For the nth time since the age of 15 I’ve been told I speak with an “English” accent which gives me no end of pleasure, Anglophile that I am – but how did I get it? I know when I speak I sound more “refined” or “cultivated” (as linguists would put it) in contrast to the stereotypical “broad Australian” accent i.e. sounding like your nose is congested and unable to free the blockage. Those who tend to do pronounce Australia as AWSTRAYLEEA or STRAYA (thank you, John Clarke!). This is known as speaking “Strine”, for in a broad Aussie accent “Australian” becomes “strine”.
Apart from the broad strain of Australian English, the only other regional variation I know of is from Melbourne. Not only is the Melbourne speech-pattern to flatten and shorten every ‘a’ – castle is cassel, mall is mal, Reservoir is Resev-war, Malvern is Molvern and Beaumaris is Beaumorris; even Balcombe Road where I lived in Melbourne is said more like “Baulkham” – but with females especially I’ve picked up on a nice little throaty thing happening with their voices too, and I’ve only found it in women from Melbourne: Marieke Hardy, Catherine Deveny and sometimes you can still pick up a few traces from Germaine Greer. I don’t know how it happens though, whether from smoking, laryngitis or something else – not that I’m complaining. I love it – it’s “well lush”. Sadly there’s not a lot to be found online that isn’t academic (read: boring) for an irreverent source here, but this is interesting – at least it mentions the most known mismatch of an accent to be found in public, the Prime Minister’s. Born in Wales, grew up in Adelaide and is pretty much a Melbourne type of person; I’ve heard Julia Gillard’s accent to be described as either (from that Age piece) “strine with a cavalier defiance” to “Wendy Harmer on Mogadon”. Better to sound like Julia Gillard than the pantomime schoolboy blubbering of former PM John Howard (the only person to start speaking like his impersonators).
So how did I get my accent? I was born in Gosford, (an hour north of Sydney) and the only thing speech-wise I notice there is how we all say New South Wales as if we’re from South London (“New Sarf Wales”). I then spent my adolescence in Queensland (which I dig as having a broader accent anyway, so parochial and backwards the place is) where I started getting all the nods to my supposed phantom accent. It’s not a conscious thing either. Despite a somewhat passable skill of putting on an English accent (I can do RP, Mockney (thank you, EastEnders) and two strains of Northern: Manchester and Yorkshire), I’ve only ever used it for mucking about in drama classes. And some things sound better English anyway, especially swearing or witty asides (I’m no Dorothy Parker). Have I gone up my own arse with my pretentious tendencies and try to sound “posh”? No! Do I spend my days swanning around as if I’m Noel Coward? I can’t think of anything worse.
Nobody else in my family speaks like this. I’m the only one who’s got it and I still can’t work out from where. Maybe it was from acting or the years of teenage misery where I hardly spoke anyway so that when I did my words would be forced and thus “cultivated” – the only way my speech is cultivated is from not coming from the nose but the back of my throat. I sound pretty normal amongst my friends apart from a lack of Strine and slang, but it’s not a put-on, I just happen to speak “properly” with what I say not how I say it.
A few afternoons ago, a friend and I had to make statements to the police after two “blaggers” (there’s some non-local lingo for you) tried to break in over the weekend. Prior to making our statements, my friend and I were discussing the many time I’ve been told I sound “English”, only for one of the cops to actually be English and even ask me where in Britain I was from. Of course it thrilled me to be actually told this by an Englishman, but I didn’t ask from where my accent sounds like it comes from. He was probably from the Home Counties if not somewhere in the South of England, and after his disbelief of me being Australian asked where I was from.
COP: So where were you born?
ME: Gosford.
COP: Down south isn’t it?
ME: Yeah, Sydney basically.
COP: Nobody talks like that in Gosford, do they?
ME: Nope.
So where in England is my accent from and how the freak did I get it? I’m not knocking it – no doubt when I do eventually go to the UK I’ll fit right in and nobody will believe I’m not native – despite having a “natural” (if that’s the word for being constantly exposed to the Queensland sun) tan. Even my local cop from Blighty remarked that I’ll never be able to get into a Walkabout bar (why would I?).
If time permits I may add a clip here of me reading this post out and you can decide if I sound English or not. If I really do sound English then I’d at least like to know what dialect I’m speaking. The Henry Higgins of blogging, here I come!
The Josh Holley 