English Accents and Dialects: By Arthur Hughes, Peter Trudgill
Synopsis
Now in its third edition, this is an introductory survey of the main regional and social varieties of English spoken in the British Isles. The authors discuss accent and dialect in the broader framework of language variation, including phonetic, phonological, grammatical, lexical, historical and stylistic differences. This is followed by a survey of the speech of 12 different areas of the British Isles. The cassette which accompanies the book, but which is available separately, consists of edited interviews (all transcribed in the book) with speakers from each of the different areas. The cassette has detailed notes on the recordings in the text. The third edition has been thoroughly revised, and includes a new chapter on "Received Pronunciation"(RP). After a general description of RP, the authors discuss various variations within RP, and consider some of the factors which account for this variation. The cassette now includes three different varieties of RP speech. Entirely new sections, with corresponding recordings, have been added on Lowland Scots, Devon and Dublin speech.
Useful guide to the accents and dialects of Britain, 9 July, 2002
Reviewer: A reader from Scotland
This book describes regional variation in accents and dialects in Britain. It provides a brief description to ways of describing sounds, and then describes the language of several regions. I think it is essential to purchase the cassette that goes with the book - and what a pity that it is a cassette, rather than a CD. I think the book would be slightly heavy going unless you're quite familiar with the IPA notation. Also, I would have liked to have seen more accents covered - or at least more discussion of variation of accents within the region described. And no Hampshire! No highland Scots! No Manchester versus Leeds!
Down to earth and to the point., 23 January, 2002
Reviewer: A reader from Essex, UK
This book really is a star. Written by people who really know how difficult it can be to pinpoint accents and dialects, this book provides maps and diagrams showing their locations, and differing phonological features of areas. The terminology is easily understood, so much so that it was a pleasure to read, always a delight for any long suffering linguistics students. Very handy for quick reference I would recommend it. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.
The tape is essential to understanding the book. As the book happens to be the most up to date reference for modern British dialects, buying one without the other is rather like buying one shoe!
Any one with a passing interest in language would love this tape + book. Would also be of use to actors researching accents.
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