Good American Speech

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Good American Speech was a consciously learned accent of English promoted in certain American courses on elocution, voice, and acting from the early to mid-20th century. As a result, it became associated with particular announcers and Hollywood actors, [1] [2] [3] [4] mostly in recorded media from the 1920s to 1950s. [5] [6] This speaking style was especially influenced by and overlapped with Northeastern elite accents from that era and earlier. [5] [2] Due to conflation of the two types of accents, both are most commonly known as a Mid-Atlantic accent or Transatlantic accent. [2] [7] Promoters of such accents additionally incorporated features from Received Pronunciation, the prestige accent of British English, [2] [5] [7] in an effort to make them sound like they transcended regional and even national borders.

Contents

During the early half of the 20th century, Mid-Atlantic classroom speech was designed, codified, and advocated by certain phoneticians and teachers, linguistic prescriptivists who felt that it was the best or most proper way to speak English. [8] [7] [9] According to voice and drama professor Dudley Knight, "its earliest advocates bragged that its chief quality was that no Americans actually spoke it unless educated to do so". [9] During the period when Mid-Atlantic accents acquired cachet within the American entertainment industry, certain stage and film actors performed them in classical works or when undertaking serious, formal, or upper-class roles, [10] while others adopted them more permanently in their public lives. Since the mid-20th century onwards, the accent has become regarded as affected and is now rare.

Terminology

No consistent label exists for this type of speech, particularly in its own era. It has increasingly become known as a Mid-Atlantic accent, [7] [4] [5] or Transatlantic accent, [11] [6] [2] terms that refer to its perceived mixture of American and British features. In specifically theatrical contexts, it is also sometimes known by names like American Theatre Standard [10] [8] or American stage speech. [12] Its promoters variously called it World (Standard) English,Good (American) Speech, Eastern (American) Standard, or simply Standard English . [13] [9] [14]

History

According to the vocal coach and drama professor Dudley Knight, in the 19th century through the early 20th century, formal public speaking in the United States primarily focused on song-like intonation, lengthily and tremulously uttered vowels (including overly articulated weak vowels), and a booming resonance. [15] He also asserts that, when the 20th century began, "American actors in classical plays all spoke with English accents", [16] due to the high prestige of English Received Pronunciation (RP), with features such as non-rhoticity, or R-dropping: in spoken English, the deleting of the phoneme /r/ everywhere except before vowel sounds. A study by linguist William Labov and others describes that non-rhoticity, "as a characteristic of British Received Pronunciation, was also taught as a model of correct, international English by schools of speech, acting, and elocution in the United States up to the end of World War II. It was the standard model for most radio announcers". [17] Linguist Geoff Lindsey argues that another major contribution to the RP elements in early Hollywood sound films is actual actors from around the British Commonwealth. [10]

Even before the early 20th century, ordinary Eastern New England accents as well as Northeastern elite accents spoken by groups like the New York elite and the Boston Brahmins, the New England upper class, already shared notable features with RP such as non-rhoticity and the trap–bath split. Boston was the American center for training in elocution, public speaking, and acting at this time; [18] [10] [2] therefore, these Northeastern-originated accents also likely contributed to the sound then becoming popular in the American theatre. In particular, the accents of the Northeastern elite already held established connotations of high education and refinement.

The proliferation of Mid-Atlantic speech was further fueled by the Australian phonetician William Tilly (né Tilley), teaching in Columbia University's extension program in New York City from 1918 to around the time of his death in 1935, whose goal was to popularize his standard of a "proper" American pronunciation for teaching in public schools and using in one's public life. [19] A proponent of precise phonetic transcription, Tilly was perhaps the most influential speech instructor in the U.S. in the first half of the 20th century. [20] He championed a version of the accent that, for the first time, was standardized with an extreme and conscious level of phonetic consistency. Calling his new standard World English, he mostly attracted a following of English-language learners and New York City public-school teachers. [21] Linguistic prescriptivists, Tilly and his adherents emphatically promoted World English, and its slight variations taught in classes of theatre and oratory, helping to eventually define the Mid-Atlantic pronunciation of American classical actors for decades. Americans have the tendency to perceive World English as sounding British, which Tilly's students sometimes acknowledged and other times denied. [22] According to Dudley Knight:

World English was a speech pattern that very specifically did not derive from any regional dialect pattern in England or America, although it clearly bears some resemblance to the speech patterns that were spoken in a few areas of New England, and a very considerable resemblance ... to the pattern in England which was becoming defined in the 1920s as "RP" or "Received Pronunciation". World English, then, was a creation of speech teachers, and boldly labeled as a class-based accent: the speech of persons variously described as "educated," "cultivated," or "cultured"; the speech of persons who moved in rarefied social or intellectual circles; and the speech of those who might aspire to do so. [23]

While Tilly did not specifically work with actors himself, some of his prominent students ended up doing so. The popularity of a Mid-Atlantic accent in theatrical training is credited to several of his disciples, among them Windsor Daggett, Margaret Prendergast McLean, and Edith Warman Skinner. [2] [9] Daggett was a Northeastern American speech teacher and theatre critic who campaigned for this Standard English in the theatre in his weekly Billboard column from 1921 to 1926, a decade when he dominated the New York City market for theatrical speech improvement. [24] [25] He viewed the accent as neither regionally American nor an "affected ultra-British class dialect" but rather a cultured, intelligible, transnational accent of English that avoided all features that could identify its speaker's upbringing. [26] Margaret Prendergast McLean from Colorado became one of the most influential speech teachers for East Coast actors by the late 1920s, distinguished for her work at Boston's Leland Powers School and New York's American Laboratory Theatre. [27] She published her text on the accent, Good American Speech, in 1928 and later taught in Los Angeles, California. [28] Canadian-born Edith Skinner, brought to the Laboratory Theatre by McLean, rose to prominence by the 1930s, [9] [12] [2] best known for her own instructional text Speak with Distinction, published in 1942. [2] [29] These speech instructors referred to this accent as Good (American) Speech, which Skinner also called Eastern (American) Standard and which she described as the appropriate American pronunciation for "classics and elevated texts". [14] She vigorously drilled her students in learning the accent at the Carnegie Institute of Technology (now, Carnegie Mellon) and, later, the Juilliard School. [9]

From the 1920s to 1950s, the Mid-Atlantic accent was a popular affectation onstage, in many New York City schools, and in forms of high culture in North America. American cinema began in the early 1900s in New York City and Philadelphia before becoming largely transplanted to Los Angeles beginning in the mid-1910s, with talkies beginning in the late 1920s. Hollywood studios encouraged actors to learn this accent into the 1940s. [4] Hollywood over time became less of a New York City-influenced enclave as it grew and attracted actors from everywhere, [10] plus the film industry moved away from studio control over its artists, [6] causing Mid-Atlantic speech to fall out of fashion by the mid-20th century. Since then, the majority class of rhotic accents, General American English, has dominated the American entertainment industry.

Examples of performers

Examples of old-time actors known for publicly using this accent include Laird Cregar, Sally Kellerman, Tammy Grimes, [30] Fred Astaire, [3] William Powell, [3] Orson Welles, [31] Westbrook Van Voorhis, [32] the Canadian actor Christopher Plummer, [2] and the British actor Michael Rennie. [33] Some actors like Bette Davis [34] and Katharine Hepburn [35] [4] are popularly described as having Mid-Atlantic stage accents, though it is difficult to extricate their onscreen accents and vocal training from their own regional Northeastern elite accents. [10] Despite the rhotic accents of their native regions, some performers like Grace Kelly, Norma Shearer, and Ginger Rogers developed a Mid-Atlantic accent, including (variable) non-rhoticity and a trap–bath split, likely due to its high prestige in their era and their formal dramatic schooling. [1] Roscoe Lee Browne, defying roles typically cast for black actors, also consistently spoke with a Mid-Atlantic accent. [36] Vincent Price often used the accent in his performances, being from Missouri but attending elite Northeastern schools for high school and college, and also being British-trained. [37] [2] Patrick Cassidy noted that his father, actor and performer Jack Cassidy, affected the Mid-Atlantic accent, despite having a native New York accent. [38] Alexander Scourby was an American stage, film, and voice actor who continues to be well known for his recording of the entire King James Bible completed in 1953. Scourby was often employed as a voice actor and narrator in advertisements and in media put out by the National Geographic Society with his refined Mid-Atlantic accent considered desirable for such roles. [31]

Cary Grant had an accent that is often popularly described as "Mid-Atlantic", though his specific accent more naturally and unconsciously mixed British and American features, because he arrived in the United States from England at age 16. [39] [10]

Performed examples in 20th-century media

Performed examples in 21st-century media

Although it has disappeared as a standard of high society and high culture, the Transatlantic accent has still been heard in some media in the 21st century for the sake of historical, humorous, or other stylistic reasons.

Phonology

Codified versions of the Mid-Atlantic accent for the American theatre were published by voice coaches like Margaret Prendergast McLean and Edith Skinner ("Good Speech" as she called it). These were once widely taught in Northeastern American acting schools of the early mid-20th century. [45]

Vowels

English diaphoneme Mid-Atlantic accent Northeastern elite accent
(for comparison)		Example
According to Skinner [46] According to McLean [47] Franklin D. Roosevelt's accent [8]
Monophthongs
/æ/[æ][æ]trap
[æ̝]pan
/ɑː/[a][a],[ɑː] [48] [a]bath
[æ̈]dance
[ɑː][ɑə] [8] father
/ɒ/[ɒ]lot, top
[ɔə] [8] cloth, gone
/ɔː/[ɔː]all, taught, saw
/ɛ/[e][e̞][ɛ]dress, met, bread
/ə/[ə]about, syrup
[o][o̞]no dataobey, melody
/ɪ/[ɪ][ɪ][ɪ̈]hit, skim, tip
[ɪ̞]response
/i/city
/iː/[iː]beam, fleet, chic
/ʌ/[ɐ][ʌ̈]bus, gus, coven
/ʊ/[ʊ]book, put, would
/uː/[uː]glue, dew
Diphthongs
/aɪ/[aɪ][äɪ]shine, try
bright, dice, pike, ride
/aʊ/[ɑʊ][ɑ̈ʊ]ouch, scout, now
/eɪ/[eɪ]lake, paid, pain, rein
/ɔɪ/[ɔɪ]boy, moist, choice
/oʊ/[oʊ][o̞ʊ][ɔʊ]goat, oh, show
Vowels historically followed by /r/
/ɑːr/[ɑə][ɑː][ɑə]car, dark, barn
/ɪər/[ɪə]fear, peer, tier
/ɛər/[ɛə][ɛə~ɛː][ɛə]fare, pair, rare
/ʊər/[ʊə]sure, tour, pure
/ɔːr/[ɔə][ɔə~ɔː][ɔə]torn, short, port
/ɜːr/[ɜː~əː]burn, first, herd
/ər/[ə]doctor, martyr, surprise

Vowels before /r/

Mid-Atlantic accents are non-rhotic, meaning the postvocalic /r/ is typically dropped. [57] The vowels /ə/ or /ɜː/ do not undergo R-coloring. Linking R is used, but Skinner openly disapproved of intrusive R. [57] [58] In Mid-Atlantic accents, intervocalic /r/'s and linking r's undergo liaison.

When preceded by a long vowel, the /r/ is vocalized to [ə], commonly known as schwa, while the long vowel itself is laxed. However, when preceded by a short vowel, the /ə/ is elided. Therefore, tense and lax vowels before /r/ are typically only distinguished by the presence/absence of /ə/. The following distinctions are examples of this concept:

  • Mirror–nearer distinction: Hence mirror is [mɪɹə], but nearer is [nɪəɹə].
  • Mary–merry distinction: [29] Hence merry is [mɛɹɪ], but Mary is [mɛəɹɪ]. Mary also has an opener variant of [ɛ] than merry.
  • "Marry" is pronounced with a different vowel altogether. See further in the bullet list below.

Other distinctions before /r/ include the following:

  • Mary–marry–merry distinction: Like in RP, New York City, and Philadelphia, marry is pronounced as /æ/ , which is distinct from the vowels of both Mary and merry. [29]
  • Cure–force–north distinction: The vowels in cure and force–north are distinguished, the former being realized as [ʊə] and the latter as [ɔə], like conservative RP.
  • Thought–force distinction: The vowels in thought and force–north are distinguished, the former being realized as [ɔː] and the latter as [ɔə]. Hence saw[sɔː], sauce[sɔːs] but sore/sour[sɔə], source[sɔəs]. [59] This does not precisely agree with /ɔː/horse and /ɔə/ for hoarse in traditional Received Pronunciation.
  • Hurry–furry distinction: The vowels in hurry and furry are distinguished, with the former pronounced as /ʌ/ and the latter pronounced as /ɜː/ . ( listen ⓘ )
  • Palm–start distinction: The vowels in palm and start are distinguished, the former being realized as [ɑː] and the latter as [ɑə]. Hence spa[spɑː], alms[ɑːmz] but spar[spɑə], arms[ɑəmz]. [60] This keeps the distinction observed in rhotic accents like General American, but not made in RP. Also, some New Englanders, particularly in Eastern New England, could pronounce the vowel in start more fronted: [aː~aə]. However, in the mid-20th century and later, this came to be associated with non-elite Boston accents.
  • Distinction of /ɒr/ and /ɔːr/ in words like orange and oral

Consonants

A table containing the consonant phonemes is given below: [45]

Consonant phonemes
Labial Dental Alveolar Post-alveolar Palatal Velar Glottal
Nasal m n ŋ
Stop p b t d k ɡ
Affricate tʃ dʒ
Fricative f v θ ð s z ʃ ʒ h
Approximant l ɹ j ʍ w

Other pronunciation patterns

ExampleMid-Atlantic [29]
military-ary[əɹɪ]
bakery-ery
inventory-ory
Canterbury-bury[bəɹɪ]
blueberry-berry
testimony-mony[mənɪ]
innovative-ative[ətɪv~ˌeɪtɪv]

See also

Citations

  1. 1 2 Boberg, Charles (2020). "Diva diction: Hollywood’s leading ladies and the rise of General American English". American Speech: A Quarterly of Linguistic Usage, 95(4), 441-484: "Kelly was from Philadelphia. Rogers, from Independence, Missouri, and Shearer, from Montreal, are about half R-less. Adoption of /r/ vocalization by these actresses from r-ful regions presumably reflects both formal dramatic training and the generally high prestige of this feature in the early twentieth century" (455); "Rogers, Kelly, and Shearer produce an [a:] quality in BATH words out of respect for the British or Boston standard" (465).
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 LaBouff, Kathryn (2007). Singing and communicating in English: a singer's guide to English diction. New York: Oxford University Press. pp. 241–42. ISBN   978-0-19-531138-9.
  3. 1 2 3 Tham, Su Fang (2018; updated 2021). "From the Archives: Behind the Accent with Dialect Coach Jessica Drake". FilmIndependent.
  4. 1 2 3 4 Tsai, Michelle (28 February 2008). "Why Did William F. Buckley Jr. talk like that?". Slate . Retrieved 28 February 2008.
  5. 1 2 3 4 MacNeil, Robert; Cran, William (2007). Do You Speak American? . Knopf Doubleday Publishing. p. 51.
  6. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Queen, Robin (2015). Vox Popular: The Surprising Life of Language in the Media. John Wiley & Sons. pp. 241–2. ISBN   9780470659922.
  7. 1 2 3 4 Boberg, Charles (2021). "Accent in North American Film and Television". Cambridge University Press. p. 126.
  8. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Urban, Mateusz (2021). "Franklin D. Roosevelt and the American Theatre Standard: The low vowels". Studia Linguistica Universitatis Iagellonicae Cracoviensis, 2021(4), 227-245.
  9. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Knight, Dudley. "Standard Speech". In: Hampton, Marian E. & Barbara Acker (eds.) (1997). The Vocal Vision: Views on Voice. Hal Leonard Corporation. pp. 174–77.
  10. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 "Hollywood's "Fake" Mid-Atlantic Myth DEBUNKED!" YouTube, uploaded by Dr Geoff Lindsey, Video on YouTube.
  11. ↑ Drum, Kevin (2011). "Oh, That Old-Timey Movie Accent!". Mother Jones.
  12. 1 2 Mufson, Daniel (1994). "The Falling Standard". Theater. 25 (1): 78. doi:10.1215/01610775-25-1-78.
  13. ↑ Deacon, 2007.
  14. 1 2 Skinner, Monich & Mansell (1990 :334)
  15. ↑ Knight, Dudley. "Standard Speech". In: Hampton, Marian E. & Barbara Acker (eds.) (1997). The Vocal Vision: Views on Voice. Hal Leonard Corporation. p. 159.
  16. ↑ Knight, 1997, p. 171.
  17. ↑ Labov, William et al. (2006). "The restoration of post-vocalic /r/". The Atlas of North American English Phonetics, Phonology and Sound Change. Mouton de Gruter: "The basic vernacular of New York City was consistently r-less in the nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth. r-less pronunciation, as a characteristic of British Received Pronunciation, was also taught as a model of correct, international English by schools of speech, acting, and elocution in the United States up to the end of World War II. It was the standard model for most radio announcers and used as a high prestige form by Franklin Roosevelt".
  18. ↑ Knight, 1997, p. 159.
  19. ↑ Knight, 1997, p. 163.
  20. ↑ Deacon, 2007, pp. 74, 78.
  21. ↑ Knight, 1997, pp. 157–158.
  22. ↑ Knight, 1997, p. 161.
  23. ↑ Knight, 1997, p. 160.
  24. ↑ Deacon, 2007, p. 73.
  25. ↑ Knight, 1997, p. 172.
  26. ↑ Deacon, 2007, pp. 73-74, 80.
  27. ↑ Knight, 1997, p. 174.
  28. ↑ Knight, 1997, pp. 165, 174.
  29. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Skinner, Edith (1 January 1990). Speak with Distinction. Hal Leonard Corporation. ISBN   9781557830470.
  30. ↑ Sweeney, Louise (31 July 1980). "TAMMY – GRIMES". The Christian Science Monitor . ISSN   0882-7729 . Retrieved 30 October 2018.
  31. 1 2 Anderegg, Michael. “Orson Welles, Shakespeare, and Popular Culture.” Columbia University Press. New York. 2015. (p. 15)
  32. ↑ Fallows, James (7 June 2015). "That Weirdo Announcer-Voice Accent: Where It Came From and Why It Went Away. Is your language rhotic? How to find out, and whether you should care". The Atlantic. Washington DC.
  33. ↑ Scheuer, Philip K. (8 November 1951). "Seeing His Worst Movie After 10 Years Assures Michael Rennie Part as Jean Valjean Is His Best". Los Angeles Times . p. D1.
  34. ↑ Kozloff, Sarah (2000). Overhearing Film Dialogue. University of California Press. p. 25. ISBN   9780520924024.
  35. ↑ Robert Blumenfeld (1 December 2002). Accents: A Manual for Actors. Hal Leonard Corporation. p. 171. ISBN   978-0-87910-967-7 . Retrieved 3 April 2012.
  36. ↑ Rawson, Christopher (28 January 2009). "Lane, Hamlisch among Theater Hall of Fame inductees" . Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Retrieved 2011-06-18.
  37. ↑ McDonald, Shawn. "Milford Academy - History". Milfordacademy.org. Retrieved 19 November 2017.
  38. ↑ Riedel, Michael (10 December 2010). "You don't know Jack (yet)". New York Post. Retrieved 17 May 2022. My dad was born in Queens but affected this mid-Atlantic accent. The old neighborhood accent only came out when he got mad at us.
  39. ↑ "Philip French's screen legends: Cary Grant". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 18 June 2011.
  40. ↑ Lane, James. "Aristocratic Villains And English-Speaking Nazis: Why Hollywood Loves Clichéd Accents". Babbel . Retrieved 23 January 2017.
  41. ↑ Mallenbaum, Carly (30 May 2014). "Are all of Disney's female villains kinda British?". USA Today . Retrieved 17 August 2024.
  42. ↑ "What Happened to the Mid-Atlantic Accent?". CMD. 3 May 2016. Retrieved 30 December 2017.
  43. ↑ Robinson, Joanna (2015). "American Horror Story Just Gave Us a Glimpse of Leonardo DiCaprio’s Next Big Role". Vanity Fair. Condé Nast.
  44. ↑ Feller, Madison (2020) "A Dialect Coach Breaks Down Moira Rose's Bonkers Schitt's Creek Accent". Elle. Hearst Magazine Media, Inc.
  45. 1 2 Skinner, Monich & Mansell (1990).
  46. ↑ Skinner, Edith (1990). Speak with distinction. Internet Archive. New York, NY : Applause Theatre Book Publishers. ISBN   978-1-55783-047-0.
  47. ↑ McLean, Margaret Prendergast (1952). Good American Speech. Internet Archive. New York, Dutton.
  48. ↑ "Good american speech". New York, Dutton. 3 November 2023.
  49. ↑ Fletcher (2005) , p. 338
  50. ↑ Fletcher (2005) , p. 339
  51. ↑ Skinner, Monich & Mansell (1990), p. 130.
  52. ↑ Skinner, Monich & Mansell (1990)
  53. ↑ E. Flemming & S. Johnson. Rosa's Roses: Reduced Vowels in American English, http://web.mit.edu/flemming/www/paper/rosasroses.pdf
  54. ↑ Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006)
  55. ↑ Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary: Pronunciation Guide https://assets2.merriam-webster.com/mw/static/pdf/help/guide-to-pronunciation.pdf
  56. ↑ Gimson (1962)
  57. 1 2 Skinner, Monich & Mansell (1990 :102)
  58. ↑ Skinner, Monich & Mansell (1990), pp. 113, 300.
  59. ↑ Skinner, Monich & Mansell (1990), p. 125-126, 177–178.
  60. ↑ Skinner, Monich & Mansell (1990), p. 182.
  61. ↑ Wells (1982), pp. 228–9.
  62. ↑ Skinner, Monich & Mansell (1990), pp. 194, 202, 250.
  63. ↑ Mojsin, Lisa (2009), Mastering the American Accent, Barron's Education Series, Inc., p. 36: "The t after n is often silent in [regional] American pronunciation. Instead of saying internet [some] Americans will frequently say 'innernet.' This is fairly standard speech and is not considered overly casual or sloppy speech."
  64. ↑ Skinner, Monich & Mansell (1990 :336)
  65. ↑ Wells, John C. (1982). Accents of English. Vol. 1. Cambridge University Press. p. 247. ISBN   0-521-22919-7.
  66. ↑ Skinner, Monich & Mansell (1990), p. 308.
  67. ↑ Skinner, Monich & Mansell (1990), p. 247.
  68. ↑ Skinner, Monich & Mansell (1990), p. 292.
  69. ↑ Skinner, Monich & Mansell (1990), p. 66.
  70. ↑ Fletcher (2013) , p. 339
  71. ↑ Skinner, Monich & Mansell (1990), pp. 348–9.

General bibliography

Further reading

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Older Southern American English is a diverse set of English dialects of the Southern United States spoken most widely up until the American Civil War of the 1860s, gradually transforming among its White speakers—possibly first due to postwar economy-driven migrations—up until the mid-20th century. By then, these local dialects had largely consolidated into, or been replaced by, a more regionally unified Southern American English. Meanwhile, among Black Southerners, these dialects transformed into a fairly stable African-American Vernacular English, now spoken nationwide among Black people. Certain features unique to older Southern U.S. English persist today, like non-rhoticity, though typically only among Black speakers or among very localized White speakers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Midland American English</span> Variety of English spoken in the United States

Midland American English is a regional dialect or super-dialect of American English, geographically lying between the traditionally-defined Northern and Southern United States. The boundaries of Midland American English are not entirely clear, being revised and reduced by linguists due to definitional changes and several Midland sub-regions undergoing rapid and diverging pronunciation shifts since the early-middle 20th century onwards.

The English language spoken and written in England encompasses a diverse range of accents and dialects. The language forms part of the broader British English, along with other varieties in the United Kingdom. Terms used to refer to the English language spoken and written in England include English English and Anglo-English.

One aspect of the differences between American and British English is that of specific word pronunciations, as described in American and British English pronunciation differences. However, there are also differences in some of the basic pronunciation patterns between the standard dialects of each country. The standard varieties for each are in fact generalizations: for the U.S., a loosely defined spectrum of unmarked varieties called General American and, for Britain, a collection of prestigious varieties most common in southeastern England, ranging from upper- to middle-class Received Pronunciation accents, which together here are abbreviated "RP". However, other regional accents in each country also show differences, for which see regional accents of English speakers.

The distinction between rhoticity and non-rhoticity is one of the most prominent ways in which varieties of the English language are classified. In rhotic accents, the sound of the historical English rhotic consonant,, is preserved in all phonetic environments. In non-rhotic accents, speakers no longer pronounce in postvocalic environments: when it is immediately after a vowel and not followed by another vowel. For example, a rhotic English speaker pronounces the words hard and butter as /ˈhɑːrd/ and /ˈbʌtər/, but a non-rhotic speaker "drops" or "deletes" the sound and pronounces them as /ˈhɑːd/ and /ˈbʌtə/. When an r is at the end of a word but the next word begins with a vowel, as in the phrase "better apples," most non-rhotic speakers will preserve the in that position, because it is followed by a vowel.

Abercraf English is a dialect of Welsh English, primarily spoken in the village of Abercraf located in the far south of Powys.

A Northeastern elite accent is any of the related American English accents used by members of the wealthy Northeastern elite born in the 19th century and early 20th century, which share significant features with Eastern New England English and Received Pronunciation (RP), the standard British accent. The late 19th century first produced audio recordings of and general commentary about such accents used by affluent East Coast and Northern Americans, particularly New Yorkers and New Englanders, sometimes directly associated with their education at private preparatory schools.

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