Which varieties of English do you like to hear?

No Cockney as an option?

I luv the East End accent, and its people. They are the friendliest Londoners!!

yankintx said:

No Cockney as an option?

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as I said: no more than 10 answers are possible.

But everybody is free to create a poll and include his choices.

Rumpel said:

So you do not like any of them all.
Well, I cannot help it.

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Hey it's a good topic to discuss and to tell Irish stories about but it's also true that if your name happens to be Mularkey you're almost surely going to vote for Irish English. And if one's voice sounds like fingernails down a chalkboard you'll vote Australian English. So no problem dude, you get a Mulligan on doing the scattershot and maxed out poll that's like asking people their favorite cereal. eace

Tangmo said:

And if one's voice sounds like fingernails down a chalkboard you'll vote Australian English.

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There is an old saying: "The Evil is in the eye of the beholder!"
Maybe in this case it is in the ear of the listener.

Rumpel said:

There is an old saying: "The Evil is in the eye of the beholder!"
Maybe in this case it is in the ear of the listener.

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Several countries from Japan to Philippines to Singapore and India don't hire Australians to teach English to their learners. Maybe there's a token Aussie here and there although Thailand is one of the few countries that hires 'em cheerfully.

Your avatar says Europe and while I've been in the business more than 20 years I've yet to hear of Aussies being hired in Europe to teach English as either a foreign language or a second language. It's easy though to defend or praise Australia given they've done so well considering their humble origins.

Australian English

Perth Methinks

Rumpel said:

You have never started a poll, I think.
Else you would know that not more than 10 answers are permitted here.

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I've done quite a few but yes, you are correct that I've never went to the limit of ten choices, elsewise I would have known about the limit.

But yes, I've done a few polls.

Tangmo said:

It matters a great deal abroad to people in their own countries learning English, if I can broaden a friendly discussion for a moment.

I started teaching English abroad in 1996 and I've done it off and on to the present, all of it in East Asia, namely, SK, China, Thailand. The learners of English abroad definitely prefer Americans teaching 'em American Johnny Carson English. American spoken standard English, ie, the Johnny Carson English dialect of the USA Midwest, is plain and clear English that's relatively easy for foreigners to speak and to hear and to understand.

Japan quite insists on Americans to teach English in their schools and universities, up to age 30 and rarely older.

SK focuses almost exclusively on Americans and Canadians to teach in their schools, colleges, universities. SK education authorities see Canadians and their culture as being junior Americans ha. Everyone knows Canadians are dependable performers of a high quality.

China needs so many native speaker teachers of English they also take Europeans who have learned English as a second language and are fluent in it...and there are lots of those. In China I taught with a French guy in his late 20s from Brittany who sounded like he was from Peoria because his English was so Johnny Carsonish. I heard zero French in his English phonics.

In Thailand where they rely heavily on tourism they also hire from Australia, Philippines and South Africa. Thais also hire Japanese from Japan to teach Japanese and Chinese from China to teach Chinese. Singapore insists on Americans although they do accept Brits who speak RP (received pronunciation, ie, the king's English). Hong Kong much prefers Brits of course to teach RP although Americans are most welcome for Johnny Carson English.

While Brits are of course hired almost anywhere English is taught in foreign countries the learners don't much care for an English teacher or tutor from UK. Learners of English in the foreign lands tell you flat out they prefer not to have Brits teaching 'em because so many Brits roll their vowels which makes their words more difficult to recognize and to pronounce. Plus Brit dialects can be almost as tangy as many Southern USA dialects and thus problematical to the foreign learners. Learners abroad definitely prefer the phonics of American Johnny Carson English.

I anyway don't see any English I can vote for in the poll. The one English I try to avoid abroad is native spoken Australian cause it's so distorted and it varies of course, Perth English being a lot of mumbling while Sydney English across the island continent is definitely distorted.

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Quite fascinating!
You see, my responses to Rumpel were my attempt to appear pragmatic.
So often I hear non-native English speakers apologizing for their English, and my response is similar, "Your English is just fine because I am not having any trouble understanding you."

So, that is just my attempt to be open, inclusive and welcoming.
This country FELL IN LOVE with a Cuban bandleader who spoke with a thick funny accent, at the height of our Cold War, with USSR and Cuba. His name was Desi Arnaz, also known as "Ricky Ricardo" and he and his brilliant wife created "I Love Lucy".

I figure if we as Americans would once again be as open and welcoming as we used to be back then, we would have a better country.

Tangmo said:

The one English I try to avoid abroad is native spoken Australian cause it's so distorted and it varies of course, Perth English being a lot of mumbling while Sydney English across the island continent is definitely distorted.

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The original Perth is in Scotland, and is pronounced Perrrrrrrth therrrrrre!
And I like the way the Scots speak theirrrrrr English a lot!

Checkerboard Strangler said:

Quite fascinating!
You see, my responses to Rumpel were my attempt to appear pragmatic.
So often I hear non-native English speakers apologizing for their English, and my response is similar, "Your English is just fine because I am not having any trouble understanding you."

So, that is just my attempt to be open, inclusive and welcoming.

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Well said if I may say so myself thx.

After more than 20 years teaching English on an off in East Asia to learners in the Tiger economy countries I'm well familiar with the learner or the professional making that apologetic plea, ie, "I only know a little English" or "My English is not so good."

It derives from the generally true East Asian society and culture approach to learning things and doing 'em. Tests in school and universities are for instance designed to find out what they don't know. It's the opposite of the USA where the educator wants to find out what you do know and like to know. We here pursue that which we like and have a keen interest in. It leads to a society and economy of achievers who are rooted well in what each does individually and corporately.

In East Asia and in China especially the pupil needs to please the teacher by pursuing what the pupil doesn't know and then get better test scores on it. Trouble with that is the pupil in school or at university spends a lot of time studying something they don't care about and, worse, don't have a good aptitude in. So the pupil studies more, tests more, yet makes only modest progress at best. Far worse yet, the pupil over there is not gaining anything from it since the pupil will anyway pursue his or her real interest subject or topic in which the pupil is already a good achiever. The young person is only losing time as the pupil pursues the subject(s) that is a weak area for the learner and that the pupil won't ever master while pleasing the teach by showing application and some progress in the alien subject.

In USA we get tested to find out what we know so we can stop stabbing around in what we don't know well or care to know much of. We pursue what we do know and have a facility in and are interested to develop and, indeed, perfect.

So my usual reply to the East Asian apologetic plea of humility and forgiveness in respect of English language competency is that learning a foreign language is a lifelong matter of eventual and greater development and improvement. The first important level is a general competency in reading, writing, speaking, listening. Expect meanwhile to experience daily new vocabulary, terms, sayings and expressions, idioms and so on and so on. The key is the individual level of competence in the four skills. If the competency level is average expect a long haul. Above average is better of course. Well above average, then perhaps teach English in your own country to expand your competency faster and better according to what you put into it. Please yourself rather than submitting to the absolute approval of the Chinese schoolmarm.

This country FELL IN LOVE with a Cuban bandleader who spoke with a thick funny accent, at the height of our Cold War, with USSR and Cuba. His name was Desi Arnaz, also known as "Ricky Ricardo" and he and his brilliant wife created "I Love Lucy".

I figure if we as Americans would once again be as open and welcoming as we used to be back then, we would have a better country.

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Grew up enjoying the hell out of the program, characters and situations along with 100% percent of everyone else not Hispanic. So in retrospect though Ricky Ricardo the band leader character of the real band leader actor Dezi Arnez was always stressed out and frantic over Lucy's hairbrained ideas and behaviors, hysterically funny as they were always. Ricky was always shouting emotionally and complaining to Lucy, in humorous ways of course as that kind of humor was then.

Then there was the Steve Allen Show with the not Hispanic guy playing Jose Jemenez the first generation immigrant being man on the street interviewed, imitating a heavy Hispanic accent from behind an absurd mustache and saying absolutely stupid things that came across as somehow funny. Those were not good times I'm afraid and they had to be overcome by the social movements that came out of the Vietnam War.

Presently moreover Ricky Ricardo and Jose Jemenez would have been deported by the fascist Trump and his racist fascist Fanboyz long since. Yet your point is well taken that Ricky and Jose were at least accepted back then to be integrated and for ourselves to learn from too and together to grow with socially and culturally.

Rumpel said:

The original Perth is in Scotland, and is pronounced Perrrrrrrth therrrrrre!
And I like the way the Scots speak theirrrrrr English a lot!

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I taught with a Scot in Bangkok, at a bilingual babble, er, school.

He kept saying of the Thai students and the Thai owned school, "Well, that takes the biscuit." LMAO. He couldn't figure why so I told him we say, "Well, that takes the cake," and he just looked at me.

Although he was a Scotsman I asked him if EnglandandWales was one word yet in UK. His upper lip twiched for an instant so I know he found it to be hysterically funny. He and I were a good team teaching the same subject, Social Subjects. I taught grades 10, 11, 12 and he taught 7, 8 and 9. We had those rich Thai brats, er, kids, in a vice ha.

The foreign teacher side of the same school was run by Australians (of Australians, for Australians) and a regular guy teacher from Canada who was both wry and new asked me the old timer at the school, "WTF is a fortnight?" LMAO cause Aussies use it often. So I said I know and that best I could remember from high school was it had something to do with Shakespeare, fate and doom so welcome to Thailand. "Oh, yeah," he said as he and I shared a chuckle at those odd fellows from down under.

We foreign teachers from North America and Europe spent each day alternating between the crazy Thais taking the biscuit, our having our cake and wanting to eat it too, and the Aussies being ignorant about the USA and Canada. Down under is a pretty remote place I'm afraid despite modern communications and all.

Tangmo said:

I taught with a Scot in Bangkok, at a bilingual babble, er, school.

He kept saying of the Thai students and the Thai owned school, "Well, that takes the biscuit." LMAO. He couldn't figure why so I told him we say, "Well, that takes the cake," and he just looked at me.

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Did he ever teach you to say - or sing: "It's a braw brecht moonlecht necht tenecht!"

Rumpel said:

Did he ever teach you to say - or sing: "It's a braw brecht moonlecht necht tenecht!"

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I never heard the Scot teaching Social Subjects at the bilingual school in Bangkok sing and never saw him drink, smoke or cuss for that matter. He taught the students as I was the lead teacher of the Secondary Department of the K-12 school. I taught Social Subjects to grades 10, 11, 12 and he taught it to grades 7, 8, 9. He and I had those rich Thai kids in a vice ha.

The Scotsman minded his own business, worked hard, stayed quiet, did a lot of observing and had some odd sayings included when he did speak.

Let me see though if I might have picked anything up from the worthy guy. That is, I think you may have said something like, "It's a balmy pleasant moonlit night, innit!" So as you can see, translation is not one of my strong points of which there are few anyway.

Tangmo said:

I never heard the Scot teaching Social Subjects at the bilingual school in Bangkok sing and never saw him drink, smoke or cuss for that matter. He taught the students as I was the lead teacher of the Secondary Department of the K-12 school. I taught Social Subjects to grades 10, 11, 12 and he taught it to grades 7, 8, 9. He and I had those rich Thai kids in a vice ha.

The Scotsman minded his own business, worked hard, stayed quiet, did a lot of observing and had some odd sayings included when he did speak.

Let me see though if I might have picked anything up from the worthy guy. That is, I think you may have said something like, "It's a balmy pleasant moonlit night, innit!"

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That comes quite near it!

Rumpel said:

That comes quite near it!

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You are too kind :2wave:

Tangmo said:

You are too kind :2wave:

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You are welcome! eace