KINKY BOOTS

DIALECT RESOURCES

GENERAL RESOURCES

THE TRAP/BATH SPLIT

What is the #1 thing American actors screw up doing British accents? Four little words: The Trap-Bath Split.

Let’s explain. In most American accents, we pronounce trap, cat, and bad with roughly the same vowel as ask, can’t and laugh.  This is what we refer to as the short-a sound.

In many British accents, however, these are two separate vowels: the first group of words (i.e. trap) are pronounced with a short-a,  (IPA æ) as in America ; but the second group (i.e. bath) is pronounced with a broad-a, IPA ɑ: (i.e. “ah“). Hence the Trap-Bath Split.

To put it in crudely, Americans would say The cat took a bath so that cat and bath are pronounced with the same vowel.  For many British people, however, only cat would be pronounced with this vowel;  bath is pronounced with the same broad-a vowel as father or palm.

Northampton would be in the SOUTHERN examples in this video.

NON RHOTIC

Non-rhoticity, meaning the “r” or “er” at the ends of words isn’t prounounced (mother sounds like “muhthuh”).

Northampton would be the NON RHOTIC examples in this video.

GLOTTAL STOP

Linguists refer to the sound that occurs in the middle of a word like uh-oh as a “glottal stop.” This sound is made by quickly closing and opening the vocal cords to release a small burst of air. Midlands and Cockney dialects will invariably include the replacement of t with glottal stops, especially when the t is in the middle of a word like better (be’ah — where the apostrophe represents the glottal stop). This is often referred to as “T-glottaling”.

COCKNEY RULES

The Northampton Midlands dialect employs many of the same rules of a general “Cockney” accent.

Vowel shifts. TH’s become “v” or “f”. Dark “L” sounds turning to “W’s”. “H” sounds become glottal, especially at the beginning of words. Words ending in “ing” sound like “in” without turning the “g”. It’s best to listen to the tutorial examples for a clear understanding of these vowel shifts and other rules.