Some of our US friends may find this interesting. It’s about a campaign to teach American tourists the finer expressions of British English. I’m not a native English speaker myself (UK nor US) but nonetheless I like this article.
Klaas Bil
Re: British English is posh?
Ef that and while we’re on the topic ef Richard Nixon for policies that resulted in the American passion for British comedy and drama.
Re: British English is posh?
That story mentioned a dictionary, but it didn’t have “posh” in it.
I’m not a native english speaker either. 
But I do know a variation of it which allows me to understand some of it.
I don’t speak English, I only speak American…
I don’t speak English either i only speak Scottish. I can type in English though!
Gotta love it!
Re: Re: British English is posh?
Here, here! As well, ef Geoffrey Nunberg… this guy’s just further evidence that people who spend too much time in academia alienate themselves from “normal” society…
Speak for yourself, numb-nuts! If we truly felt culturally inferior we’d all be drinking warm beer, have really bad teeth and drive on the wrong side of the road.
I, for one, am proud we don’t go around referring to the storage compartments of our cars with the same word used to describe a heavy-duty piece of footwear. And, ferchrissakes, how can you take anyone seriously who uses words as silly as “poppycock” and “bollocks”? It’s “sht" and "blls,” thank you very much. Such simple terms only need one syllable!
I’m still miffed that we’re hanging onto this word “English” to describe our language – it just ain’t the same, and that ain’t right! 
It is worth noting that the British, considered “posh” here in the States, lifted classism up to a fine art. And while to us most British accents, Cockney being a notable exception, sound classy, they are keenly aware of which are the “right” accents to have and which not.
And let’s not forget too that it is said, by certain professional and otherwise reputable linguists, that our own Appalachian hillbilly is likely to speak more closely as did the Bard than any current resident of England does today.
For what it’s worth, of course.
So how does one learn to speak with a british accent? I suppose it probably first helps to understand it.
Re: Re: Re: British English is posh?
Yes, you should be very,very proud…
I’ve lived in some of the posher and more well-spoken bits of Britain for 19 years now, no-one ever uses the word poppycock. Also i found that article highly amusing when the Americans are complaining about British words creepng in to their language, when people in Britain are always complaining about Americanisms appearing over here. Also, i’ve never been asked for my ‘secret code’, the acronym is PIN.
‘I, for one, am proud we don’t go around referring to the storage compartments of our cars with the same word used to describe a heavy-duty piece of footwear’ -no, you name it after part of an elephant, see how this thing works both ways? Strange how there are certain little phrases that seem so alien, ‘my bad’ for instance annoys me beyond belief. Incidently i hate Marmite, HP sauce and Bovril (even though i was born near the black country) and is it true that America doesn’t currently know of the delicacy which is the pork pie, or the Scotch egg? I can’t believe two such incredibly fattening foodstuffs haven’t found their way on to the American market.
Dave
Here, here, old chap,
-pop the bonnet not the ‘hood’
-who came up with ‘faucet’?
-sidewalk=footpath, color=colour ect… ect…
but we english do get it wrong occasionally, for instance we pronounce Aluminium (al-you-mini-um) wheras the yanks pronounce it (Al-oom-in-um).
their method of pronounciation follows the trend in the elements of that area of the periodic table. It was in fact the discoverer of aluminium who mis-pronounced it, even though all the other scientsts of the time pronounced it (Al-oom-in-um).
Sulpher on the other hand should be left well alone.
oh, and i hope that apple flavour popcorn doesn’t make it over here.
I’m no expert (in fact i’m rubbish, I’ve never been to america) but the MOST annoying americanism ever is the tendancy for ‘cool’ generally black rappers to put ‘izzle’ at the end of words that should in fact be ‘ion’. So (and I quote from a very annoying song doing the rounds here in blighty) “Production” becomes “Producshizzle” (thats how its pronounced, it would be spelt Productizzle, but that sounds stupid 
.
AAAH!
Loose
By jove, one can simply peruse an American film with a british chap in it, they always speak with a spiffingly posh accent, whatwhat.
And at least we don’t name car storage compartments after elephants noses. That would just be silly.
John
cor, blimey matey,
You know, the greetings gallery is still available to upload your hello to the rest of this community in your native or dialect. You can use the opportunity to insert all your proud 'isms (Americanisms, Queen’s English, etc.) to show off your national pride.
The gallery accepts .wav and .mp3 forms as well. So work up your greeting and take a trip to the greetings gallery with your recording.
http://gallery.unicyclist.com/greetings
Bruce
Edit: Kristine, thanks for your input. I have to say for some reason I expected you to have a bit more an accent (compared to midwest America, I suppose). Don’t ask me why I expected it. Maybe I need to study up more on my geography. 
Has anyone read Bill Bryson’s Made in America. It’s a very good book about the evolution and usage of American english.
If you want to hear proper posh talk you should hear my G’parents. They pronounce plastic bag plaarstic bag. Poles apart from the Cheshire.Manchester accent around my way.
My mum had elocution lessons when she was a nipper. She had a garbled mix of Somerset, Wiltshire and Queens English which my G’parents decided needed sorting out.
When I first read Bryson’s The Lost Continent, his first travelogue, I had to get off a subway train before my stop because I was laughing so hard and actually embarrassed myself.
I must say though that I started reading Bryson’s The Mother Tongue, a history of the English language - not limited to the U.S version - and I found his research skills to be wanting and his repeating of discredited linguistic theories annoying at best and disturbing at worst. Truthfully, I never got past page 20 or so but I no longer read anything of his that purports to be other than his wit and opinion.
Good point by BoogieJuice (great name), there’s a long running debate about the pronunciation of words such as: grass, castle, bath. Basically, which ‘a’ sound? i.e. b ah th or b ar th? does this varitaion occur across America, and if not then which one do you use? I, being pure-bred Warwickshire stock, favour the later, people i know from Up North genreally go for the former.
Dave