounge" or "sitting room", lavatory or toilet, sofa or settee, lunch or dinner, and you thereby commit to a particular class and disdain all the other possibilities.

Maggie Smith is an actress that I like greatly, and I greatly enjoyed this conversation with her, Kenneth Williams, Michael Betjeman and Michael Parkinson. (On youtube recently, not when it came out! ) At 12.03 or so K Williams brings up a poem of Betjeman's that Maggie Smith particularly liked: "How to get on in society". Look it up, and all it is is an array of mantraps for the nouveaux riches; and its appeal is to those who can snigger because they know they wouldn't make those solecistic mistakes. They would use the correct upper class terminology, or, better, remain in their inferior class to which they so manifestly belong.

Every country has classes and they differ from one another, but no country that I know distinguishes so maddeningly and stupidly as this one.

I'm guessing "whar ats the shitter?" would be a dead giveaway.

I thought even the poorest, uneducated American called it the 'bathroom'.

(Even if it's just a toilet, which is quite annoying. )

laklak wrote:I'm guessing "whar ats the shitter?" would be a dead giveaway.

I think one would pretend one hadn't heard, and rapidly start a conversation on an entirely different topic.

Scarlett wrote:I thought even the poorest, uneducated American called it the 'bathroom'.

(Even if it's just a toilet, which is quite annoying. )

Silly, the bath is on the porch but we bring it into the kitchen when it's cold out. The shitter is outdoors, just down the path, next to the pile of old corncobs.

The corncobs are for when there's only shiny pages left in the Sears catalog.

laklak wrote:

Scarlett wrote:I thought even the poorest, uneducated American called it the 'bathroom'.

(Even if it's just a toilet, which is quite annoying. )

Silly, the bath is on the porch but we bring it into the kitchen when it's cold out. The shitter is outdoors, just down the path, next to the pile of old corncobs.

The corncobs are for when there's only shiny pages left in the Sears catalog.

Evolving wrote:

laklak wrote:I'm guessing "whar ats the shitter?" would be a dead giveaway.

I think one would pretend one hadn't heard, and rapidly start a conversation on an entirely different topic.

I don't think one would wish to continue a conversation with someone who asked "whar ats the shitter?" Wouldn't one simply point to outside and then send one's footman to escort the person off the premises?

I didn't say the conversation would be with this person.

Scarlett wrote:

Agrippina wrote:

Fallible wrote:

Agrippina wrote:I love the different ways the English pronounce words: "often" sometimes: "or-phen" other times "of-tin" we say "off-fen"

Most people here say 'offen' as well.

Then the "haitch" thing. We asked someone in York for directions and she told us it was next door to the "Haitch SBC" bank. Funny.

And what's with pronouncing the "g" at the end of words like "walking?"

It's only some people, and it's dependant on the regional accent. Southerners don't tend to do it, west midlanders and some northerners do, also some Welsh.

Which was why we found it odd. We'd only heard other people talking about its use, so it was strange to hear someone actually doing it.

Also some British people can't say "through" they say "true" instead. Rod Stewart does it.

My favourite British accent is Scottish. OMG I could listen to a Scot speaking forever. Love it.

I've never heard any British person not being able to say through. Some Irish people can't though. I'd say with a British person that's more likely to be a speech impediment. The most common issue with 'th' words here is people pronouncing it 'v' or 'f'- vem, vat, fought, frough, fink.

British meaning from the Isles. Rod Stewart does it in one of his songs, I forget which. Possibly the Celtic thing. It's quaint though.

Afrikaans-speakers have a problem with "th" as well.

This post makes it look like Fall just loves the Scottish accent. I was going to invite myself down for a few days and talk and talk and talk and talk................ [/quote]


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