The Sun 42 WYNDHAM STREET, AUCKLAND SATURDAY, AUGUST 10, 1929 ENGLISH UNDEFILED

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 738, 10 August 1929, Page 10

The Sun 42 WYNDHAM STREET, AUCKLAND SATURDAY, AUGUST 10, 1929 ENGLISH UNDEFILED

THE difficulty about endeavouring to encourage correct speech is that the author is immediately suspected of affectation. Of course, in its social form much of the speech that passes as correct is hopelessly affected and garbled, just as garbled as the careless diction of illiterates who have more excuse for their lapses. Again, there is among other classes a deliberate tendency to overlay their speech with what they choose to regard as a New Zealand idiom and dialect. The fact that this often embraces language tainted with vulgar importations, chiefly Americanisms, is to a great extent ignored. It is indisputable that Americans have a faculty for coining expressive terms, and that where these are bright and apt they are unconsciously drafted for service in the language. But in such circumstances it is the duty of a British stock to be meticulous in its sifting. New Zealand happens to be a country overwhelmingly British; so British that most New Zealanders speak purer English than a large number of newcomers from the British Isles. England is a country over-ridden by the dialects of counties and shires. In New Zealand there are no such divisions. People circulate freely and hence there is not any tendency of one part of the country to develop a manner of speech distinct from that employed in another. But if there is any sign of such a tendency, it occurs more in Auckland than elsewhere. No one should wish to eliminate the expressive colonial idiom which colours much of our speech. That idiom, on the contrary, is a thing we should treasure. But the true idiom is expressed in words rather than in the manner of their pronunciation. The danger is that in addition to the idiom we may interlard our speech with slurred and violated words. The comparative propinquity of Auckland to such a large and distinctively Australian port as Sydney unquestionably contributes to the danger.

The existence of an Australian dialect, if not an actual twang, seems indisputable. To tlie ear accustomed to bearing reasonably pure English, the diction of the average Sydney man is appalling. The same sentiment applies to the more penetrating forms of “Americanese.” The mellifluous accents of Massachusetts and Virginia may be charming, but for the most part English as spoken in. the United States is interesting rather than attractive. Even so, both Americans and Australians are fully entitled to regard their national habits of speech as an acceptable growth. The speech of these two great nations obviously represents some national spirit, and the fact that it does not appeal to others does not alter their pride in a distinctive characteristic of their own. New Zealand’s interest in the tendencies of these two nations lies in her position between them, Unless she guards against it, she is liable in the course of generations to become a melting pot in which these two forms of the English tongue will fuse and blend. The ultimate sequel would be distasteful to New Zealanders, and for that reason there should be more than passing interest in the plea made by Professor Maxwell Walker for close attention to the need for correct speech. Doubtless when lie discussed the question in his address at the University graduation ceremony yesterday, the professor had in mind the carelessness which is the besetting sin of New’ Zealand speech. There may be no deliberate distortion, but carelessness is the surest road to that conclusion, and it must be confessed that even among the assembled graduates who heard Professor Maxwell Walker’s speech there could be found ample evidence of the tendency. It is the last object of those who advocate correct speech that their plea should be made the basis of affectation born purely of snobbery. But it is a fact that outside a limited group of secondary schools, modelled somewhat on the English public school lines, the secondary schools and university colleges of New Zealand are not doing their part to encourage purity of diction in the community. The ultimate improvement sought fry Professor Maxwell Whlker can be achieved, as he perceives. on!y_ through the schools, both primary and secondary, and the impulse can in the long run come only from the university. Hence there is a great deal to be said for the suggestion that professors of. elocution should be appointed to the university colleges. It is hardly necessary to add that the selection of these men should be made with the utmost care, for as elocution is generally understood it is in itself the shelter of so much patent artificiality that many people are shy of it. The incumbents of these offices would have a heavy responsibility, the task of influencing tlie future teachers of the nation so that its speech will remain what it lias happily been m the. past, the purest English spoken anywhere over such an extensive territory. They would refrain from endorsing any of the many cults that frighten sensitive people away from anything that may be suspected of affectation. We do not want tlie Oxford drawl or the slaughtered syllables of the army and the navy. But between all the studied affectation, the carelessness and the. simpering, lies the practice of true and melodious English, which New Zealand should endeavour to encourage and perpetuate.