The Orthoepic Norm

Varieties of English Pronunciation

The Orthoepic Norm

There exist numerous varieties of pronunciation in any language, the English language as well. The pronunciation of almost of every locality in the British Isles has peculiar features that distinguish it from the pronunciation of other localities. Besides, pr-n is socially influenced. It reflects class distinctions, education and upbringing. The varieties that are spoken by a socially limited number of people and used only in certain localities are called dialects. There are therefore local dialects & social dialects. All these varieties have much more in common. They are varieties of one & the same language, the English language.

Dialects have some peculiarities in pr-n, vocabulary and grammatical structure. Due to mass media (radio, TV, cinema), the increased mobility of the population, concentration of the population in the cities, the dialectal differences are becoming less marked. That, of course, does not mean the pr-n of a

Manchester dialect speaker does not differ from the pr-n of a London dialect speaker. Among the most well-known dialects one should mention Cockney (spoken by the less educated part of the Londoners), Cornish dialect (in Cornwall) & others.

Dialect speakers are, as a rule, the less educated part of the population. With the more educated people pr-n generally tends to conform to a particular standard. Dialects enrich the language & make it more lively & fresh.

In present – day English the number of local dialects is being reduced to fewer, more or less general, regional types. Every regional type of pr-n is characterized by features that are common to all the dialects used in the region. The regional types of pr-n, in their turn, are marked one from another by a number of peculiarities specific to each of them. British English phoneticians generally distinguish 3 main regional types of pr-n: Southern, Northern & Scottish regional types of English pr-n.

One of the types of pr-n, generally the one that is spoken by the educated people in the capital, is recognized as the orthoepic norm. The orthoepic norm of a language is the standard pr-n adopted by native speakers as the right & proper way of speaking. It is used by the most educated part of the population.

The orthoepic norm is based on the variants of pr-n that are widely used in actual speech, that reflect the main phonetic tendencies, & that are considered to be acceptable by the educated.

Since the orthoepic norm is ever changing & developing, from time to time the pronouncing dictionaries have to be revised & reset. E.g. in the (1937) edition of Everyman’s English Pronouncing Dictionary by D.Jones the pr-ns of the following words were indicated in such an order: “again” / ә'gein - ә' gen /, “national” - /næ әnәl, nәl, nl /. In the (1956) edition the order is reversed: “again” / ә'gen - ә' gein /, “national” - /næ әnl, nәl, nl, nl, әnәl /.

In connected speech the sound structures of words are modified under the influence of rhythm, tempo &utterance stress. But the pronouncing dictionaries do not and cannot reflect all these variants.