COCKNEY—LONDON, ENGLAND (class based social dialect)

The term cockney refers to working-class inhabitants of London, particularly east London, and the slang used by these people. It is also often used in reference to the " cockney accent", the accent common among London's working-class.

Cockney speakers have a distinctive accent and dialect, and frequently use Cockney rhyming slang. Cockney ryhming slang has its own syntax that is incomparable to anything in common Standard British, futhermore, several other features mark Cokney as a separate social dialect.

Typical features of Cockney speech include:

Dropped H, as in not 'alf pronounced [aː f], (" not half")

Boot – bute

The /u: / (in 'tune') phoneme is centralised, for instance, /bʉ ː t/ for 'boot.'

Math -- maeth

/æ / in 'bad' is lengthened somewhat. This feature, in addition to the Monophthongisation of the /au/ phoneme, means that in some dialects the words 'math' and 'mouth' rhyme.

Th – f/v

Bother -- Bover

Merger of /θ / with /f/, and [ð ] with /v/, hence [mæ fs] for ‘maths’, [bɒ və ] for 'bother'.

Down -- Daewn

Monophthongisation of /aʊ / to [æ ː ], hence [dæ ː n] for ‘down’

Bottle – Bo’l

Butter—Bu’er

Use of a glottal stop for intervocalic 't', as in bottle or butter (but not when it precedes the stress, as in deter); it can also occur between other sonorants, as in mental or in Feltham (the h of which is silent even in RP)

Floor—floo-er

Considerable glide of the /ɔ: / phoneme in 'cord' and 'thought.' In words with 'open' syllables like 'floor' and 'bore, ' this vowel is pronounced with an upglide, similar to New York English. Hence /kɔ: ə / for 'core.' In words with 'closed' syllables, such as 'cord' and 'caught, ' the vowel glides to /ʊ /, hence /bɔ: ʊ n/ for 'born.'

Intrusive 'R' after a vowel, hence 'America-r-is' for 'America is'

Use of me instead of my

Use of ain't instead of isn't, am not, are not, has not, and have not

Use of " In'it" to question a positive when making a statement, for example, " Good day today in'it? "

Use of double negatives, for example " I didn't see nothing"

A whole sentence in Cockney might sound like this:

PUT ON BOARD: Forty thousand thrushes flew over Thornton Heath.

Faw'y fahsan' frushes flew ova fawn'n 'eaf (" [ˈ fɔ ː ʔ i ˈ fæ ː zə nʔ ˈ fɹ ʌ ʃ ɪ z ˈ fluː ˌ ə ʊ və ˈ fɔ ː nʔ ə nˌ iː f]") for Forty thousand thrushes flew over Thornton Heath

Or " The wa'er in Majorca don' taste like wot it ough' a", for “The water in Mallorca doesn't taste quite how it ought to."

Another famous example of Cockney still in use is Cockney rhyming slang in which, in the simplest case, a given word or phrase is replaced by another word or phrase that rhymes with it.

For example= “Let’s have a little rabbit and pork = Let’s have a little talk.”

Often the rhyming replacement is abbreviated further, making the expressions even more obscure.

So, for the last example you might just say “rabbit” for “talk” in Cockney slang.

A new rhyme may then be introduced for the abbreviation and the process continues.

Other examples of rhyming slang are apples (and pears), for stairs, and trouble (and strife), for wife.

An example of truncation and replacement of rhyming slang starts with bottle and glass being used for arse (ass). This was reduced to bottle, for which the new rhyme Aristotle was found; Aristotle was then reduced to Aris for which plaster of Paris became the rhyme. This was, in turn, reduced to plaster, and then " sticking plaster". Ergo, sticky means arse.

That being said, most of the features mentioned above have in recent years partly spread into more general south-eastern speech and have partially helped to create the accent called Estuary English; an Estuary speaker will use some but not all of the Cockney sounds.

THIS IS VERY INTERESTING and IMPORTANT BECAUSE COCKNEY SPEAKERS ARE USUALLY THE MIDDLE AND LOWER CLASS OF LONDON. THEY ARE LEADING THE WAY TO A NEW ACCENT, ESTUARY, WHICH IS COMPETEING WITH THE RP ACCENT—THIS IS EXACTLY WHAT WILLIAM LABOV SAYS SHOULD HAPPEN.

Now let’s move on to the new world: What are some social dialects in America?

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R-LESS NEW YORK: NEW YORK CITY, U.S.A (class-based social dialect)

The New York dialect of the English language is spoken by most working class European Americans who were raised in New York City and much of its metropolitan area including the lower Hudson Valley, western Long Island, and in northeastern New Jersey. It is often considered to be one of the most recognizable accents within American English

The New York dialect is closely confined to the geographically small but densely populated New York City Dialect Region, which consists of the city's five Boroughs, the western half of Long Island, and the cities of Newark and Jersey City in New Jersey.

The classic New York dialect is centered on middle and working class European Americans, and this ethnic cluster now accounts for less than half of the city’s population.

All groups share the relevant features. It is possible that there are substantial differences, but these have not been found.

There is a tendency for middle and upper middle class members of all groups to use more New York dialect features and lower income residents to use fewer.

Not every American New Yorker uses the New York variety of English. Upper-middle class European American New Yorkers and suburban residents from educated backgrounds often speak with less conspicuous accents; in particular, many, though hardly all, use rhotic pronunciations instead of the less prestigious non-rhotic pronunciations.