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Did Americans in 1776 have British accents? (Suprising answer)

Posted on by prisoner6

The typical English accent didn't develop until after the Revolutionary War, so Americans actually speak proper English. Here comes the science.

Did Americans in 1776 have British accents?

Reading David McCulloughs 1776, I found myself wondering: Did Americans in 1776 have British accents? If so, when did American accents diverge from British accents?

The answer surprised me.

Id always assumed that Americans used to have British accents, and that American accents diverged after the Revolutionary War, while British accents remained more or less the same.

Americans in 1776 did have British accents in that American accents and British accents hadnt yet diverged. Thats not too surprising.

Whats surprising, though, is that those accents were much closer to todays American accents than to todays British accents. While both have changed over time, its actually British accents that have changed much more drastically since then.

First, lets be clear: the terms British accent and American accent are oversimplifications; there were, and still are, many constantly-evolving regional British and American accents. What many Americans think of as the British accent is the standardized Received Pronunciation, also known as BBC English.

The biggest difference between most American and most British accents is rhotacism. While most American accents are rhotic, the standard British accent is non-rhotic. (Rhotic speakers pronounce the R sound in the word hard. Non-rhotic speakers do not.)

So, what happened?

In 1776, both American accents and British accents were largely rhotic. It was around this time that non-rhotic speech took off in southern England, especially among the upper class. This prestige non-rhotic speech was standardized, and has been spreading in Britain ever since.

Most American accents, however, remained rhotic.

There are a few fascinating exceptions: New York and Boston accents became non-rhotic, perhaps because of the regions British connections in the post-Revolutionary War era. Irish and Scottish accents are still rhotic.

If youd like to learn more, this passage in The Cambridge History of the English Language is a good place to start.

Sources:

■American English, Rhotic and non-rhotic accents, Received Pronunciation - Wikipedia

■The Cambridge History of the English Language - Google Books



TOPICS:

History

Society

KEYWORDS:

dialect

english

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language

linguistics

From someone's blog so take it FWIW, however it is sourced. Something I've always wondered about, especially after all those Disney movies/TV programs from the '50's and '60's. Both accents have obviously diverged. I wonder if we woould be able to understand our sncestors.



To: prisoner6

sncestors. sncestors. sncestors. sncestors. sncestors. Does not compute. :O)



To: prisoner6

Something like 7 generations seperated them from Britain. As I understand it, the colonists were considerably taller than the brits as well.



by 3 posted onby cripplecreek (Remember the River Raisin! (look it up))

To: cripplecreek

Rhotic speakers pronounce the R sound in the word hard. Pirates must be rhotic speakers.



To: prisoner6

Sourced, but, if this hypothesis is accurate, then why was the dialog in Dickens’ writing praised for so accurately presenting the nuances of the various regional dialects (a skill he developed while serving in some capacity as government reporter, where he could tell the region of a speaker by the accent)? Those sorts of nuances don’t develop in merely half a century. I’m not saying that this is not possible, it is. But it is far more likely that the early colonists spoke the English they came here with and that the “America” dialect commenced when immigration began in earnest and Americans had been here for several generations. Thus, it is far more likely that we did, in fact, diverge from the English accent into an amalgamation of dialects from various immigrant accents.



To: prisoner6

I’ve always wondered about this. It isn’t like we have lots of .mp3 files of Washington giving speeches to his troops.



by 6 posted onby KoRn (Department of Homeland Security, Certified - "Right Wing Extremist")

To: glorgau

Arrrhh!



To: cripplecreek

In WWI the British army found the height of the lower classes was 5'6” and the upper class was 5'9”, by WWII the difference had disappeared.



by 8 posted onby razorback-bert (Some days it's not worth chewing through the straps.)

To: prisoner6

this is one part of an accent.... saying Hard or Haaad what about the rest of the accent.....?



by 9 posted onby Vaquero ("an armed society is a polite society" Robert A. Heinlein)

To: prisoner6

Can’t stand a Brit accent ... someone with a mouthful of marbles makes more sense.



To: Vaquero

In my opinion the Australian accent is converging with the American accent.



by 11 posted onby cripplecreek (Remember the River Raisin! (look it up))

To: prisoner6

I have always wondered the same thing. I always pictured the colonial era British sounding more like Charles Laughton of Captain Bligh, than Peter Noone of Herman’s Hermits. Looks like I was right.



To: prisoner6

There’s a band of “r” coloring (”Rhoticism”) about 50 miles wide North to South that stretches from Baltimore to the Rocky Mountains ~ just listen to it when someone says “wash” (as in Warshington) or “squash” (as in Squarsh).



by 13 posted onby muawiyah ("GIT OUT THE WAY" The Republicans are coming)

To: prisoner6

There’s a band of “r” coloring (”Rhoticism”) about 50 miles wide North to South that stretches from Baltimore to the Rocky Mountains ~ just listen to it when someone says “wash” (as in Warshington) or “squash” (as in Squarsh).



by 14 posted onby muawiyah ("GIT OUT THE WAY" The Republicans are coming)

To: prisoner6

There’s a band of “r” coloring (”Rhoticism”) about 50 miles wide North to South that stretches from Baltimore to the Rocky Mountains ~ just listen to it when someone says “wash” (as in Warshington) or “squash” (as in Squarsh).



by 15 posted onby muawiyah ("GIT OUT THE WAY" The Republicans are coming)

To: prisoner6

I used to wonder about the quasi accents of women in old movies, ie 30’s & 40’s. I looked it up & found that in the day, acting schools taught a “mid Atlantic” accent that sounds like something of a hybrid.



To: cripplecreek

And with the increase in the Hispanic population, English and Spanish are converging in America. In a few decades I believe we’ll have a separate language called Spanglish. It’s already beginning.



by 17 posted onby VA_Gentleman ("Poor Al Gore. Global warming completely debunked via the very internet you invented." -Jon Stewart)

To: glorgau

Pirates aspired to be from the upper crust of England. A few even were. So Bawney Fronk would've been Barney Frank had he been born in Iowa, which is still considered the center of the most proper Shakespearean English.



by 18 posted onby Vigilanteman (Obama: Fake black man. Fake Messiah. Fake American. How many fakes can you fit in one Zer0?)

To: prisoner6

I’d just like to point out for those I know who will say it is: It isn’t my fault.



by 19 posted onby Darksheare (I shook hands with Sheryl Crow and all I got was Typhus and a single sheet of toilet paper.)

To: prisoner6

So interesting. They are pretty rhotic in Northumberland. We had a great laugh with our B&B hosts - who told ME, “We enjoyed listening to your interesting accents.” (We live in Los Angeles). “Oh, no, Geoff, YOU have the interesting accent.” He also asked me, “What is that word ‘cute’ you used? I don’t know that word. I had told him his B&B was so cute. The next morning he said, “I found that word ‘cute’ — it is archaic!” “But it is alive and well in Los Angeles.” So interesting, the English language. Thanks for posting.



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