SLOVENLY SPEECH.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1849, 8 September 1913, Page 8

SLOVENLY SPEECH.

B i A NEW ZEALAND. DEFECT. ! TWANG BECOMING MORE MARKED. A TEACHER'S VIEWS. Has New Zealand a distinctive dialect ? Mr. F. Ronner, of the Wellington Collego teaching staff, 'thinks it has. Tho New Zealand dialect 'ho considers is loss marked than the Victorian, and much less marked than that of Now South Wales. But it is,' nevertheless with us aud Mr. llenuor thinks it will bo difficult to get rid of. In tho course of n paper on tho subject, read at tho secondary school teachers' confercnoe on Thursday, ho made tlio following remarks: — Those of us who havo given tho whole matter earnest thought aro convinced, of two things. Tho first is, that tho school- children of this Dominion do, in tho groat majority, speak badly, and secondly, that the tendency to do bo has, of lato years, increased. I am not exaggerating when I say that it is by no means an uncommon thing to hear from a schoolboy tho . rendering of a portion of Macaulay's Armada, something liko this: "Oi toll of tho tliroico fymous deeds aho wrought in aincient dys, Wen that grito fleet invincible, agynst her bore in vine Tho richest spoils of Moxicow, the Stoutest hearts of Spino" Or tho rendering of a ,lcss classic line: "Reound tha ' teown, witheout er breown." A mere cursory examination of tho atrocities porpetrated hero load us to the conclusion that if wo could eradicate from our scliools and homos tho mispronunciation of four.vocalic sounds, we could then porhaps say with sonio /reason that there is no general accent discerniblo in New Zealand. I am leaving out of consideration at present all sucli abominations, as "don'tcher," "won'tcher," "no idear of," "a commer rafter," etc., etc. They are tho results of a slovenly habit of speech and are curable. Undoubtedly it is tho pronunciation, or rather tho mispronunciation, of the following four sounds that gives the hall-mark to tho Now Zealand dialect. Wo have first of all the pronunciation, from nino persons out of ten, of tho medial or final "ou" or "ow," as "cow." instead of tho correct "nu" (see Slreat, also Morris). Here, too, wo must class also the mispronunciation of final "o" as "eow." For example we hear on all sides "ncow," "heow," "gow," "Moxicaw," "thaukyeow." Because the above-given mispronunciation of tho words now, how, go, Mexico, and.thank you is so extraordinarily common, it is tho hardest to eradicate. A child feels that the correct sound is an. uncommon sound and is afraid of doing something out of tlio common. On tho other hand, the correct pronunciation of these and similar woras seems a pliysical impossibility to some boys. For the last tour years I havo kept a T.ecord of one class— picked scholars from the primary scliools. I find that tho numbers who did actually avid unconsciously pronounce the "ou" and "ow" sound correctly rail as follow: 5. 3, 2, 1; those who wero physically unable to do so were 33 follow: 4, 4, o, 7. (2) Tho pronunciation of "a" as "i" or "y." For example, "dy" for "day," "dyly" for "daily," "nymo" for "name," "rine" for "rain.". In connection with this it is worth noticing that tliis is a mispronunciation of comparatively recent origin. It had its beginning, as far as England is concerned, in Essex and the Ealst End of London. It spread over a largo part of London itself, then over tile adjacent counties, and iis still widening its range both geographically and socially. (3) The pronunciation of "a" before "r" as "ao." For examplo, "kaerd" for "card," "kaert" for "cart," "haerd" for "hard.". (4) The pronunciation of "i" as a diphthong, "oi"—"moino" for "mine," "noine" f<jr "nino," and so on. What. Is Standard English? It lias often been argued that tho groat difficulty confronting a teacher zealous in his attempts to improve tho spoeoh of tho younger generation is the want of a standard English pronuncia- - tibn. The difficulty is more apparent than real. Tlio standard 1 set toy good authorities —amon<r them Professor 1)., Jones, of London University—is tho specch of > tho educated unpor middle-class of England 1 , a speech which is free from such faults as I have enumerated, and : which, on the other haJid, scorns the vulgar affectation of many of the upper classes', who pronounco "good-bye" as "good-bay," and "five" as "favo." Perhaps a further explanation may inako matters clearer to tlioso that do not understand what'is meant by "tlio , spoech'of tho educated upper . middleclass." v Tho true pronunciation of "a" in' suoh,words as "name," "day," etc., is that of tho diphthong. phonetically written "ai." It should be pronoilnoed with little or no perceptible glido. "Ou" and "ow" should bo pronounced as a rounded "an." If the voice is allowed to glide, it becomes tho oommonly heard 1 ea.u or "cow." ' Tho "i" sound of such words as "mine," "fine," should 'be a pure diphthong. Great care must be taken not to accentuate tho glide, which is only barely perceptible, otherwise tho pure phonetically written "oi" becomes the 1 atrocious "oi," viz., "moino," "foino," The "a" sound boforo "r" in such words , as "card,"-"cart," '"hard," must bo an open ono, not olosed. Great care 'has i to be exorcised in the use of the voice. The "a" sound 1 before "r" of all consonants is most liable to mispronunciation. The baneful effect of that consonant has been commented cn by most authorities ou phonetics. Authorities such as Skeat, Ellis, Althaus, arc emphatic and unanimous in their rerclict as to what- tho correct pronunciation of English vowels and diphthongs should he. The standard is set right enough, but we in New Zealand arc too far away from it. Our teachers, both in tho primary and in tho secondary schools, number among them men and women who havo readied a very lugh standard of education—so-called'. Many of them havo taken their degrees with honours; many of them havo a profound knmvled'go of tho history and the literature of their -Mothertongue.: but tho very mothcr-tonguo, that they havo studied so fully and completely, they cannot speak correctly. To put .it quite frankly, many teachers, primary and secondary alike, very often are not capable of undertaking the task of teaching children to talk and speak English according to tho standard of "good English." Our first duty .is to put our own speech abovo reproach, beforo we undertake the very difficult task of remedying tlio defects in tho 6peeeli of our pupils. _ I say a difficult task, and it is such, for it must be remembered that besides tho general tendencies towards the development of dialect, there are others nioro particular to the individual, which aro equally important factors. If a person speaks rapidly or carelessly, modifications. of pronunciation aro bound to arise. If a person docs not control his breath or does not properly use the various organs _ that control his specch, mispronunciation is again bound to aviso. We havo already seen that tho introduction of glide in diphthongs causes modification of those sounds. It is equally apparent that if wo pronounco with caro the four vowel sounds—"a" as in card, "ou" as in shout, "i" as in mino; "ay as in day—it is obvious that if we

wish to pronounco them correctly wo must open tlio mouth. If we pronounoo them in tho incorrect fashion, it 'is equally obvious that they are capable of being pronounced with tho mouth very nearly closed. Tho more rapid and tho nioro careless, the specch the easier is it to fall into tho danger of mispronunciation. A common fault, for oxample, is tho pronouncing 0 f "ou" or "ow" (final) as er, "Thank yer." Singing and Speech. I am quito of 'the opinion that much moro can bo dono in tlio direction of making young people talk carefully and - slowly, and making them pay duo attention to tho control of the speechorgans than by tho teaching of phonetics. Abovo all, tho teaching of singing under a competent instructor will do more good than anything elso. I havo listened again and again to well-, trained singers and well-trained choirs. I havo never yet heard mispronunciations of sucli words as "about, "down," "name," otc. In tlio teaching of singing, the'competent instructor empha- ' siscs'tho need for tho proper control of tho breath, tho need of opening tho mouth, and tlio necessity of careful and distinct enunciation, as well as pronunciation. At tlio Conference of Headmasters of English Public Schools last year, tho good effects of singing properly taught wero emphasised by many of those present. . Granted that tho great majority of our tcachera, both primary and secondary, bocamo fitted to teach a standard pronunciation of English, and granted that timo could bo given to tho teaching of singing by competent instructors and of carefulness in both pronunciation and enunciation, wo should still find great difficulties iu tho way. In tho first place, it must not bo forgotten that many children are extremely sensitive to the. correction of their spcecli when that is dono in class. I have found this to bo so in very many instances. It must be remembered, too, that though a child lias the ability to speak correctly and may, even in class, answer questions in a language abovo reproach, the same child will, outside tho class-room, fall into tho vcry style of speech that a .teaober desires to roform,. The reason of this iB obvious. Firstly, tho atmosphere iu a olass-room is different from that outsido a. class-room. Secondly, the feeling that lie is speaking in a different fashion from his fellows causes him to ignore wilfully all instruction that lie has received in school. Ono notices over and over again the smilo that conies over the faces of tlio members of a class when ono boy or girl makes an honest endeavour to render a vowel sound correctly. Outside, such a boy or girl would bo laughed at openly, and be accused, to use a colloquialism, of "putting i.n sido." _ Such a remark, coining from ono child to another, is a potent factor in tho destruction of all good that has been dono by the teacher. But an even greater difficulty lies beforo us in-overcoming hoine-influonce. ■, Tlio peoplo of New Zealand aro nothing if not democratic. They scorn, and rightly so, anything that'savours of af-. fectation. Yot their conception of what . is affectation and what is not affectation is sometimes wrong. So i it is in regard to the matter under discussion. I was lecturing, some years ago, to a number of primary school teachers on tho pronunciation and enunciation of English. At tho conclusion of my remarks ono of them said to mo: "Wo havo made attempts to improve the speech of tho children in our classes, ■ but our headmaster received letters ' from parents who objected to their 1 children being taught to speak English 1 different from that spoken by them." 1 Iu other words, "what was good enough for mo is good enough for my child." The task of reforming speech and of bringing, it into conformity with a wellaccepted standard presents then many ' difficulties. As I havo pointed out, wo j 1 have to consider theso difficulties under three heads:. (1) The prononess of all colonial speech' to drift into dialect. (2) Tho inability of very many teachers to set a uniformly correct st-andard. (3) Tho carelessness, sensitiveness of the onriil, living, as ho or slio does, ! for half his or her timo in sujTonndings inimical to correct instruction. But I think that when once both primary and secondary touchers' aro ablo to speak standard English, and are ablo 1 to impart tfieir knowledge to their punils bv tho best methods, then we need havo little fear of remaining difficulties.