These 30 Tweets Are Teaching People To Speak In A British Accent And It’s Ridiculously Spot On
When you ask people what they think about British accents, most of them either love ‘em or find them amusing. While some of us are busy swooning over people speaking like Hugh Grant, some Twitter users have pointed out that far from every Brit speaks like they’re Victorian gentlemen and ladies.
We’ve collected some of the most hilarious times that Twitter users have poked fun at people who speak British English (or Bri-ish as one Twitter user who created a viral thread with over 663k likes joked). Upvote the best tweets and let us know in the comments what you think of the way British people speak. Personally, I absolutely adore the variety of accents in the UK, but to each their own.
While we might call it the Queen’s English, very few people apart from the British royals and nobility employ the British English pronunciation the way that Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II does. In fact, there are more than 37 dialects in the British Isles! Scroll down for Bored Panda's interview with Dr. David Britain, Professor of Modern English Linguistics at the University of Bern in Switzerland.
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I'm British (Londoner) and I find it absolutely hilarious that the rest of the world think we talk like we're from the Victorian times. There's so many different accents around and that is not one of them
Not all of us drop our H's. And I've never called anyone "love", because I don't want to sound like a patronising wanker.
I think it's how they would say 'Hello, Love,' when saying 'hi' to someone.
Load More Replies...English people are actually wondering "How come you yanks all think we talk like D**k van Dyke? Haven't you heard how you lot have bastardised the language WE gave to you?? What kind of grammar (not your female grand parent) are you using?? A perfect example is shown at the beginning of all of your posts...'British people be like...." That is clearly not grammatically correct is it!!
it seems like these accents are of the southern variety and do not reflect British accents.
Do people not realise there are thousands of different types of British / English accents. Seriously we don't all talk like that. Yeah yeah it's a joke but still.
This sounds like it was written by an American trying to do an impression of D**k Van Dyke trying to do his Cockney voice in Mary Poppins.
People never say "I'm British". Never. That's an American misunderstanding. We say "I'm English", or Welsh, Scottish, Irish, but never British.
Not true at all, I always say I'm British. Saying I'm 'English' sounds weird to me
Load More Replies...If your from Wales it would be "I'm Welsh" If from Scotland it would be "I'm Scottish" If from Northan Ireland "am Bro ish" If from Liverpool "I'm Scouse"
According to Dr. Britain, the dialect that Americans most closely associate with British people is "almost certainly" Standard British English "with the accent known as Received Pronunciation."
"This is the one they are exposed to the most through the media, and the accent they may know from the Royal family. Some will know Scottish accents, and perhaps also London (the traditional accent of which is known as Cockney)," the professor explained to Bored Panda about the most common stereotypes that foreigners have when it comes to British pronunciation and accents.
My British husband does. Now I do. I'm South African 😄
Load More Replies...Who tf doesn't say it like "chewsday". Do you say "toozday" or what?
Never, ever used the term innit. When asking a question I may say ay it
I'm from South East London, born in Croydon. It is mostly 'chavs' that say init.
Why do people thing we don't pronounce the letter T... in fact we probably do so way more than Americans. Think about it. We say "Letter". You say "Ledder".
I'm British and would have turned out this way if my mother hadn't constantly corrected me. I.e I say bu-er to be admonished 'butter has 2 t' s! '
Mainly Londoners that miss the t like that. The rest of us pronounce it
Hell, I'll even leave out the first "R" of "February".
Load More Replies...Listen to the American accent.... I have to correct my daughter who says dawg
We also say "beauty-full"! 😊 Not just in Philly, either; with so many suburbs, things spread quickly outward. Especially with folks moving from center city out to the suburbs and small places in the country.
Load More Replies...Wait a second... How else are you supposed to say Wednesday? As a native French speaker, I'm really confused now
It is said Wensday. It is said differently to how it's spelt.
Load More Replies...Ok. So Americans be like.... Munday, Tooseday, Whensday, ThUrsdaay, Fridey, SatERday Sundie
Dr. Britain noted that the variety of British accents and dialects has both grown and shrunk in the last few decades! "There is a lot of evidence that many of the traditional, especially rural accents and dialects, are being leveled away with people using accents common to their whole region rather than their locality. But there is also evidence that urban areas continue to diversify, and new accents and dialects are emerging because of immigration and mobility.
Whether it's the Hugh Grant accent or the 'Peta Paka' accent these are not 'British' accents as no such accent exists. These are accents of the south of England only. You'll find a plethora of other accents including Welsh, Scots and Irish..
I'm not even sure how they mean 'paka' is pronounced. Do they mean pakka or Pahker? Totally agree that there are many, many accents in the UK.
Load More Replies...I pronounce the R in Parker so do many people I know. Others don’t pronounce the R. It all depends on your regional dialect. There really is no 1 British accent.
Then there is me who has never left australia has strong British accent.
Load More Replies...Jesus we're not Victorian Street Urchins and we don't all talk in Cockney Rhyming slang either. I'm guessing these posts are mostly by Americans. A Nation who appropriated our language and bastardised it, mispronounce and even can't spell most of it correctly.
Nowhere in Britain would anyone say paka instead of parker. NOWHERE.
Actually, some British people say "Peter Parker", .....but I don't know anyone.
I am finding the people on this site are not in the slightest funny, it is a pity you hate the British so much, but do we really care?
We also wanted to know just how important British popular culture and media are when it comes to forming stereotypes about the way that Brits speak. Here's what Dr. Britain had to say: "It's very important in Britain certainly—many people's main exposure to different funny accents is through the media, and so the media are very powerful—the way they present these accents has an important effect on how they are perceived."
He continued: "Rural people in southern England are very often represented as all having the same dialect (which they don't actually have) and are often presented as rather traditional, friendly but unintelligent, and unworldly characters, so their accents become tied in people's minds to these attributes."
Of course, ever since the Progressive commercial, I feel bad when people call him Bigfoot. ("What did you call me?" (Looks at feet, hurt.) "My name is Darryl.")
I agree. Poor Darryl looks so sad about being called Bigfoot.
Load More Replies...That would be too big of a reaction, they'd more likely not even flinch. Honestly, I saw a dude on tube in a banana costume and nobody even noticed him. They're like "meh" to anything odd.
Because of the high concentration of eccentrics - you get used to weird things.
Load More Replies...Being English I have no idea where this comes from, must be the Americans inventing things again.
"Internationally, it is often the case, for example, that Brits often play clever but evil characters in film, and so their accents can then also (outside Britain) be associated with those traits. We, in Britain, think this is funny of course, as we don't have those associations about ourselves."
According to Dr. Britain, the media are very important in spreading awareness of accents and creating stereotypical links between accents and character traits. "But it wasn't also the case. I can recall my dad (born in 1928) telling me he was 20 before he heard an American accent for the first time. Now that is inconceivable."
Where did they get the 'cow' bit? I've only heard it as co to rhyme with low. Though the Nointeen is D**k Van Dyke in Mary Poppins version of English.
Load More Replies...I've clearly been mispronouncing it since the beginning!! If I now start saying it right can I please resume my old 'normal' life??
Where the heck do you all come from? This is maybe what one may hear in London, definitely not British in general.
Um no. That's like saying..... "I likes ma gun and I likes shootin' ma hillbilly nayba's" .... said every American person ever.
Fun fact: London is just one part of Britain. Fun fact 2: Britain is made of three separate countries, and within these countries are multiple accents! Does every American drink kwah-fee?
Londoners maybe, people form Essex definitely. Rest of the country? Not so much.
Never said fank yew in my life - usually - thanks, ta, reet or cheers
speaking of British people and youtube. anytime there is an informational video and a British person is talking it automatically means everything is true
Brit YouTube channels for hobbies, crafts, etc are the WORST! They have no idea how to get to the point. They ramble on and on about sh*t that has no bearing on the subject. They're like, "when ma da taught me how to ride me pennyfarthing, mum was making me porridge and I remember I thought to myself, 'one day I'll learn how to make bespoke bumbershoots by hand, and that's how I came to grow champion aubergines 🍆 '"
Load More Replies...We have the tube in London, no one I know in London pronounces it toob. It's chube where I'm from
Literally, all of these are calling out the cockney, London accent, it's like the rest of the world doesn't realise we're a cultural melting pot with a vast amount of different accents - not just this one.
This one certainly does not and millions of others don't either, stop kidding yourself
It’s like their “t” means “ch”. For example: Today’s chusday innit
How a Brit speaks depends not only on what part of the country they’re from but also on their social class. One of the best-known dialects worldwide is Cockney which was (and still is) spoken by London’s working class. In fact, some Twitter users who are gently mocking British people are most likely thinking of people speaking Cockney in their minds.
Another well-known dialect is spoken by people from Yorkshire County. One of the things that sets it apart is that words that end with ‘ee’ sounds are pronounced as ‘eh.’ Want to say that something’s ‘nasty’ in Yorkshire and sound like a local? Try saying ‘nasteh!’
Unless you’re not beautiful, then we say - f*k in ell mayt that geezer is well mingin
Ha ha ha I say that all the time! Am loving this - also I can hear the different dialects in some of these posts! 😂
I heard northern/Yorkshire in this one. It’s the Joe king bit with the space.
Load More Replies...Very true - only mathematics to people who don't understand much
Load More Replies...maths , because unlike yanks we know these's more than one mathematical problem....and who the f**k says init?????????
Nope. It would be Maths, and it would be "are". Maths are plural.
I don't think so. Possibly 'mathematics is hard, isn't it?', or alternatively 'my goodness, this maths is really tricky, is it not?' - enunciation is paramount.
No, they say "maths", being sure to emphasize that there is more than one math
We normally say math here but I normally say maths. Lego is the only one where the s dies completely
I'm American, so "maths" is incorrect grammar, but at the same time we don't pronounce "bomb" like "tomb" or "womb"
There are two accents that foreigners often mix up: the Northern Irish and Scottish ones. The first one’s very melodic, but people using it tend to miss out on some letters in words.
Meanwhile, there are various Scottish accents that vary from city to city. In parts of the country, the accent becomes incredibly similar to the Northern Irish one and it becomes hard to tell apart. And if you find yourself blushing with embarrassment because you find it difficult to understand a Scotsman speaking, don’t worry—some Scots have problems deciphering how others from Scotland, especially Glasgow, speak.
Don't sell roar eggs, or you'll be hearing from the loar!
Load More Replies...My.husband is from New Jersey (USA) and after 60 years in south Georgia (USA), he still says, ""I soar an eagle..." His whole family speaks like that.
Wait, I KNOW the reason for this one! My Australian daughter-in-law explained it when my son was teasing her about this. Once I knew the rule, I saw it holds true -- when a word ends in a vowel and the next word starts with a vowel, you put an R at the end of the first word.
What word is that supposed to be? I’ve tried saying it a million different ways. 🤷♀️
the bee -ools, ah row smit, jur-ney, and red hoat chile peppars
Why do you pronounce the r in magma but not in butter
Load More Replies...No, no, we (the British) tend to say our British bands the same as everyone else does
Finally, let’s not forget the Scouse dialect spoken by people from Liverpool and made popular by The Beatles. It’s a very nasal dialect, so if you want to sound like John, Paul, Ringo, and George, you’d better start practicing!
Definitely Brumie. Down south it’s ryce and in Scotland it’s r.r.rice
Load More Replies...No marra - we'd want ta know wot sort - we'd say basmati - or white rice, or puddin rice
No why do ppl think ALL BRITTISH PPL ATE LUKE THIS SOME ARE POSHOES U KNOE
It sounds like when my mom said “Harry Potter = Hairy Puto”
Let me correct this one. "British people on holiday are like 'I'm sorry, how much? We're not used to taxes being added on at the checkout. The price displayed is the price we pay, and we don't subsidise minimum wage workers with tips, because we're not neanderthals.'"
Tip industry workers often do not get minimum wage. Their wage is literally their tips. So you are not 'subsidizing', you are paying them.
Load More Replies...what's that supposed to mean? i get the "How much" part. but that's it :D
If written correctly the last part is “you’re having a f*****g laugh aren’t you?” In this situation it means your joking about the price right? Usually used when we think it’s over priced. However we say it at other times too in response to something that sounds outrageous. I didn’t realise how in depth that explanation would be 😂😂
Load More Replies...or Ey I'm British not a fukin (insert whatever country you don't like). Gimme a proper price
So how many consonants do non-Brits think we actually drop? The correct answer is "we never drop them", because we've all seen Countdown.
Why is this guy so triggered in all the comments lmao
Load More Replies...Non British people need to actually lisen to us talk no one talks like this for what I know of
Remove the "innit" and it would make sense. Also it would be "shtewpid"
Oi turns up a lot in this list and apart from the west Midlands that's really more of a D**k Van Dyke thing.
I kept thinking what’s aaaht until I said it again it was art how schupid of mei
More likely to thumb over shoulder and say look at that marra, grand eh ?
We don’t really have Mountain Dew in the U.K. (lack of the right kind of hill billy I guess).
We can send you some of ours so you can get the full hillbilly experience, lol.
Load More Replies...Not at this time of year. The Mountain Jew is observing Passover, and is currently unavailable.
And you rednecks would say Mountain Doo. That's wrong as well. (Yes, I'm deliberately referring to all Americans as rednecks in a counter to this thread.)
sort like, 'MAOW-tin Doo' in the Carolinas...
Load More Replies...well getting to the end of all this bastardisation of the english language all i can assume is americans learn how we english speak from eastenders, corination street and emmerdale, not one is accurate in the slightest.
A bit of etymology for you: The word "choob" is a corruption of "tube". It's believed to have originated in Barlinnie Prison, Glasgow and was assigned to inmates who were not as strong as others and were used for the sexual relief of stronger and more violent prisoners.
So you pronounce it properly then :D I hate hearing “youtoob” and “stoopid”. Funniest one was Joey’s (Friends) “emoo”.
Load More Replies...I watch British TV all the time, and this is spot on, just watch Emmerdale, trust me......
God help us if our standard to be judged by is Ennerdale!
Load More Replies...I think bored panda needs to get out more, I'm happy with the fact you think it's funny to observe the way we pronounce English, maybe that's why you all want to speak it.
Chuna butty - only posh fok eat sandwiches - and proberbly cut 'tcrusts off
Ikr? They're trying too hard to come up with one that's funny.
Load More Replies...That’s because it is an aitch (pronounced aitch or haitch depending on your propensity or not for H adding).
I say "Aych" no H at the start. Only when on the phone do I say "hayche" to make it sound less like "A" or "8" to help avoid any confusion especially when on a dodgy line which happens a lot at work.
It's hilarious when people say Hayche instead of ayche.
Load More Replies...I have noticed that many americans have hard time understanding the concept of 'innit' 😂
I'm American, and I feel like I get how these uses make no sense
Load More Replies...We don't get in wardrobes very often! We're happy to use colloquialisms at times.
Only ever heard one person say it like that - he also said Fagitas instead of fajitas.
We are not familiar with Mexican food or Spanish spellings. So we just make a best guess, until told otherwise. I thought my housemate was joking when she told me the proper way to say that word. It is similar to Americans trying to say french-origin words.
That was a while back though, right? Please say that's a while ago.
Load More Replies...Ah no! That is hilarious - we definitely put the Rs in mirror. That's another country's weird way of saying it.
my old homeroom teacher used to say it like Al- uh- min- i -mum always thought this was hiliarious bc she was from scotland
I adopted the US way of saying aluminium because its just too much of tongue twister to say it the English way. People occasionally laugh at me, but a lot less then when their were five extra 'muniums' that came out of my mouth.
It's spelt differently though. Do you find minimum hard to say?
Load More Replies...Um? We heard the movie and listened to how it's pronounced - there's no british spin on how it is said.
You mean the way that Alex Guinness and Ewan McGregor would. You know, the people who play him? (I know Ewans Scottish)
Rattata evolved into Raticate. It's a Pokémon reference XD
Load More Replies...No. Very, very few people in the UK would ever say r******d and no-one has ever pronounced it abschewlutely - not even one of the stronger accents. Nathan you're missing by a mile here fella.
No. It’s ‘not everyone’s cup of tea’. We are not a nation of pee drinkers. P**s takers, sure, but not pee drinkers.
Bit disappointed that these are all cockney-sounding. But I guess Americans & others hearing scousers, geordies, brummies - or anyone from Wales or NI speak mightn't have realised that they were speaking English!
I was going to say the same thing. Britain, like America, has their dialects and accents. Not everyone in Britain talks like this.
Load More Replies...Might it be worth pointing out that the UK is not just composed of England alone? Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland are also (for now at least) part of Union... And we don't just have our own accents, we have our own entire LANGUAGES, thanks.
Sigh. My American colleague said to me after I did a presentation "It's too bad you don't have a classic British accent". After some quizzing, I worked out that he meant '"too bad you don't sound like Renee Zellweger doing a poor impression of a British accent in Bridget Jones' Diary".
This is awful. Everyone thinks we all live in one suburb of East London. We have hundreds of accents and dialects. Plus, we don't feel the need to say "be like" in every chuffing sentence.
I'm in nz, my dad's from Lisbon, country Anterrim in ireland: when he hears a Brit speak he seems to know exactly what part of the UK they're from, it's quite interesting. From what I know, you're absolutely right: you guys have an enormous range of accents, almost from borough to borough
Load More Replies...most of these "sound" like Bart Simpson doing a dodgy British/Hackney accent.
Please do continue to correct the way we pronounce the language we invented, because clearly it is we, not you, who have the accent.
Nobody's correcting you? They're just showing how you sound to them.
Load More Replies...It's a shame that all the Yanks over there in 'Murica seem to think we all talk like D**k Van Dyke character Bert in Mary Poppins or Audrey Hepburn's character Eliza Dolittle character in My Fair Lady. That would be like the British watching old reruns of the Dukes of Hazzard and thinking all Americans talked with a Redneck Hill billy accent Or watching Jersey Shore and thinking everybody talked like Snooky or Pauly D.
Sadly no, this is how SOME Londoners talk, if you look at the country of Britain it includes Scotland and Wales as well as the rest of England where people have thousands of accents...so no this is not what British people sound like, just a very small segment of Londoners, shame you didn't title this correctly because you have just tarred and entire country with one accent!!! Like saying all Americans talk like a quarter of New Yorkers!!
Bit disappointed that these are all cockney-sounding. But I guess Americans & others hearing scousers, geordies, brummies - or anyone from Wales or NI speak mightn't have realised that they were speaking English!
I was going to say the same thing. Britain, like America, has their dialects and accents. Not everyone in Britain talks like this.
Load More Replies...Might it be worth pointing out that the UK is not just composed of England alone? Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland are also (for now at least) part of Union... And we don't just have our own accents, we have our own entire LANGUAGES, thanks.
Sigh. My American colleague said to me after I did a presentation "It's too bad you don't have a classic British accent". After some quizzing, I worked out that he meant '"too bad you don't sound like Renee Zellweger doing a poor impression of a British accent in Bridget Jones' Diary".
This is awful. Everyone thinks we all live in one suburb of East London. We have hundreds of accents and dialects. Plus, we don't feel the need to say "be like" in every chuffing sentence.
I'm in nz, my dad's from Lisbon, country Anterrim in ireland: when he hears a Brit speak he seems to know exactly what part of the UK they're from, it's quite interesting. From what I know, you're absolutely right: you guys have an enormous range of accents, almost from borough to borough
Load More Replies...most of these "sound" like Bart Simpson doing a dodgy British/Hackney accent.
Please do continue to correct the way we pronounce the language we invented, because clearly it is we, not you, who have the accent.
Nobody's correcting you? They're just showing how you sound to them.
Load More Replies...It's a shame that all the Yanks over there in 'Murica seem to think we all talk like D**k Van Dyke character Bert in Mary Poppins or Audrey Hepburn's character Eliza Dolittle character in My Fair Lady. That would be like the British watching old reruns of the Dukes of Hazzard and thinking all Americans talked with a Redneck Hill billy accent Or watching Jersey Shore and thinking everybody talked like Snooky or Pauly D.
Sadly no, this is how SOME Londoners talk, if you look at the country of Britain it includes Scotland and Wales as well as the rest of England where people have thousands of accents...so no this is not what British people sound like, just a very small segment of Londoners, shame you didn't title this correctly because you have just tarred and entire country with one accent!!! Like saying all Americans talk like a quarter of New Yorkers!!
