It is endlessly fascinating how words can develop and become part of conversations. I grew up in East Anglia, where phrases like, ‘set yourself down and have a mardle’, ‘he’s had a barney with someone’ and ‘have you seen that Bishey Barney Bee?’ were common. These are dialect words which belonged to the fabric of my early years. Sitting down and having a chat (still one of my favourite pastimes); he’s had a quarrel with someone; and asking if you have seen a Ladybird, are the non-dialect words from these Norfolk sayings.

As a voice and accent coach, I am sometimes asked to coach actors in a regional accent and this will usually involve learning dialect words, too as writers tend to use the regions they know well and throw in a fair smattering of local words into characters.

It’s a joy to discover new words, which sadly are not mainstream. West Country dialect – especially Bristolian – is another rich source of local words, such as ‘Ark at ‘ee’ (listen to him), ‘Where’s that to?’ (where is it?) and ‘Gert lush’ (lovely). The distinctive local accent also adds an ‘L’ to a final vowel at the end of a word, so you may hear ‘cinamel’ (cinema), ‘ariel’ (area) and even a ‘Toyotal Carinal’ (Toyota Carina).

Moving northwards to Manchester, you might be offered a ‘chuddy’ that you could keep in your ‘keks’ while you’re taking your car in to ‘get fettled’. In other words, ‘you might be offered some chewing gum that you can keep in your trousers while you’re taking your car to the garage to get mended’.

If you’re looking for someone to help you with an English accent, however, you need an accent coach. In the States, an accent coach is known as a dialect coach and this person takes care of the way words are pronounced. I help many of my clients to speak with a modern Received Pronunciation (RP), BBC English or Queen’s English accent.

The way vowels are used are one of the key ways to vary an accent and a misplaced vowel can be confusing to the listener. Consonant sounds are also important indicators of where an accent comes from. Using your voice to support a sound or not, can move your accent 1,000 miles east from the UK, adding a rhotic R could move your accent to Bristol, Scotland or the US!

Accent and dialect are wonderfully interesting subjects and the more you understand how your articulators and your voice works, the more you get out of voice and accent coaching.
As well as speaking, the ‘feel’ or ‘embodiment’ of the accent is another aspect of dialectical speech.

So, in plain English, if you want to master an accent, learn a dialect and broaden your vocabulary on the way, please get in touch.