I gave a talk at the Royal Over-Seas League this evening (Over-Seas is always spelt with a hyphen for some reason in the title of the organisation) and there were lots of questions after the talk, one of which was "What exactly is Estuary English?"
I do not speak Estuary English, as I am a northerner, so all my information comes from articles and websites (eg this BBC page). Estuary English is an accent somewhere between RP (received pronunciation) and Cockney, and is popular with many people, as it is not as 'posh' as RP so appeals to those who wish to hide their upper-class origins, yet it is not perceived to be as working-class as Cockney. Tony Blair is said to have adopted Estuary English to sound more ordinary and more appealing to Joe Public. RP speakers adopt some, but not the most extreme, features of the Cockney accent, and this is what gives them an Estuary English accent. So, RP speakers pronounce t in words (water, daughter, bottle, right etc) and Cockneys don't - they use a glottal stop instead. Speakers of Estuary English drop the t in some positions (usually at the end of words) but keep it in others (eg in the middle of short words). The final l of words (eg bill, feel) is likely to be pronounced like a w by Estuary English speakers.
The term Estuary English was coined in the 1980s by David Rosewarne. Here's an article from English Today which he wrote in 1994. It is a fashionable variety of English and has now spread beyond the south-east of England, both northwards and westwards.
One thing that seems to escape all commentators on Estuary English is the modification of the "oo" sound and of the "o" diphthong of which it forms part. The sentence "Susan and Luke got married in June and spent their honeymoon in Corfu" becomes "Season and Leek got married in Jean and spent their honeymean in Corfee"; the sentence "Tony lives in Hove across the road from his folks" becomes "Tainy lives in Haive across the raid from his fakes". I was at a London airport waiting for a plane to Bergamo in Italy; the announcer called it Bergamay. Luckily I was travelling on Ryanair; Dublin has not yet been estuarised, although I wouldn't rule it out in the next 20 years or so.
Posted by: Jonathan | September 30, 2009 at 01:19 PM
Thank you for this, Jonathan. I'll listen out for this as I live in London, where Estuary English is often heard. Since my name is Susan, I'll listen carefully to how people pronounce the vowel sound.
Posted by: Virtual Linguist | September 30, 2009 at 05:41 PM