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LadyEllen -> RE: In Arizona (11/10/2006 2:42:26 AM)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: MasterKalif
quote:
ORIGINAL: LadyEllen
and they're English as in proper English , chromosomes here since year zero English!
"I's goin" (I'm going)
"We am" (we are)
etc
E
Lady Ellen, when you stated "I's goin" it reminded me of the fake rapper Ali G (also known as Borat and as Bruno)...yes quite brilliant and funny actually. By the way what is your opinion on the so-called 'cockney' accent over there? When I lived in Britain as a teenager, I couldn't understand a word when I came across peple who spoke like that....
There is a real cockney accent - it happens to drive me crazy to be honest; in fact the whole cockney thing for some reason makes me want to offer the east end of London to North Korea for nuclear testing. Basically, you're a cockney if you're born within earshot of Bow bells - the peal of a church in the vicinity. I have no problem understanding it, but damn it just annoys me for some reason!
Then we have the mockney accent; this is where young people in particular, ape the accent, no matter where they live, because on some incomprehensible grounds they seem to think its cool. Ali G is a case in point - Sacha Baron Cohen (the actor who plays Ali and Borat et al) is doing exactly that as part of the character. Ali is from Slough on the western fringes of London; now to those overseas and those in the rest of the UK, there might not be much of a difference between a Slough and east end London accent, but for those of us interested in such things, there is.
My son does it too a little. He wont say water with the pronunication war-tur like the rest of us, favouring instead the glottal stop of eastend London with the pronunication war-ur. We live 150 miles from the east end and have our own peculiar accent, but it seems this mockney thing gets everywhere. 150 miles isnt a lot in US terms I realise, but here in England the accent changes every 10 miles.
Now throw in bad grammar on top of the mockney accent and one has a recipe for many clips around the head for my son (and my 15 year old sister too!). The problem with it really is, that it makes the speaker sound like a half wit - albeit that being a half wit is something to be aspired to and idealised here for the last decade or so. Without being racist, I'm afraid much of the impetus towards all this has come from rap music and especially the uber-cool status of black rap culture in the UK; the urban youth of Britain are now rebelling through that medium, seeing their lives in the same terms as the genuinely prejudiced circumstances of young black people living in Detroit for instance.
Hope that helps
E
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