Regional Variations: Changing London Dialects Tasks

Task 1: Cockney Accent Article Summary - James Orr
In the article, the writer immediately states that Cockney rhyming slang is dying out 'amid London's diverse, multicultural society'. This is due to almost half of the people who polled, which were Londoners, having a lack of recognition towards certain words spoken in their society. It is also becoming noticable that much more new rhyming slang is being invented, so the idea of Cockney rhyming slang dying out is becoming much more widespread due to this and the fact that it orignially started out as a code language for London thieves who stopped using it once people began to find out what particular words meant.

Task 2:

1. Nikesh Shukla believes that 'Cockney rhyming slang is nang' as the title of her article suggests. He thinks Cockney is no longer spoken in East London and that it has moved to Essex with the minority.

2. He believes that rhyming slang is being replaced by the entry of different communities making the language more multicultural.

3. The reasons he gives for this is because people are moving from elsewhere to Cockney and they all 'need a new language' to represent us and our 'manors, our yard, our ends'.

4. The origins of MLE (multicultural London English) are that at first rhyming slang was in the East Ends of London, but ever since it has moved due to society becoming more multicultural, therefore people of other languages and cultures who have migrated have influenced slang making it more widespread.

Task 3: Paul Kerswill:
Summary of his ideas:
- Paul Kerswill was a professor of socio-linguistics at York University who said that there are two things going on, youth slang that many people use but also core users of MLE and to them it is a dialect and an accent. It doesn't have to have slang in it. He states 'it's a new kind of Cockney in a way.'

1. The main linguistic elements of MLE are...
- Linguistic researchers / professors identified the 'new cockney hybrid dialect
- It has West Indian, South Asian, Cockney and Estuary roots. (What the dialect has been influenced by) and it was originally named Jafaican - fake Jamaican .
- The dialect is most prevalent in East London, among people with few oppurtunities.

2. It has developed from West Indian, South Asian, Cockney and Estuary roots and the dialect has been helped to popularise by famous individuals such as rap artist Dizzee Rascal and Hackney born actor Idris Elba.

3. People use it because if they are one of the core speakers in the East End of London, where they have low opportunities, they use MLE to speak differently, using it as an 'exclusionary strategy' as one of the mechanisms when people find themselves unable to make progress in life or are discriminated against.

4. You can relate this to William Labov due to his findings on Martha's vineyard in 1961. This is because Labov was interested in how social class affected language usage, therefore it can be related as MLE is used in places such as the East End of London, a place where people have low opportunities, so you can investigate how the less fortunate people are affected in contrast to different parts of the population - to see how the results vary and if your social class actually determines this.