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Pragmatics of Accents
Edited by Gaëlle Planchenault and Livia Poljak
[Pragmatics & Beyond New Series 327] 2021
► pp. 141–162

A lack of phonological inherentness

Perceptions of accents in UK education

| The University of Manchester, United Kingdom

This paper addresses accent preference in the context of UK teaching. From this, there are instances of trainee teachers being told to reduce their accents. The views of 32 teachers were collected and the paper focuses on two specific points. First, it is not the sounds per se that characterise accents in terms of positive or negative evaluations; rather, it is the societal connotations. Second, it is not merely regional accents as such that are targeted for reduction but instead, more broad realisations of such accents. Thus, in the context of teaching, notions of professionalism are sometimes understood differently between teachers and mentors when viewed from a linguistic perspective, with broad accents often the target for change.

Keywords: accent, teaching, trichotomy, reduction
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Contextualisation of the study: Sociocultural attitudes to accents and a suggested trichotomy of UK accents
    • A lack of inherentness in accents
    • A trichotomy of UK accents
  • 3.Previous studies on accent reduction
    • Study one participants
    • Study two participants
    • Interviews
    • Study three participants
  • 4.Discussion of the results: Three cases of teachers’ accent reduction
    • The case of T1: A desire to retain one’s working-class roots through accent
    • The case of T7: Agreement on what constitutes a ‘professional’ accent in teaching
    • The case of T20: Linguistic pride
  • 5.Implications of the study for UK teaching
  • 6.Conclusion
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 11 October 2021
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/pbns.327.06bar
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