Thank you for bringing this to light. I guess I'm a bit of an Anglophile, but since I've found my direct ancestral home land mentioned in the opening lines of Finnegans Wake, and since my grandmother spent her golden years in Dublin, Ireland.... not just Dublin Georgia, where she was born, I've felt a kinship and a longing for the homeland, and this document has given birth to some wonderful ideas and the wonderful sounds of the English Language that I will be able to share with my Daughter as well as others. Thanks again for putting this information up for those of us in the U.S. to digest. I had tears during most of this documentary. Us Yanks tend to think that we were the only ones who sacrificed in any of the wars of our century, it's so good to be reminded that others paid the price for freedom, and others were left to bring the boys back home.

After the first minute or so, I was unaware of the translator, just as I forget, moments into a movie with subtitles, that I am reading. The mind adjusts!

Well, thanks for putting it up, but it makes it unwatchable, and it's totally absurd in a programme about how people sounded.

No at at all true! People who can't hear are, perhaps even more interested, than the hearing, in the study of dialects and sounds of languages as they strive to better understand sound. I sure would be. Regarding your comment, please give it some more thought. If you were blind, wouldn't you want every opportunity to learn of the color red or blue? To me it's hardly unwatchable, but rather a brilliant and enlightening thing to see. Kudos to the signer and producers. I would also guess this documentary is part of a course of study in schools for the deaf!

Thanks for that explanation, man. Just a shame that the sign language guy was so annoying.

Oh no! That's so sad! I remember seeing this documentary years ago and being fascinated! I found her knowledge and passion for her subject to be so impressive! I was so glad to find the documentary on YT and her death is a real loss to the field in which she worked. Had no idea she was married to Richard E. Grant either. RIP Joan and thank you for passing on just a small part of your treasury of knowledge on a little known subject.

Peace and strength in our Lord.

Thank you Claire. The same happenstance for me, right now. God bless Joan.....a truly amazing woman, that has gifted us all a strong strand to our incredible past.

So sad to hear that. As you, I have stumbled on this documentary.

Someone really needs to write her a Wikipedia page.

Pundy Amazing!!!!:) you're done a great service.

A lot of Brits have mixed accents, my mum came from Cambridgeshire, and I lived there for the first eight years of my life, then we moved to Surrey, and were joined by my father who came from Gloucestershire. I now live in Wiltshire, but I don't think I have an accent; but on holiday in the USA, a man standing behind me in Yellowstone Park, said "Bristol," which astounded me, it's about 30 miles away! Took a Yank to spot it.

I want to record my parents, each telling tale of how they fell in love..

@@lesleyhawes6895 Brizzel!

this good idea I lost my grandmother record I feel bad

RiP

Really? She really seemed very lovely indeed. RIP

You should contact the lady who made this doco.

Kiitos!

He lives through you

🙏🙏💕

My uncle had a breakdown through fear as he was forced into the army. He never recovered and became psychotic. His father beat him for weakness. He died at 56, he was so sweet and clever and lived his life in a mental institution. It hurts, he was a lovely man. Here we are once again at war.... do we never learn ✌

my ancestors came from Cornwall and always wondered if they sounded british

@@deanawade5878 your Cornish ancestors, if you go back far enough, would likely have spoken the Cornish language.

Like how the Queen speaks

Everyone was certainly more articulate. I love reading Dickens, too. English was beautiful, then. You could insult someone with the most eloquent words!

I would love to hear that. I love these country accents in England. They are so comfortable-sounding.

I've lived away from the south for decades, but my accent comes back for the same reasons as hers.

Very interesting

I have a rather uninteresting accent that is close to standard received English when I am working or amongst strangers. As soon as I am amongst friends and relatives, my centre Leeds accent floods back. Few, even local people, can place the city centre Leeds accent, it has a hint of the city posh underpinned by the Yorkshire U hard vowel and a down the nose adenoidal sound. Its a bit as though I am ''putting it on'. It is very much an accent of commerce trying to step up. People rarely realise it is an accent not an affectation.

@@toforgetisagem8145 Received English is the synthetic accent. It was developed in Court by nobles to differentiate themselves from the common classes during the Early Victorian Era. If you listen to Original Pronunciation Shakespeare it is a very different thing than the usual high-flown eloquence of the usual performance. Romeo and his mates really do sound rather more like an East End gang of toughs roaming the streets. Hamlet sounds like a West Virginia "hillbilly". I've heard the Leeds accent, but it has been a very long time. Now I shall have to review it.

@@natfoote4967 I am well aware that Shakespeare's English is said to sounded more USA than modern English. English. It's not quite true. USA accent probably sounds more like Elizabethan English. Wordsworth's water rhymed with matter. My work voice is clear and clipped a bit like a relaxed BBC announcer of the late 1970's it is not particularly attractive. As you would expect Leeds has several varieties of accents. You can sometimes hear the centre of Leeds accents in the locally born office workers and some solicitors and city workers like bar staff. I think it maybe dying out a bit because of foreign influences. Mine comes from the Harehills area towards town. To hear it you might have to listen to older white people from that area. Some nurses at St James and LGI have it. Certainly there are psychiatric nurses at Beckling centre and other units in to the city centre have it know they have an accent like mine because I can't hear an accent! I think it might be an accent influenced by commerce, retail and engineering.

Indeed, and I find this rather sad.😊

Cockneys already weren't speaking like they ough'a. Language constantly changes

Same as my Grandmother who spoke english with a light scottish accent. Her sister born in 1874 did the same. Their diction was very clear and it impressed me as a child.

As an Asian I did notice that English speaking people are sounding more American and it saddens me. I love British shows and occasionally there's an American accent from an American and it spoils the flow.

What's wrong with American accents? All accents are interesting?

Why is a flat landscape like Norfolk productive of a monotone and a hilly landscape like S. Wales: the absolute reverse? How come? Which is the tougher landscape to live in? Which landscape makes humans happier? Post war, could this impact upon planning and house prices? Wonderful to hear Shackleton and Pankhurst, and some locals from WW1

Hahaha trust me 🤣

I saw a very old American show that did exactly that (on KZfaq)

There is actually a KZfaq video of a girl who does it as a party trick and she does something like 20 different English accents it's pretty cool

Great idea

Bet she can’t do the difference between Blackburn and Darwen, Lancashire. They say Darron and we say Darrwon. It’s quite différant (or was 20 years ago when people actually met other people all the time spending time in pubs, clubs and fields etc. Btw, it’s 4 miles from centre to centre by road and 3 miles by train.

Maybe he was having them on by doing the wrong accent, his little rebellion like when he nicked the bread rolls ! 😅

@@janehendry-webb1944 And they had spent a long time with other lads, different accents make you speak differently its still like that in the military now... in the Navy anyway its a huge melting pot of class, brilliant.

And maybe they worried if they didn't sound "educated" they would be killed!

@@SR-ol6xm Correct. and modern communication, and travel, spreads the changes. While on a 2 week sales meeting 20 yrs ago, sales staff from most large cities ,were gathered close together, during work and in the evenings. By the events ending, we all admitted that we had all picked up the SCOUSE Reps accent the most.

@@almister 😂 that's what I actually thought then I read your comment eee funny comment that was you made Me laugh thanks.

American Natives

Indeed. So much better than tedious subtitles, eh? You get to see a large image of a man, signing furiously, drawing attention away from the subject matter. Brilliant!

@@Bhatt_Hole I suppose it can get on one’s nerves after a while.

@@michaelmaselly9164 No, Michael, this is British Sign Language. It is an indigenous language of the UK, grown since at least medieval times. Most countries have their own developed sign language, except countries where deaf people have been isolated amongst hearing people.

Also, quite pointless in a study of how people sound.

I would agree wholeheartedly, and place a particular stress on the proverbial telly. Accents, wherever or whenever, come about historically by local communication, geography, and outer influences such as (unfortunately) wars and migratory flow. It's extremely hard to express regional accents in the written form; because language is oral- it's all about SOUNDS, added to which are rises and dips. A fascinating study in human communication. You might want to look up "The Story of the English Language"- a series on that precise subject that came out in the seventies I believe, and covered the subject of English spoken across the earth and through the ages. Highly recommendable. Please forgive me if you already know this series. Best regards.

It's a shame accents have all but disappeared in the USA. The "Southern Accent" is gone & we wont hear it once people over 43 are dead.

Same in the US. There was so much variety when I was under ten, fifty five± years ago.

@@diane9247 The average young men and women from Louisiana Arkansas Tennessee Virginia NC Georgia and Texas talk with a Tom Brokaw type accent. It's shocking to hear individuals under 27/28 yrs old from the "Deep South" talk like someone from Pennsylvania.

@@etherealcatholic5711 Right, it's a nation of newscasters! 😮 A southern accent I really miss hearing is New Orleans, which has a certain elegance and sometimes a slight North Eastern flair. As for micro-regional accents, the Upper Mission Dist. of San Francisco sounded Brooklyn-ish until about the late '60s. It can still be heard among the elderly. (In that case it's about a change in immigrant groups.)

yes, clearly you are.

No you are not. I have a hard time imagining that. btw, What's a jordi(?) accent?

pair of assholes here guys

Ron Jitter Why are they assholes for wondering?

jfhow Geordie accent is the accent spoken in and around Newcastle

I loved it when she said that Shackleton didn't have much of an accent, simply because his was close to her own very posh (to my ears) southern, middle class accent.

It's possible that she doesn't consider her 'RP' accent a proper regional accent.

❤️👍

Yes there is hope. For me, one of the heroes of this clip is an old German gentleman from the start, who upon the discovery of voice recordings wanted to make a world archive of languages, the way they were spoken then. Oh, and by the way, greetings from Beograd, sa Slavije :-)

@@quirkessence9446Pozdrav, brate i sunarodniče! I am glad that I am not the only Serb who is interested in old sound recordings. I feared that, after the death of Milan Milovanović, only two or three of us are left alive.

As The only Englishman speaking English on the show he kind of has a point

@@ludovica8221 so English his grandfather had to change their family surname from Battenburg to Windsor, just in case anyone had any doubts.

Idiotic if you ask me. She sounds like she's got a golden egg 🥚in her gob

@@andyjarman4958 No it was changed from Saxe-Coburg (the family of Prince Albert) to Windsor in 1917 because of anti-German sentiment in WWI. Three days earlier the Battenburg family resident in England changed their name to Mountbatten for the same reason. Thus the title of Prince Philip's mother Princess Alice of Battenburg became Mountbatten, a name that Philip himself adopted in 1947 (though strictly he was a Schleswig-Holstein- Sonderburg-Glücksburg). Thus some members of the Royal Family are entitled to use the surname Mountbatten-Windsor, though the official name of the family is Windsor.

@@andyjarman4958 I thought they changed from Saxe-Coburg-Gotha.

The stories he must have told! You don't have any recordings of him by any chance?

@@VNExperience no sorry, he rarely spoke, he wasn't unfriendly but he and his wife just got on with thing's, he was a painter and decorator working for himself and didn't retire till he was 75, he always wore a flat cap, navy 40s style suit and studded collar shirt and tie, shiny black lace up boot's, smoked 12.5 grams of tobacco every day of his life. Never ever swore and spoke with a edwardian london accent, I never knew his first name, just granddad and grandmother

@@roberthayes9842 He was fortunate to have been born at a time when the technological revolution had kicked off and changed our way of life at an incredible rate. From telegrams and horse-drawn carriages to computers, TV and voyages to the moon. I wonder what stories we will be able tell our grandchildren's generation if we get to live a long life and remain sharp.

@@VNExperience haha I'm nearly dead my friend, I do wonder about flying cars, the eradication of cancer and heart problems, genetic birth defects, fortunately I won't be here to see the future as within 50 year's food, water and rising sea levels will possibly be the beginning of the end of us, sorry to be pessimistic, so I think my great grandfather father may have seen the best of time, who really knows

@@roberthayes9842 We have not evolved to solve problems as big as climate change and water scarcity, everything stemming from unbridled population growth. Alas, I share your sentiment. But no matter how messed up things are 50 years from now, there will be a campfire somewhere where stories are told of excess and greed.

There are many youtubers much better than her.

@@keptins can you name them ?

I wish you strength and courage. There are no words for your loss.

I can't even imagine how you find the strength to carry on after the loss of a child. Although with others depending on you and loving you, there isn't a choice. The only words I think of at times of loss for someone, is to remind them that their loved one has gone to a world infinitely better than this one. God bless!

❤️❤️❤️❤️

♥️Please listen to those tapes ! 🙏🏻♥️

The death of a child has been described as a mortal wound from which you do not die. I can quite understand why you cannot yet listen to those recordings I would be exactly the same, don't let anyone rush you do it in your own time or not at all if it's just too upsetting. Sincere condolences for your loss.

❤️❤️

My heart goes out to you.

I too am from the old country of Germany and I ll comment on the minstrels of the Europeon ancestry that had to leave their homes,lands andjust bring with them the tools of their trades. Alpng The Homestead and Oregon trails families after hauling thwir menial prized possessions with them to the New World were forced to leave them behind on the trails. Whatever happened to all those old marvelous machines that they painstakingly loaded so they as craftsman could start all over once they attained a settlement to rebuild their once stable lives? Who were the miners and pickers who aquired their precious tools of their trades? Dod anyone ever wonder?

@@shirleyfunte3063 I’ve not been able to stop my sobs either. My family are from all over the uk so itmakes less sense that I’d cry. Very moving watching the family members listen along and what a gorgeous gift from this presenter ❤️ I understand it, sending you a hug. Be well 🌻 xxv

#Liza ❤️ I’ve not been able to stop my sobs either. My family are from all over the uk so itmakes less sense that I’d cry. Very moving watching the family members listen along and what a gorgeous gift from this presenter ❤️ I understand it, sending you a hug. Be well 🌻 xxv

My Grandmother was born in Kilmarnock 1886 died in Boston, MA 1973 when we were out of the house my Grandmother had no accent at all, but the minute she was around other Scots she would just sing! makes my heart 💔 to think she suppressed her speech out fear of sounding foreign. Miss her today.

@@jeanwinders9556 I'm American and I was traveling in Canada and I stayed at a hostel where there were Canadians and a Scotsman. I noticed that the Scotsman was stiff and formal when he spoke to me & his English was typically British, if you will, but when I said that I think that Scotland should have its freedom and I am for freedom for All nations, he switched into a Scottish accent which hed been using with the Canadians & which I could understand completely and it was so lovely. AND THEN I thought of the power of language and WHAT people DO TO BE accepted or fit in or to avoid censure you from a snobby person. WHICH brings to my mind my doctor's appointment here in Texas yesterday-- the doctor was Asian and she spoke with a strong Texan accent which seemed so incongruous with her face and her body language which was NOT Texan BUT much MORE Asian. IN time she realised I had NO Texan accent and so I must be from elsewhere and she relaxed into a type of English similar to what I was speaking-- which is sort of considered Standard English that you hear on the radio or TV-- & again I thought of the POWER of language and HOW people try to reflect the accent used by the persons they associate with, even if it means suppressing their own true way of speaking and feeling. AS Shakespeare would say: THAT IS THE RUB. BECAUSE language and HOW we use it, contains feelings and if we cannot use language the way we want to, THAT means THAT our feelings are bottled up; repressed; & suppressed; making us feel oppressed, if you will. IT occurs to me that with the removal of local accents you have removed the feelings that were embedded in those accents and that is where our sadness comes from. I think the relatives-- that heard their ancestor from 90 years ago speak-- were sad because he was gone BUT also BECAUSE of the lost of the feelings embedded in the type of accent that he used so very naturally AND THAT THEY NO LONGER used and SO NO LONGER had access to the feelings of this long gone soul and his generation, albeit they shared the same bloodline.

My mum was Glaswegian moved to Liverpool lived here for over 40 years and never lost her accent.

@@alice-rm5hgyou only lose ye accent if ye want to

My dad was born in 1896, so Victorian, fought in, and survived WW1, trained soldier's in the Transport units of WW2. I was born in 1941, so, although he has now departed, we two linked 3 centuries.

@@MrDaiseymay wow born so early. Any stories or vivid memories?

I as thinking that too. As a child I was surrounded by Victorians and Edwardians. Now they are mostly gone.

Agreed

Frances Van Siclen War. What is it good for? Absolutely nothing.

War is neccessary to further enrich the already rich and the tools required to do so are the ready supply of people.

Spot on. So many young lives lost to make others rich🤮

Now those same people have co-opted nearly every government in the world into a third war. An unconventional war against us the people.

@@daevaskye Small Hats are causing so many problems.

Lovely comment! 🙂

Beautifully expressed.

I wonder how many of these guys were doing a 'telephone voice' (ie a bit posher) when they were being recorded.

What a lovely comment and beautifully put. I couldn't agree with you more. I feel very emotional watching this programme.

@@mesolithicman164 I wonder how many men would have had access to a telephone back in the UK. Not that many, I'm guessing

I loved the lovely put togetherness of that man and how he so resembled his father.

youtube lol

​@@8ballphil150That all you picked up from their comment which is actually a tribute to Joan the presenter

No, not one of the best Documentaries on You Tube…. Do look, and you’ll see countless better ones, however, this is fun to watch. A strange one, is the conversation with Quentin Crisp, back in the seventies. It’s all out there, and quite extraordinary!

Very unusual for someone from that area to think they are accentless and we are far more self deprecating about it too. I'm from the other side of the Cat and Fiddle to Macclesfield in Derbyshire and we are accutely aware of our terrible rural dialects. I do like some dialects, Gloucestershire for one. But North Midlands, my own, not one of the better ones.

stewart fearn Yet they have one of the heaviest accents of all lol.

I don't think I have an accent, I just speak normally. It is everyone else who has an accent.

Oxford vs Oxfordshire

Yep, mass media in general were a big leveller of dialectal differences, beginning with literacy and the general reading of orthographically standardised texts like prayer books and newspapers.

@@muenzfernsprecher Interesting never considered that before.

pomosapiens thank you for taking time to explain your experience 😊 there’s a lot of ignorant people here!

pomosapiens May I ask what caused the deafness. To have normal hearing then to lose it suddenly at a an age where life is beginning to become challenging must have been extremely difficult to deal with. I’m guessing you had good family support at least I hope so.

Do regional accents make it harder to read lips? I'm from the US and we have varying accents much like the UK.

pomosapiens Thank you for taking the time to explain. It makes sense now.

@@bugler75 HOw ignorant of us. I didnt know they could sign accents

There is no such place as the 'British isles'

@@andrewgoodbody2121 The British Isles are a group of islands in the North Atlantic Ocean off the north-western coast of continental Europe, consisting of the islands of Great Britain, Ireland, the Isle of Man, the Inner and Outer Hebrides, the Northern Isles (Orkney and Shetland), and over six thousand smaller islands. They have a total area of 315,159 km2 (121,684 sq mi) and a combined population of almost 72 million, and include two sovereign states, the Republic of Ireland (which covers roughly five-sixths of Ireland), and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. The Channel Islands, off the north coast of France, are normally taken to be part of the British Isles, even though they do not form part of the archipelago.

Thanks for sharing this

I’m trying to work out where Joan Washington comes from.

I don't doubt that she's quite an expert accent coach. But this American is struck by how she speaks (in her normal voice) with a locked jaw! How very British!

During the film, when she was interviewing in Scotland, I believe she stated she grew up in Aberdeen.

Were you playing the role of Quentin?

Same thing happened with me and wolverhampton the other day

It's astounding to me that there are people who are NOT distracted by the signer !! Let me come over to your flat and stand at the corner of your TV and wildly gesticulate as you try to watch. It would be a different story if the subject was different. I'm not in the habit of laughing at people with disabilities, having one myself, but this was absurd.

My favorite part as well. "Don't look in my orifice!"

I had to drape a cloth over the part of my iPad where he was because he was so distracting. But I have a sister who is deaf so I know how essential sign language is to someone with that disability. Seeing the interpreter is a minor inconvenience for a hearing person.

I don't own an hotel, but you would be welcome at my table any day Sir!

It’s a shame she did not move 30 miles inland and listen to the folk speaking “”teuchter”. Much softer accent with a multitude of unique words and sounds. Lovely accent that can be very difficult to understand if your are not from the area.

(Being german): Could they have found anybody with a more stereotypical (bad) german accent?

@@mediagirl Sein Englisch war ziemlich schlecht für eine studierten Menschen.

Less than that i'd say. I grew up in Warwickshire and my accent was different to where i went to school in Nuneaton. My school was 4 or so miles away.

Thatreettheer

@@naturalbornchiller158 I roughly think its 10 miles. But the town 6 miles from me have a different accent. So it could be as little as 5 miles...

Much less than that in parts. Where I live there are three accents within a 3 mile radius; if I went ten miles north, I'd cross an accent zone and be in another!

@@naturalbornchiller158 agreed there. I was born in Coventry, spent my early and mid teens near Birmingham and my parents live in Nuneaton. I now live in Lincolnshire and have done for about 15years. I can Definately say Coventry and Birmingham have little in common. Similar elongation on certain syllables but the Coventry accent is faster with its speech patterns and much more nasel then Birmingham. Nuneaton is like a countrified Birmingham. Lincolnshire to my ears is a diet coke version of East yorkshire. Im a magpie for picking up accents once I've been there long enough (doesn't take long though. Lol). So I guess my accent is a bit of a mongrel nowadays. Lol

Wonderful comment 10/10

Well said.

A beautiful, beautiful comment, that needed to be written. Thank you so much. 💖

Bravo, well put! This should be a highlighted comment! Somebody at last with something sensible to say and intelligently and coherently expressed! I was beginning to believe such commentators didn't exist! 😄

Well said

Yes, a real loss. I wish she had made more as this is one of the most interesting programmes I've ever seen.

When he was promoting his new book about Joan I tweeted to him about how much I love this program and how I'd always hoped it would spawn a series.. He sent me a very heartfelt and sweet reply.. Such a lovely man. He was crazy in love with her, and I can totally see why

My exact thought! 👍

Its so true though

Neither have I. I'm wondering if there is any truth to this.

The Orcadian writer George Mackay Brown mentions this in one of his short stories (can’t remember which one!)

Barry Poupard This is very obvious inIreland. Midland accents are very flat as is the landscape but in cork with many hills, the accent is very sing-song

How and who organises battlefield visits? I would like to visit.

Bless you for visiting...and not forgetting.

This generation will have very little photos of this time since pics are on ph. not developed into film.

It's just the same with the industrial Midlands (Black Country), great variation with just a small distance.

Once Rome had conquered the known world and had it all unified by one Speech LATIN. Then the classical World fell, and a multiplicity of dialects evolved into separate tongues. With the threat of worldwide global Conflict, fueled by escalating Terrorism, it could conceivably happen again, in all parts of the world with their own unifying mode of communication in each region of the globe breaking down into conflicting babble talk, as in the Biblical Story of The Tower of Babel. But then, it may not, God willing. With cell phones, computers, and libraries, hopefully, every possible dialect will be preserved like every species of animal on Noah's Ark!

I'll never forget attending an AA meeting in Edinburgh decades ago. I could not understand someone talking and it was explained to me that they were from the Outer Hebrides - it seems everyone else there had no difficulty. As an American, I was bemused that they had no trouble knowing exactly what I said. 🤗

I grew up in Liverpool and it's amazing how many different accents there are within the city.

Thank you!

You're brilliant thank you so much!

52.07 Christabel Pankhurst-Suffragette. 53.34 Sir Ernest Shackleton-Great Antarctic explorer.

I live in South Somerset on the borders of Dorset but I am from London/Surrey. Difficult to distinguish South Somerset dialect with North Dorset.

Jarvis *

sassulusmagnus - Here in Holland, we have dozens of very distinct accents in a very small area and the landscape everywhere is exactly the same: COMPLETELY FLAT. So much for the landscape theory. Not only regions, but inner-city, suburbs, countryside, and, of course, working class, middle class, upper class, etc., with subtle or not so subtle variations within each. What's funny is that the pompous upper crust accent in Holland shares with that in England in that speakers of each sound like they are speaking with a hot potato in their mouth.

I thought that was fascinating, how the landscape could potential he affect an accent!

@HerrNilssonTheMonkey I don't see the correlation. What's wrong or imprecise about the gentleman's comment? The fine language expert herself voiced those very words. I think you ought to take an extensive course in geography and especially in linguistics. A very piteous remark of yours, indeed.

@@virvisquevir3320 That's probably because they walk around with hot potatoes in their mouths, but feel they have to talk all the time. Mind you, the Eastenders of London loved their steaming hot chips, while doing their Cockney Rhyming Slang- a gem in it's own.

@Nim Boo A very coherent and logical approach have you Sir. We are a mixture of frailties at all times, and are also subject to the influence of outer circumstances, which are a myriad of possibilities, accidents, and circumstances of all sorts.

I wish someone in our generation can talk like her , she seems like she has a wonderful accent

The fact I read this with an accent

Love your grandmothers observation! .. she sounds just like my own dear granny did all those many years ago!

Brilliant!

Stumble? The KZfaq algorithms are rubbing their hands in glee!

The say that the Cockney accent will disappear in a few years time.

I am from Louisiana and I feel the same. There are so many unique accents some so distinct but only 30 mins apart in geography. As the world becomes more global the more we lose these community identities without really gaining the “global one”.

@@Bambisgf77 interesting that you said that. Here in the UK it’s said that accents go in 15 mile bands. But then again, the UK is much smaller than the US but more densely packed per square mile.

I wonder why that is.

@@tamaliaalisjahbana9354 - Me too!

Because we are the centre of western civilisation

@@hoggarththewisesmeagol8362 Ah, a very British response

Here in Darlington we are not Geordies, Teessiders, Yorkies, or Pennine people, but we speak completely differently from all of them, & also from places as little as 4 miles away. I can identify dialect boundaries up river, down river, & up county in all directions.

RedTango but really. Somebody signing during a documentary about accents?

I dont waste time and energy worrying about stuff like that. Many deaf people can hear a little bit, and the study of language and accents may be of interest to them, as they probably one day hope they would be able to hear better and be able to interpret different accents. I would think if one of the most important human functions is missing in whole or in part by someone, it would be of great interest to them to study it-in this case, speech. I think it's great, actually, that deaf people take an interest in this. Good for them.

+The Phantom "First, did you just refer to videos online as a miracle?? Odd." You must be very young if you do take it for granted.

+The Phantom Are you kidding? ain't it? The whole internet is the miracle. Ask and get an answer, the magic crystal sphere. Not perfect, but hey, isn't that amazing?

Right, don't bitch about something that RUINS the fucking show; do you get it?

That is beyond an incredible story - i would love to know the recollection of Hardy - my God the quintessential Victorian novelist and one I had alwys focused on.

@@writeract2 I was a huge fan too and studied him at University.

@@maggiefollett636 what's your favorite work of his?

@@writeract2 It's so hard to say. The more popular works I've read so many times, but I think, perhaps, "The Mayor of Casterbridge", and a more obscure work I first read only two years ago, "The Woodlanders". (I did a mini-thesis on "The Return of the Native" at UCT a gazillion years ago, but cannot recall the book at all. Will definitely rectify this.) Thanks for the chat. Hardy is all about hubris, fatal character flaws, and dark synchronicities, which are so much part of life.

@@maggiefollett636 I've only read his poetry which I love (he considered himself more of a poet than noveliest but his novels fared better), I've yet to tackle the novels but I know I will get through all or most one day. Jude The Obscure is a major one, also Tess of the D'ubervilles. I watched Barchester Chronicles BBC adaptation - - not bad. If hubris and human character flaws major themes, that would be interesting for me.

Not forgotten as long as people read books like Testament of Youth by Vera Brittain.

My great grandfather was taken prisoner at Cambrai in 1917 serving with the London Rifle Brigade. He was held in two different camps in Westphalia. The prisoners were gradually starved by the Germans (who themselves had little or no food due to the blockade of their seaports by the Royal Navy) and a Russian prisoner kicked my GGF's teeth out when he bent down to pick up a biscuit thrown down by a guard.

Yes they done genetic testing of the Shetland islanders and they had more Nordic genealogy than Celtic. Considering the next islands are the Faroe Islands who are of Scandinavian stock it’s hardly surprising. I heard the Shetland people want independence from Scotland and I’m not surprised.

I can distinguish between Essex accents in the various Essex towns.

I'm from Blackburn spent a lot of my life in Accy and I think a pakistani accent is more common from here these days.. Bye bye England

"had their own language called NORN which has disappeared now" - A dozen years ago I made several trips to the Shetland Isles and stayed for one night with an older lady who spoke to me in English, with a Scottish accent, but at one point she called her son on the phone and conversed with him in a Nordic-sounding language, which I could not follow.

I was born and brought up in Flixton South Manchester. When I was 19 I worked as an AA Patrol on the East Lancs Road opposite Haydock race course. I worked with a man called Fred Gillbanks who was from Leigh. Every evening he would say to me " Arn't not bin gang whoam la". It took a while to understand what he was saying.

Most of these are extinct or watered down now because of the promotion of BBC English

My Auntie has lived in Boston for 50yrs...I love her Boston twang 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿💕🇺🇲

I think also the widespread ability to travel and to watch the same media globally has started to melt accents together. I know when my Canadian kid watched Peppa Pig he started to pronounce "ruler" with a British accent. 😂

Great idea! Pretending you're blind, instead if being forced to pretend you're deaf. Malicious compliance in its rawest form. Respect.

Yes, we need an analysis of US and Canadian regional accents before they are all gone.

Some of the accents in the USA, maybe around Virginia or towards the south, are supposed to be close derivatives of the British settlers' dialects at the time. There is a little bit of linguistic history in them thar hills.

That reminds me of when I first heard yall comm bak now yehere... I dutifully walked back to ask why I had to go back 😆🤣 I thought I'd forgotten to pay the bill 😃😄😂

as someone with a mancunian accent I'm sure the accent of you're parents generation was actually awful

We have all this round here,east and north of Bristol on the farms. I couldn't understand the farmers when I 1st moved here 15 years ago. . V few of them left as all about to croak and the younguns don't want to go into farming, what with all the cow prejudice and other difficulties. There is also the BBC which is v prejudiced agai at the west country accent from Birmingham onwards. What a shame we can't have a couple more episodes? Ms Washington introduced a fascinating subject.

I totally agree even in this country we don't have as many different accents but they're going away to you know the Brooklyn accent that you see an old movies doesn't exist anymore if it ever did yes I hate to see them going away

So your grandmother was 98 AT what age did she actually die?

@@ladybug5859 No she wasn`t. 1907 to 1995 is 88 years. She died at 91 years old.

I'm from Sheffield and my grandad was born just outside Barnsley our accents are totally different. I love all our Yorkshire accents it's so fun to go a few miles up the road and hear people talking in a foreign language lol

gusjudge but you have such a rich library of accents!

There are so many accents, its amazing really.

gusjudge Me too! Greetings from south Texas😃

This program of course is UK focused. However Americans were taken prisoner in WW1 AND the German said they had around 1K recordings. Be interesting to know if they had any Americans or if it was so late in the War that we got involved they had stopped doing them.

gusjudge - I love the different American accents! My favourite is the New York/New Jersey. The way that Joe Pesci speaks. I could listen to it all day! I also like the African American accent - like Eddy Murphy!

Jojo Sagewitch i'm with you except there is no need for the guy waving the hands All BBC programmes of an optional subtitle which can be turned on and off This is getting more and more out of hand many programs going out now with these guys were getting closer to the middle of the screen all the time

David Pickering theres a hand signing for every language

Sign Languages are the natural languages of Deaf people. Subtitles, being a ( in English, a very poor) transcription of spoken language are difficult for Deaf people to read in real time. Objecting to the signer is like Deaf people objecting to dull thud of the sound track.

Hugh7777 the signer is pretty damn amazing at his job as well. it must be incredibly difficult to translate and keep up like that. very impressive. and fun to see which words you can pick up on. also its just ignorant and selfish to whine about being distracted by other humans most natural communication method.

Jojo Sagewitch You have explained yourself well as to why nobody should take offence over the visual obstruction or interference caused by the signer pledged to affording the hearing impaired with the same opportunities to enjoy a tele show. Do not take offence however with those of us who disagree completely and entirely with you, for, you see, we have the right to offer the contrarian view: we have the right to watch on the tele an educational programme unhindered by a coercive philosophy that we somehow owe the "hearing impaired" "equal time" at our personal expense...paticularly when we are required to pay licensing fees to the BBC, which now seeks to act as a type of moral police.