Received Pronunciation (RP) is theaccent ofBritish English regarded as thestandard one, carrying the highestsocial prestige, since as late as the beginning of the 20th century.[1][2] It is also commonly referred to as theQueen's English orKing's English. The study of RP is concerned only with matters of pronunciation, while other features ofstandard British English, such asvocabulary,grammar, andstyle, are not considered.
Language scholars have long disagreed on RP's exact definition, how geographically neutral it is, how many speakers there are, the nature and classification of its sub-varieties, how appropriate a choice it is as a standard, how the accent has changed over time, and even its name.[3] Furthermore, RP has changed to such a degree over the last century that many of its early 20th-century traditions of transcription and analysis have become outdated or are no longer consideredevidence-based bylinguists.[4]Standard Southern British English (SSBE) is a label some linguists use for the variety that gradually evolved from RP in the late 20th century and replaced it as the commonplace standard variety ofSouthern England,[5] while others now simply use SSBE and RP assynonyms.[6] Still, the older traditions of RP analysis continue to be commonly taught and used, for instance inlanguage education andcomparative linguistics, and RP remains a popularumbrella term in British society.
Although a form ofStandard English had been established in theCity of London by the end of the 15th century, it did not begin to resemble RP until the late 19th century.[12][13] RP has most in common with the dialects of what has been termed the South East Midlands, in particular theGolden Triangle of universities, namely London, Oxford and Cambridge, and the public schools that fed them, such asEton,Harrow andRugby.[14] In 1922, theBBC selected RP as its broadcasting standard, citing its being widely understood globally as a reason.[14]
According toFowler's Modern English Usage (1965), "the correct term is 'the Received Pronunciation'. The word 'received' conveys its original meaning of 'accepted' or 'approved', as in 'received wisdom'."[15]
Some linguists have used the term "RP" while expressing reservations about its suitability.[16][17][18] The Cambridge-publishedEnglish Pronouncing Dictionary (aimed at those learning English as a foreign language) uses the phrase "BBC Pronunciation", on the basis that the name "Received Pronunciation" is "archaic" and thatBBC News presenters no longer suggest high social class and privilege to their listeners.[19] Other writers have also used the name "BBC Pronunciation".[20][21] The term 'The Queen's English' has also been used by some writers.[14]
The phoneticianJack Windsor Lewis frequently criticised the name "Received Pronunciation" in his blog: he has called it "invidious",[22] a "ridiculously archaic, parochial and question-begging term"[23] and noted that American scholars find the term "quite curious".[24] He used the term "General British" (to parallel "General American") in his 1970s publication ofA Concise Pronouncing Dictionary of American and British English[25] and in subsequent publications.[26] The name "General British" is adopted in the latest revision of Gimson'sPronunciation of English.[27] Beverley Collins and Inger Mees use the term "Non-Regional Pronunciation" for what is often otherwise called RP, and reserve the term "Received Pronunciation" for the "upper-class speech of the twentieth century".[28] Received Pronunciation has sometimes been called "Oxford English", as it used to be the accent of most members of theUniversity of Oxford.[14] TheHandbook of the International Phonetic Association uses the name "Standard Southern British". Page 4 reads:
Standard Southern British (where 'Standard' should not be taken as implying a value judgment of 'correctness') is the modern equivalent of what has been called 'Received Pronunciation' ('RP'). It is an accent of the south east of England which operates as a prestige norm there and (to varying degrees) in other parts of the British Isles and beyond.[29]
Faced with the difficulty of defining a single standard of RP, some researchers have tried to distinguish between sub-varieties:
Gimson (1962) proposed Conservative, General, and Advanced; "Conservative RP" referred to a traditional accent associated with older speakers with certain social backgrounds; General RP was considered neutral regarding age, occupation or lifestyle of the speaker; and Advanced RP referred to speech of a younger generation of speakers.[30][31] Later editions (e.g., Gimson 2008) use the terms General, Refined and Regional RP. In the latest revision of Gimson's book, the terms preferred are General British (GB), Conspicuous GB and Regional GB.[27]
Wells (1982) refers to "mainstream RP" and "U-RP"; he suggests that Gimson's categories of Conservative and Advanced RP referred to the U-RP of the old and young respectively. However, Wells stated, "It is difficult to separate stereotype from reality" with U-RP.[32] Writing on his blog in February 2013, Wells wrote, "If only a very small percentage of English people speak RP, as Trudgill et al. claim, then the percentage speaking U-RP is vanishingly small" and "If I were redoing it today, I think I'd drop all mention of 'U-RP'".[33]
Upton distinguishes between RP (which he equates with Wells's "mainstream RP"), Traditional RP (after Ramsaran 1990), and an even older version which he identifies with Cruttenden's "Refined RP".[34]
An article on the website of theBritish Library refers to Conservative, Mainstream and Contemporary RP.[35]
Traditionally, Received Pronunciation has been associated with high social class. It was the "everyday speech in the families of Southern English persons whose men-folk [had] been educated at the great public boarding-schools"[36] and which conveyed no information about that speaker's region of origin before attending the school. An 1891 teacher's handbook stated, "It is the business of educated people to speak so that no-one may be able to tell in what county their childhood was passed".[37] Nevertheless, in the 19th century some British prime ministers, such asWilliam Ewart Gladstone, still spoke with some regional features.[38]
Opinions differ over the proportion of Britons who speak RP.Trudgill estimated 3% in 1974,[39] but that rough estimate has been questioned byJ. Windsor Lewis.[40] Upton notes higher estimates of 5% (Romaine, 2000) and 10% (Wells, 1982) but refers to these as "guesstimates" not based on robust research.[41]
The claim that RP is non-regional is disputed, since it is most commonly found in London and the southeast of England. It is defined in theConcise Oxford English Dictionary as "the standard accent of English as spoken in the South of England",[42] and alternative names such as "Standard Southern British" have been used.[43]Despite RP's historic high social prestige in Britain,[44] being seen as the accent of those with power, money, and influence, it may be perceived negatively by some as being associated with undeserved, or accidental, privilege[45][46] and as a symbol of the southeast's political power in Britain.[46] Based on a 1997 survey, Jane Stuart-Smith wrote, "RP has little status in Glasgow, and is regarded with hostility in some quarters".[47] A 2007 survey found that residents of Scotland and Northern Ireland tend to dislike RP.[48] It is shunned by some with left-wing political views, who may be proud of having accents more typical of the working classes.[49]
Since the Second World War, and increasingly since the 1960s, a wider acceptance of regional English varieties has taken hold in education and public life.[50][51] Nonetheless, surveys from 1969 to 2022 consistently show that RP is perceived as the most prestigious accent of English in the United Kingdom. In 2022, 25% of British adults reported being mocked for their regional accent at work, and 46% in social situations.[2]
In the early days of British broadcasting, speakers of English origin almost universally used RP. The first director-general of theBBC,Lord Reith, encouraged the use of a 'BBC accent' because it was a "style or quality of English which would not be laughed at in any part of the country". He distinguished the BBC accent from the 'Oxford accent', to which he was "vehemently opposed".[52] In 1926 the BBC established anAdvisory Committee on Spoken English with distinguished experts, includingDaniel Jones, to advise on the correct pronunciation and other aspects of broadcast language. The Committee proved unsuccessful and was dissolved after theSecond World War.[53] While the BBC did advise its speakers on pronunciation, there was never a formalised official BBC pronunciation standard.[54] A notable departure from the use of RP came with the Yorkshire-born newsreaderWilfred Pickles during the Second World War; his accent allowing listeners to more clearly distinguish BBC broadcasts from German propaganda, though Pickles had modified his accent to be closer to RP.[55][56]Since the Second World War RP has played a much smaller role in broadcast speech. RP remains the accent most often heard in the speech of announcers and newsreaders on BBC Radio 3 and Radio 4, and in some TV channels, but non-RP accents are now more widely encountered.[57]
Most English dictionaries published in Britain (including theOxford English Dictionary) now give phonetically transcribed RP pronunciations for all words. Pronunciation dictionaries represent a special class of dictionary giving a wide range of possible pronunciations: British pronunciation dictionaries are all based on RP, though not necessarily using that name. Daniel Jones transcribed RP pronunciations of words and names in theEnglish Pronouncing Dictionary. Cambridge University Press continues to publish this title, as of 1997 edited byPeter Roach. Two other pronunciation dictionaries are in common use: theLongman Pronunciation Dictionary,[58] compiled byJohn C. Wells (using the name "Received Pronunciation"), andClive Upton'sOxford Dictionary of Pronunciation for Current English,[59] (now republished asThe Routledge Dictionary of Pronunciation for Current English).[60]
Pronunciation forms an essential component of language learning and teaching; amodel accent is necessary for learners to aim at, and to act as a basis for description in textbooks and classroom materials. RP has been the traditional choice for teachers and learners ofBritish English.[61] However, the choice of pronunciation model is difficult, and the adoption of RP is in many ways problematic.[62][63]
Voiceless plosives (/p/,/t/,/k/,/tʃ/) areaspirated at the beginning of a syllable, unless a completely unstressed vowel follows. (For example, the/p/ is aspirated in "impasse", with primary stress on "-passe", but not "compass", where "-pass" has no stress.) Aspiration does not occur when/s/ precedes in the same syllable, as in "spot" or "stop". When asonorant/l/,/r/,/w/, or/j/ follows, this aspiration is indicated by partialdevoicing of the sonorant.[66]/r/ is africative when devoiced.[65]
Syllable final/p/,/t/,/tʃ/, and/k/ may be either preceded by aglottal stop (glottal reinforcement) or, in the case of/t/, fully replaced by a glottal stop, especially before asyllabic nasal (bitten[ˈbɪʔn̩]).[66][67] The glottal stop may be realised ascreaky voice; thus, an alternative phonetic transcription ofattempt[əˈtʰemʔt] could be[əˈtʰemm̰t].[65]
As in other varieties of English, voiced plosives (/b/,/d/,/ɡ/,/dʒ/) are partly or even fully devoiced at utterance boundaries or adjacent tovoiceless consonants. The voicing distinction between voiced and voiceless sounds is reinforced by a number of other differences, with the result that the two of consonants can clearly be distinguished even in the presence of devoicing of voiced sounds:
Aspiration of voiceless consonants syllable-initially
Glottal reinforcement of /p, t, k, tʃ/ syllable-finally
Shortening of vowels before voiceless consonants
As a result, some authors prefer to use the termsfortis andlenis[68] in place ofvoiceless andvoiced. However, the latter are traditional and in more frequent usage.
Monophthongs of a fairly conservative variety of RP. FromRoach (2004, p. 242)Monophthongs of a modern variety of RP. Adapted fromCruttenden (2014)Ranges of the weak vowels in RP and GA. FromWells (2008, p. XXV)Allophones of some RP monophthongs, fromCollins & Mees (2003:92, 95, 101). The red ones occur before dark/l/,[75] and the blue one occurs before velars.[76]
The long mid front vowel/ɛː/ is elsewhere transcribed with the traditional symbols ⟨ɛə,eə⟩. The predominant realisation in contemporary RP ismonophthongal.[77]
Many conventional descriptions of the RP vowel system group the non-diphthongal vowels into the categories "long" and "short". This should not be taken to mean that RP hasminimal pairs in which the only difference is vowel length. "Long" and "short" are convenient cover terms for a number of phonetic features. The long-short pairings shown above include also differences in vowel quality.
The vowels called "long"high vowels in RP/iː/ and/uː/ are slightlydiphthongized, and are often narrowly transcribed in phonetic literature as diphthongs[ɪi] and[ʊu].[78][a] The starting point of the diphthongal/uː/ can be either close to[ʊ] or a more centralised and even unrounded[ɨ̞], and its narrow transcriptions could be either[ʊu] or[ɨ̞ɯ̈].[79]
Vowels may be phonologically long or short (i.e. belong to the long or the short group of vowel phonemes) but their length is influenced by their context: in particular, they are shortened if a voiceless (fortis) consonant follows in the syllable, so that, for example, the vowel inbat[bæʔt] is shorter than the vowel inbad[bæˑd]. The process is known aspre-fortis clipping. Thus phonologically short vowels in one context can be phoneticallylonger than phonologically long vowels in another context.[65] For example, the vowel called "long"/iː/ inreach/riːtʃ/ (which ends with a voiceless consonant) may be shorter than the vowel called "short"/ɪ/ in the wordridge/rɪdʒ/ (which ends with a voiced consonant). Wiik,[80] cited in (Cruttenden 2014), published durations of English vowels with a mean value of 172ms for short vowels before voiced consonants but a mean value of 165 ms for long vowels preceding voiceless consonants.[81]
Innatural speech, the plosives/t/ and/d/ often have no audible release utterance-finally, and voiced consonants are partly or completely devoiced (as in[b̥æˑd̥]); thus the perceptual distinction between pairs of words such asbad andbat, orseed andseat rests mostly on vowel length (though the presence or absence of glottal reinforcement provides an additional cue).[82]
Unstressed vowels are both shorter and more centralised than stressed ones. In unstressed syllables occurring before vowels and in final position, contrasts between long and short high vowels are neutralised and short[i] and[u] occur (e.g.happy[ˈhæpi],throughout[θɹuˈaʊʔt]).[83] The neutralisation is common throughout many English dialects, though the phonetic realisation of e.g.[i] rather than[ɪ] (a phenomenon calledhappy-tensing) is not as universal.
Diphthongs of RP. FromRoach (2004, p. 242)Closing diphthongs of RP (with the diphthongal realisations of/iː/ and/uː/). Adapted fromCruttenden (2014)Centring diphthongs of RP. Adapted fromCruttenden (2014)
The centring diphthongs are gradually being eliminated in RP. The vowel/ɔə/ (as indoor,boar) had largely merged with/ɔː/ by the Second World War, and the vowel/ʊə/ (as inpoor,tour) has more recently merged with/ɔː/ as well among most speakers,[85] although the sound/ʊə/ is still found in conservative speakers, and in less common words such asboor. SeeCURE–FORCE merger. More recently/ɛə/ has become a pure long vowel/ɛː/, as explained above./ɪə/ is increasingly pronounced as a monophthong[ɪː], although without merging with any existing vowels.[86]
The diphthong/əʊ/ is pronounced by some RP speakers in a noticeably different way when it occurs before/l/, if that consonant issyllable-final and not followed by a vowel (the context in which/l/ is pronounced as a "dark l"). The realisation of/əʊ/ in this case begins with a more back, rounded and sometimes more open vowel quality; it may be transcribed as[ɔʊ] or[ɒʊ]. It is likely that the backness of the diphthong onset is the result ofallophonic variation caused by the raising of the back of the tongue for the/l/. If the speaker has "l-vocalization" the/l/ is realised as a back rounded vowel, which again is likely to cause backing and rounding in a preceding vowel ascoarticulation effects. This phenomenon has been discussed in several blogs byJohn C. Wells.[87][88][89] In the recording included in this article the phrase "fold his cloak" contains examples of the/əʊ/ diphthong in the two different contexts. The onset of the pre-/l/ diphthong in "fold" is slightly more back and rounded than that in "cloak".
RP also possesses thetriphthongs/aɪə/ as intire,/aʊə/ as intower,/əʊə/ as inlower,/eɪə/ as inlayer and/ɔɪə/ as inloyal. There are different possible realisations of these items: in slow, careful speech they may be pronounced as two syllables with three distinct vowel qualities in succession, or as a monosyllabic triphthong. In more casual speech the middle vowel may be considerably reduced, by a process known assmoothing, and in an extreme form of this process the triphthong may even be reduced to a single long vowel.[90] In such a case the difference between/aʊə/,/aɪə/, and/ɑː/ intower,tire, andtar may beneutralised with all three units realised as[ɑː] or[äː]. This type of smoothing is known as thetower–tire,tower–tar andtire–tar mergers.
There are differing opinions as to whether/æ/ in theBATHlexical set can be considered RP. The pronunciations with/ɑː/ are invariably accepted as RP.[91] TheEnglish Pronouncing Dictionary does not admit/æ/ inBATH words and theLongman Pronunciation Dictionary lists them with a § marker of non-RP status.[92] John Wells wrote in a blog entry on 16 March 2012 that when growing up in the north of England he used/ɑː/ in "bath" and "glass", and considers this the only acceptable phoneme in RP.[93] Others have argued that/æ/ is too categorical in the north of England to be excluded. Clive Upton believes that/æ/ in these words must be considered within RP and has called the opposing view "south-centric".[94] Upton'sOxford Dictionary of Pronunciation for Current English gives both variants forBATH words. A. F. Gupta's survey of mostly middle-class students found that/æ/ was used by almost everyone who was from clearly north of theisogloss forBATH words. She wrote, "There is no justification for the claims by Wells and Mugglestone that this is a sociolinguistic variable in the north, though it is a sociolinguistic variable on the areas on the border [the isogloss between north and south]".[95] In a study of speech in West Yorkshire,K. M. Petyt wrote that "the amount of/ɑː/ usage is too low to correlate meaningfully with the usual factors", having found only two speakers (both having attended boarding schools in the south) who consistently used/ɑː/.[96]
Jack Windsor Lewis has noted that the Oxford Dictionary's position has changed several times on whether to include short/æ/ within its prescribed pronunciation.[97] TheBBC Pronouncing Dictionary of British Names uses only/ɑː/, but its author, Graham Pointon, has stated on his blog that he finds both variants to be acceptable in place names.[98]
Some research has concluded that many people in theNorth of England have a dislike of the/ɑː/ vowel inBATH words. A. F. Gupta wrote, "Many of the northerners were noticeably hostile to/ɡrɑːs/, describing it as 'comical', 'snobbish', 'pompous' or even 'for morons'."[95] On the subject, K. M. Petyt wrote that several respondents "positively said that they did not prefer the long-vowel form or that they really detested it or even that it was incorrect".[99] Mark Newbrook has assigned this phenomenon the name "conscious rejection", and has cited theBATH vowel as "the main instance of conscious rejection of RP" in his research in WestWirral.[100]
John Wells has argued that, as educated British speakers often attempt to pronounce French names in a French way, there is a case for including/ɒ̃/ (as inbon), and/æ̃/ and/ɜ̃ː/ (as invingt-et-un), as marginal members of the RP vowel system.[101] He also argues against including other French vowels on the grounds that not many British speakers succeed in distinguishing the vowels inbon andbanc, or inrue androue.[101] However, theCambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary draws a distinction between/ɒ̃/ (there rendered as/ɔ̃ː/) and the unrounded/ɑ̃ː/ ofbanc for a total of four nasal vowels.[102]
Not all reference sources use the same system of transcription.Clive Upton devised a modified system for theShorter Oxford English Dictionary (1993) based on contemporary pronunciation. His changes to five symbols from the traditional Gimson system are now used in many otherOxford University Press dictionaries; the differences are shown in the table below.
Geoff Lindsey, arguing that the system of transcription for RP has become outdated, has proposed a new system (which he calls Standard Southern British, or SSB) as a replacement.[103][104] Lindsey's system is as follows—differences between it and standard transcription are depicted with the traditional transcription in parentheses.
Like all accents, RP has changed with time. For example, sound recordings and films from the first half of the 20th century demonstrate that it was usual for speakers of RP to pronounce the/æ/ sound, as inland, with a vowel close to[ɛ], so thatland would sound similar to a present-day pronunciation oflend. RP is sometimes known asthe Queen's English, but recordings show that evenQueen Elizabeth II shifted her pronunciation over the course of her reign, ceasing to use an[ɛ]-like vowel in words likeland.[105] The change in RP may be observed in the home of "BBC English". The BBC accent of the 1950s is distinctly different from today's: a news report from the 1950s is recognisable as such, and a mock-1950s BBC voice is used for comic effect in programmes wishing to satirise 1950s social attitudes such as theHarry Enfield Show and its "Mr. Cholmondley-Warner" sketches.[106][107]
A comparison of theformant values of/iːæɑːɔːʊuː/ for older (black) and younger (light blue) RP speakers. Fromde Jong et al. (2007, p. 1814)
A few illustrative examples of changes in RP during the 20th century and early 21st are given below. A more comprehensive list (using the name "General British" in place of "RP") is given inGimson's Pronunciation of English.[108]
Words such asCLOTH,gone,off,often,cross were formerly pronounced with/ɔː/ instead of/ɒ/, so thatoften andorphan werehomophones (seelot–cloth split). The Queen continued to use the older pronunciations,[109] but it is now rare to hear this on the BBC.
There used to be adistinction betweenhorse andhoarse with an extra diphthong/ɔə/ appearing in words likehoarse,FORCE, andpour.[110] The symbols used by Wright are slightly different: the sound infall, law, saw is transcribed as/oː/ and that inmore, soar, etc. as/oə/.Daniel Jones gives an account of the /ɔə/ diphthong, but notes "many speakers of Received English (sic), myself among them, do not use the diphthong at all, but replace it always by /ɔː/".[111] This distinction had become obsolete in RP by the late 20th century.[112]
The vowel in words such astour,moor,sure used to be/ʊə/, but this has merged with/ɔː/ for most contemporary speakers.[113] The effect of these two mergers (horse-hoarse and moor-more) is to bring about a number of three-way mergers of items which were hitherto distinct, such aspoor,paw andpore (/pʊə/,/pɔː/,/pɔə/) all becoming/pɔː/.
TheDRESS vowel and the starting point of theFACE diphthong has become lowered from mid[e̞] to open-mid[ɛ].[114]
The starting point of thechoice diphthong has raised from[ɔɪ] to[oɪ].[115]
Before the Second World War, the vowel ofcup was a back vowel close tocardinal[ʌ]. It then shifted forward to[ɐ], but[ʌ] is increasingly used in modern RP to avoid the clash with the lowered variety of/æ/ in the[a] region (thetrap-strut merger).[116][117][118]
There has been a change in the pronunciation of the unstressed final vowel ofhappy as a result of a process known ashappY-tensing: an older pronunciation ofhappy would have had the vowel /ɪ/ whereas a more modern pronunciation has a vowel nearer to /iː/.[119] In pronunciation handbooks and dictionaries it is now common to use the symbol /i/ to cover both possibilities.
In a number of words where contemporary RP has an unstressed syllable with schwa/ə/, older pronunciations had/ɪ/, for instance, the final vowel in the following:kindness,doubtless,witness,witless,toilet,fortunate.[107]
The/ɛː/ phoneme (as infair,care,there) was realised as a centring diphthong[ɛə] in the past, whereas most present-day speakers of RP pronounce it as a long monophthong[ɛː].[107]
The/ɪə/ (as innear,serious) and/ʊə/ (as incure,rural; when not merged with/ɔː/) phonemes are also becoming monophthongised to[ɪː] and[ʊː~ɵː], though this is not yet as widespread as for/ɛː/.[120][121]
A change in the symbolisation of the GOAT diphthong reflects a change in the pronunciation of the starting point: older accounts of this diphthong describe it as starting with [ö̞], moving towards [u].[122] This was often symbolised as /ou/ or /oʊ/. In modern RP the starting point is unrounded and central, and is symbolised /əʊ/.[112]
The vowels inLOT andTHOUGHT-NORTH-FORCE, traditionally transcribed as/ɒ/ and/ɔː/, have shifted upwards, and are now close to[ɔ] and[oː], respectively, in quality.[123][124][125][126]
The vowels inFOOT andGOOSE, traditionally transcribed as/ʊ/ and/uː/, have undergone fronting and reduction in the amount of lip-rounding[127] (phonetically, these can be transcribed[ʊ̜̈] and[ʉ̜ː], respectively).
As noted above, theTRAP vowel/æ/ has become more open, near to cardinal[a].[128][102][112]
For speakers of Received Pronunciation in the late 19th century, it was common for the consonant combination⟨wh⟩ (as inwhich,whistle,whether) to be realised as avoiceless labio-velar fricative/ʍ/ (also transcribed/hw/), as can still be heard in the 21st century in the speech of many speakers in Ireland, Scotland and parts of the US. Since the beginning of the 20th century, however, the/ʍ/ phoneme has ceased to be a feature of RP, except in an exaggeratedly precise style of speaking (the wine-whine merger).[129]
There has been considerable growth inglottalisation in RP, most commonly in the form ofglottal reinforcement. This has been noted by writers on RP since quite early in the 20th century.[130] Ward notes pronunciations such as [njuːʔtrəl] forneutral and [reʔkləs] forreckless. Glottalization of /tʃ/ is widespread in present-day RP when at the end of a stressed syllable, as inbutcher [bʊʔtʃə].[131]
The realisation of /r/ as atap or flap [ɾ] has largely disappeared from RP, though it can be heard in films and broadcasts from the first half of the 20th century. The wordvery was frequently pronounced [veɾɪ]. The same sound, however, is sometimes pronounced as an allophone of /t/ when it occurs intervocalically after a stressed syllable – the"flapped /t/" that is familiar in American English. Phonetically, this sounds more like /d/, and this pronunciation is sometimes known as /t/-voicing.[132]
Most RP speakers use /tʃ/ instead of /tj/ and /dʒ/ instead of /dj/ in accented syllables.[113]
A number of cases can be identified where changes in the pronunciation of individual words, or small groups of words, have taken place.
The wordMass (referring to the religious rite) was often pronounced /mɑːs/ in older versions of RP, but the word is now almost always /mæs/.
The indefinite articlean was traditionally used before a sounded /h/ if immediately followed by an unstressed vowel, as in 'an hyaena.'[133] This is now uncommon, especially in speech, and may be confined only to some of the more frequently used words, such as 'horrific' and 'historical.'[134][135][136]
Like most other varieties of English outside Northern England, RP has undergone thefoot–strut split: pairs likeput/putt are pronounced differently.[137]
RP is anon-rhotic accent, so/r/ does not occur unless followed immediately by a vowel. Pairs such asfather/farther,caught/court andformally/formerly are homophones.[138]
RP does not haveyod-dropping after/n/,/t/,/d/,/z/ and/θ/, but some speakers of RP haveyod-dropping after/s/ and/l/. Hence, for example,new,tune,dune,resume andenthusiasm are pronounced/njuː/,/tjuːn/,/djuːn/,/rɪˈzjuːm/ and/ɪnˈθjuːziæzm/ rather than/nuː/,/tuːn/,/duːn/,/rɪˈzuːm/ and/ɪnˈθuːziæzm/. This contrasts with manyEast Anglian andEast Midland varieties ofEnglish language in England and with many forms ofAmerican English, includingGeneral American. In words such aspursuit andallure, both pronunciations (with and without/j/) may be heard in RP, but major dictionaries only list the pronunciation with/j/ forpursuit.[140][141][142] There are, however, several words where a yod has been lost with the passage of time: for example, the wordsuit originally had a yod in RP but this is now extremely rare.
Theflapped variant of/t/ and/d/ (as in much of the West Country, Ulster, most North American varieties including General American, Australian English, and theCape Coloured dialect of South Africa) is not used very often.
RP has undergone thewine–whine merger (so the sequence/hw/ is not present except among those who have acquired this distinction as the result of speech training).[143] TheRoyal Academy of Dramatic Art, based in London, still teaches these two sounds for international breadth as distinct phonemes. They are also distinct from one another in most of Scotland and Ireland, in the northeast of England, and in the southeastern United States.[143]
Unlike some other varieties ofEnglish language in England, there is noh-dropping in words likehead orhorse.[144] In hurried phrases such as "as hard as he could" h-dropping commonly applies to the wordhe.
In traditional RP[ɾ] is anallophone of/r/ (it is used intervocalically after a stressed syllable, after/θ,ð/ and sometimes even after/b,ɡ/).[146][147][148]
TheJournal of the International Phonetic Association regularly publishes "Illustrations of the IPA" which present an outline of the phonetics of a particular language or accent. It is usual to base the description on a recording of the traditional story ofthe North Wind and the Sun. There is an IPA illustration of British English (Received Pronunciation).
The female speaker is described as having been born in 1953 and educated atOxford University. To accompany the recording there are three transcriptions: orthographic, phonemic and allophonic.
The North Wind and the Sun were disputing which was the stronger, when a traveller came along wrapped in a warm cloak. They agreed that the one who first succeeded in making the traveller take his cloak off should be considered stronger than the other. Then the North Wind blew as hard as he could, but the more he blew the more closely did the traveller fold his cloak around him, and at last the North Wind gave up the attempt. Then the Sun shone out warmly, and immediately the traveller took off his cloak. And so the North Wind was obliged to confess that the Sun was the stronger of the two.[149]
^Roach (2009, p. 20)'s notes on one of the reasons for not treating these two phonemes as diphthongs: "I mention above thatiː,uː are often pronounced as slightly diphthongal: although this glide is often noticeable, I have never found it helpful to try to teach foreign learners to pronounceiː,uː in this way."
^Lindsey, Geoff; Wells, John C. (2019).English after RP: standard British pronunciation today. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan.ISBN978-3-030-04356-8.
^Burrell, A. (1891).Recitation: a Handbook for Teachers in Public Elementary School. London.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
^Upton, Clive (21 January 2019). "Chapter 14: British English". In Reed, Marnie; Levis, John (eds.).The Handbook of English Pronunciation. John Wiley & Son. p. 251.ISBN978-1119055266.
^Stuart-Smith, Jane (1999). "Glasgow: accent and voice quality". In Foulkes, Paul; Docherty, Gerard (eds.).Urban Voices. Arnold. p. 204.ISBN0340706082.
^Sangster, Catherine, 'The BBC, its Pronunciation Unit and 'BBC English' in Roach, P., Setter, J. and Esling, J. (eds)Daniel Jones' English Pronouncing Dictionary, 4th Edition, Cambridge University Press, pp. xxviii-xxix
^Discussed inMugglestone (2003, pp. 277–278), but even then Pickles modified his speech towards RP when reading the news.
^Zoe Thornton,The Pickles Experiment – a Yorkshire man reading the news, Transactions of the Yorkshire Dialect Society 2012, pp. 4–19.
^Roach, Peter; Setter, Jane; Esling, John (2011).Daniel Jones' English Pronouncing Dictionary. Cambridge. p. xii.
^Upton, Clive; Kretzschmar, William (2017).The Routledge Dictionary of Pronunciation for Current English. Routledge.ISBN9781138125667.
^"Case Studies – Received Pronunciation". British Library. 13 March 2007. Archived fromthe original on 22 July 2019. Retrieved27 January 2019.As well as being a living accent, RP is also a theoretical linguistic concept. It is the accent on which phonemic transcriptions in dictionaries are based, and it is widely used (in competition with General American) for teaching English as a foreign language.
^Brown, Adam (1991).Pronunciation Models. Singapore University Press.ISBN9971-69-157-4.
^Jones, Daniel (1957).An outline of English phonetics (9th ed.). Heffer. p. 101, para 394.ISBN978-0521210980.{{cite book}}:ISBN / Date incompatibility (help)
^Wikström (2013), p. 45. "It seems to be the case that younger RP or near-RP speakers typically use a closer quality, possibly approaching Cardinal 6 considering that the quality appears to be roughly intermediate between that used by older speakers for the LOT vowel and that used for the THOUGHT vowel, while older speakers use a more open quality, between Cardinal Vowels 13 and 6."
^Collins, Beverley; Mees, Inger (2019).Practical English Phonetics and Phonology (4th ed.). Routledge. p. 52.ISBN978-1-138-59150-9.A tap was also to be heardintervocalically... from old-fashioned traditional RP speakers... It was used for /r/ after a stressed vowel, e.g.carry, very, Paris.
^Moore, Roger (22 July 2003)."A Villainous Mix from Comic Artiste Atkinson".Orlando Sentinel. Tribune Publishing. Retrieved5 July 2025.Born upper-middle-class, he has a distinctly upper-class accent
^"7 Best English Podcasts (Free and Paid)".TruFluency. 23 May 2022. Retrieved3 July 2023.Gyles Brandreth and Susie Dent are the hosts of Something Rhymes with Purple, ... the speech of the hosts tends to show features of the Received Pronunciation (RP) English accent, ...
^Brandreth, Gyles (23 December 2018)."Am I posh? Is David Dimbleby? Are you?".GYLES BRANDRETH. Retrieved3 July 2023....I have a 'posh' accent. In fact, I sound much less fruity and plummy than I used to do. (So does The Queen, incidentally.) I sound very like my father, and English middle class professional people of his generation (he was born in 1910) sounded like he sounded and I sound now.
^Wells, John (8 April 2010)."EE, yet again".John Wells's phonetic blog.
^Lawson, Nigella (24 December 2000)."English as it is spoke".The Guardian. Retrieved15 March 2025.When I was a child, my accent, for example, was Received Pronunciation; now I am given to understand it is posh. I can live with that.
^"Labour MP Angela Rayner: 'I'm proud of my accent'".BBC News. 10 July 2017. Retrieved9 February 2021.Tory MP Jacob Rees-Mogg struggled with his "posh RP [received pronunciation] accent" when he was trying to get elected in Fife.
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Wise, Claude Merton (1957),Introduction to phonetics, Englewood Cliffs{{citation}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
Sounds Familiar?Archived 22 July 2019 at theWayback Machine – Listen to examples of received pronunciation on the British Library's 'Sounds Familiar' website
'Hover & Hear' R.P., and compare it with other accents from the UK and around the World.
