I've noticed over the past few years that the "younger" generation now seem to pronounce any word that ends in er or re with an a at the end, such as tenda (tender), centa (centre), ginga (ginger) etc. Is that classed as estuary English?

How young is "younger"? I have some colleagues in their late 20s - early 30s and I have not noticed that.

At my first trip in UK, I found myself in a noisy bar, and a half drunk guy started talking to me (saying my wife was beautiful actually).

I was so very proud to have held a conversation with this half drunk probably cockney in such an environment.
Then, once outside, my wife told me 'I thought you spoke better English, you had to make repeat every sentence'.
Grrrr.

On one of my last trips, I ordered water at Macnhester airport. The waiter came back with some "a 'er'".
I guessed rightly that it was my water.

Next time I'll order beer, easier to understand ;-)
Accents is what makes life interesting in my opinion. It would be so dull to all speak the same way.

There is only one accent I don't like : the one from the region I was born. I suppose we don't like to be spotted coming from here or there whilst we don't bother where the other one comes from.

Fyi, my accent is slightly less than French, some people even think I'm German. When I speak French however, 'they' always come up triomphant saying 'I knew you were Belgian !'
(why should I hide it).

>>I've noticed over the past few years that the "younger" generation now seem to pronounce any word that ends in er or re with an a at the end, such as tenda (tender), centa (centre), ginga (ginger) etc. Is that classed as estuary English?<<

I'm not up with the latest professional linguists' classifications, but I associate that slightly over-emphasised "ah" (rather than the standard RP neutral "schwa") with Essex and East London.

Round my way, there's a whole new accent incorporating various sounds from Caribbean and south Asian backgrounds as well. Things may have moved on a few years from the references and slang phrases in this clip, but it's that sort of thing (albeit parodied)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WPZ3bNdl6y4
Here's an interesting variety: the presenter/interviewer has a toned-down north-eastern accent, the rest are a variety of mostly south and east London accents:
https://youtu.be/o47qgPvXAyU?t=2070

Listen to Kate MIddleton on holiday with the girls

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tVlB...youtu.be&t=19s

:)

As an example, when this Lidl advert was on it used to annoy me intensely, at 0.30 the woman says "tenda" aarrrgh.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QTz4TuqPgQ4


Generally it seems to be young women that talk this way, when I was in Cyprus last year, we were seated next to a couple of English women (aged around 28ish), I've never heard so many A's on the end of words in my life, even the wife got annoyed by it and we ended up moving to another table.

what annoys me more are those who regularly pepper their speech with "she was like..." and 'he was like" and .. - well "you know" what I mean. that and the aussie-style upward inflection at the end of the sentence as if they are uncertain about what they are saying really gets my goat, like, you know?

>>>aussie-style upward inflection at the end of the sentence

Yes! that bothered me strongly when I was in Australia and I can't believe I am now hearing Americans do it also.

Tom - I'm convinced they do it just to annoy me.

The Queen's English is not an accent, but refers to a grammatically and idiomatically correct English, spoken in the Commonwealth, with whatever accent of the speaker. So, Gandhi spoke the Queen's English. The queen is of course queen Victoria.

Received Pronunciation is an accent of the higher classes.

This is a tangent but I like and want to hear English people, especially middle class people in the "Home Counties" area, speaking like Mary Crawley on Downton Abbey. I like that this character's speech is so clearly enunciated and easy to understand, and it has no class overtones to me. That's what I expect to hear. So I was surprised to hear Michelle Dockery's normal speaking voice, less clear and frankly a bit sloppy in enunciation and with a touch of melody, by no means like Adele but not as pleasant on the ears.

>>it has no class overtones to me>>

That's interesting. I didn't think it has quite the class overtones it's intended to have, but they are there. It's crisp, clipped and somehow detached enough for an upper-crust young lady who wanted to be modern in the 1920s, but there's still something in the timbre of the voice that suggests something a bit more regional. On the other hand, nowadays a lot of middle to uppers have relaxed a lot more. You'll hear a fair few letting slip plenty of "gonnas" and the occasional "summink".

Not entirely sure what "summick" might mean, I found foreign language forums puzzling over the same thing:

http://dict.leo.org/forum/viewUnsolv...p=ende&lang=de

http://forum.wordreference.com/threads/summick.847567/

Outside of tiny enclaves in places like Boston or New York (perhaps, not really sure, it's completely unimportant nationally) there is no upper class American accent. There are regional accents that are strongest in working class and rural speakers and these gradate to a standard American dialect now spoken by some people everywhere. I guess one could call it the American RP since someone speaking it cannot be regionally identified. It has no posh connotation and seems to be taking over.

summick = something

I didn't think it has quite the class overtones it's intended to have, but they are there.>>

of course they are. anyone in the UK who does not speak the local patois is going to stand out. I heard Baroness Stockport i.e. Joan Bakewell on radio recently talking about how she quickly lost her northern accent when she got to Oxford, mostly as a matter of self-preservation - there were only a limited number of times that she could tolerate being looked down on because she said "Bath" not Barth".

in her case the local patois was the RP spoken by her fellow students; her northern accent marked her out as someone of the lower classes who was not to be taken seriously.

And after Liz it will be the King's English?

Funny some Kings of England only spoke German - that was the King's English for the early Geroge's?

I love all the various accents in the U.K. Especially those Cockney ones you hear at Petticoat Lane and markets.

In a History of American English class I once took it was said that the accent found in the hills of Kentucky and Tennessee - Hill Billies if you have it - was nearly the same as what the English hottie tots spoke when they first settled America- and being isolated in hollers, etc the Hill Billy English stagnated whilst the rest of the country's tongues evolved.

Funny some Kings of England only spoke German - that was the King's English for the early Geroge's?>>

when we went to Hannover [which was where the Georges came from] co-incidentally on the 300th anniversary of the accession of George I to the English throne in 1714, I recall being told that George I spoke little or no english but the rest of them spoke it well enough. Also that George II never went to Germany, but George III did, but perhaps only once. or vice versa. I forget.

it is interesting to note [or it is to me] that had only one of Queen Anne's 17 children lived beyond infancy, there would have been no Hannovarian kings, no Prinny and the Royal Pavilion, no Queen Victoria, no Kaiser Bill and possibly no WWI or WW2.

Accents vary hugely depending on which part of the UK you visit. Very few people speak like the Queen. Many people in London speak with a cockney accent, but you will struggle to find this accent outside of London. Each part of the country has a unique accent, with big differences over small distances.

I remember how thrilled I was the first time I went to London back in the 60's and heard someone say "wiv" instead of "with." The only time I'd ever come across "wiv" was in books--I think in Dickens novels.

Supposedly Tangier Island, Virginia, preserves Elizabethan English. I can't understand the younger men wearing feed caps.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AIZgw09CG9E