Accents are pretty complicated thing . Linguistically speak , the modernBritish accentis known as Received Pronunciation , or RP .
There are a ton of different accents in the UK , but the Oxford English Dictionary determine RP as “ the stock accent of English as speak in the Confederate States of England . ” And that ’s what Americans typically mean when they say “ British emphasis . ” There ’s a snotty-nosed side to that , too : Americans have tons of dissimilar idiom , but the oecumenical “ American ” accent is what a British mortal would call an “ American accent . ”
Whencolonistsfrom Englandarrived in North America , both accent were rhotic , like an American accent . Rhoticism means the letterRis marked inwordslikehardandpark . In Received Pronunciation , thatRsound is n’t pronounced . evidently , there are n’t any recording from the seventeenth 100 , so we ca n’t know for sure what British and American people voice like . But polyglot are jolly sure both were rhotic because theRis present in those words , so it ’s probably think to be pronounced .
Experts have also observed that it was n’t until the former eighteenth 100 that British mass started to write words likehardorparkwhile omit theRfor time in shorthand notes .
So , where did the modern British stress come from ? According to theCambridge account of the English Language , the Received Pronunciation come out in southern England during theIndustrial Revolution . People who were yield into lower social classes and then became wealthy developed away of speakingso they could specify themselves apart from the societal class they had outgo . “ London pronunciation became the exclusive right of a new breed of specialists — orthoepists and teacher of elocution , ” concord to theCambridge History . “ The orthoepists decided upon correct pronunciations , compiled pronouncing dictionaries and , in private and expensive tutoring sessions , drilled enterprising citizen in fashionable joint . ”
So , if you ever see amovieor play that takes stead in Britain before the 18th century , those characters should be speaking in “ American ” accents .
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A version of this story was published in 2015 ; it has been update for 2024 .
