estuary english

the dialect spoken by many people from the south and south east of england, including parts of london, although c-ckney and received pr-nounciation (the queen’s english) are far more common.

received pr-nounciation can be heard in the same areas as estuary english, however rp tends to be spoken by the upper cl-sses while estuary english is spoken by the lower and working cl-ss.

estuary english is also far more common in younger people, with parents who have rp. so the decline in rp is likely to continue and be replaced with estuary.

many features of the estuary accent include:
– the broad a. this includes pr-nouncing words such as ‘fast > farst’ and ‘path > parth’

– regular glottal stops – this is not pr-nouncing the letter ‘t’ in most words. i.e water is pr-nounced war’er.

th-fronting – this is prouncing most words that start a ‘th’ with an f. i.e ‘three > free’, ‘think > fink’ and ‘north > norf’. if ‘th’ is in the middle of a word, it is usually replaced with a ‘v’. i.e ‘other > ovver’ ‘southern > sovvern’

l-vocalisation – this is not pr-nouncing the letter ‘l’ in certain words and tends to be ended with a ‘w’ sound instead. i.e ‘fall > faw’ and ‘milk > miwk’.

– h-dropping – not pr-nouncing the letter ‘h’ at the start of most words. i.e ‘here > ere’ and ‘hate > ate’

– g’s are also not pr-nounced at the end of words. ‘swimming > swimmin’

other things are included in the accent other than just the pr-nounciation. this includes double negatives and finishing a lot of sentances with questions even ifthey are not asking a question. i.e i didn’t mean to, did i? and ‘we should shouldn’t we?’
received pr-nounciation can be ‘eard in the same areas as estree inglish, owever rp tends te be spoken by the upper cl-rs-s while estuary english is spoken by the lower and workin clars.
an accent which is not considered rp or c-ckney.
it is somewhat in between the two and features bits of both accents in some way or another.
c-ckney & estuary: ‘will’ is pr-nounced ‘wiw’
rp & estuary: ‘hate’ is pr-nounced with the ‘h’ and the ‘t’.
estuary english: ‘hallway’ is pr-nounced ‘haaw-way’
a hybrid of recieved pr-nounciation(rp) and southern english esp. london and surrounds. the speakers know exactly how to say the words correctly but choose not to do so,to sound more street cred. quite often used by persons as yuppies, or song artists such as lily allen (who went to a public school) in “smile”
so mate, vere i wos wiv me bo”l (bottle) ov wa’er givin’ it some ov the owld rp when blah me dhan, the geezer were speakin estuary english like meself duz.