"RP speakers are perceived, as soon as they start speaking, as haughty and unfriendly unless and until they are able to demonstrate the contrary." - "guilty until proven innocent"
Children with working class accents are evaluated by some listeners, including teachers, as having less educational potenial than those with middle class accents - unless they can demonstrate the opposite.
Norwich study
1970s
Studied the final consonant in words like walking, running. In standard British English, -ng is pronounced nasally, but in Norwich the words are pronounced walkin' and runnin' like the word just ends in "n".
Not unique to Norwich - "Nearly everywhere in the English speaking world we find this alternation between formal "ng" and informal "n"."
Goes back to Old English where it used to be fashionable to drop the "g", but no longer is.
1. In all social classes, the more careful the speech, the more likely people were to say walking rather than walkin.
2. The proportion of walkin type forms was higher in lower social classes.
3. The nonstandard -n' forms occurred much more often in mens speech
4. Women perceived themselves to use -ng but actually seemed to use -n'
5. Men the opposite - perceived to use -n' but actually seemed to use -ng
Children with working class accents are evaluated by some listeners, including teachers, as having less educational potenial than those with middle class accents - unless they can demonstrate the opposite.
Norwich study
1970s
Studied the final consonant in words like walking, running. In standard British English, -ng is pronounced nasally, but in Norwich the words are pronounced walkin' and runnin' like the word just ends in "n".
Not unique to Norwich - "Nearly everywhere in the English speaking world we find this alternation between formal "ng" and informal "n"."
Goes back to Old English where it used to be fashionable to drop the "g", but no longer is.
1. In all social classes, the more careful the speech, the more likely people were to say walking rather than walkin.
2. The proportion of walkin type forms was higher in lower social classes.
3. The nonstandard -n' forms occurred much more often in mens speech
4. Women perceived themselves to use -ng but actually seemed to use -n'
5. Men the opposite - perceived to use -n' but actually seemed to use -ng
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