REFERENCE BASE
RHOTICITY IN ENGLISH

O.T. FORD

Rhoticity is the pronunciation of ‘R’ sounds, phonemes represented with the letter ‘R’ or its analogues; in the context of English, the ‘R’ sound in question is [ɹ]. English is spoken natively all over the world, but it is the predominant native dialect in three regions: North America, the British Isles, and Australasia. In all of those regions, [ɹ] is the sound used for ‘R’ at the beginning of syllables. Within the native dialects of these regions, there is a division between rhotic dialects, in which [ɹ] is pronounced in all contexts, and non-rhotic dialects, in which [ɹ] is systematically deleted in certain contexts (namely, at the end of syllables, or after a vowel but before a consonant). The standard North American dialect is rhotic, while the standard British dialect is non-rhotic. The fact that English originated in Britain has given rise to widespread misunderstandings about the distribution, geographically and historically, of non-rhoticity. The basic fact is this: rhoticity is the historical norm, while non-rhoticity is a late innovation that began in the south of England, did not become widely used until after the settlement of North America, and has still not spread into all the English vernaculars even in England itself. The settlers in the New World brought their accents with them.

Non-rhoticity is used anachronistically to distinguish the British, and especially the British upper classes, in filmed period dramas. It’s reasonable for British films to use non-rhotic accents in these situations — producing films in the local vernacular is perfectly normal — but this only makes sense if non-rhotic accents are used for all characters. It is completely unreasonable for North American films to use non-rhotic accents, or to deliberately seek out British actors, for British characters in colonial settings. For example, ‘The last of the Mohicans’ (1992), set on the Hudson Valley frontier in 1757, casts a British actor (Daniel Day-Lewis) to play its North American protagonist, but speaking in a rhotic accent, while his British rival, also played by a British actor (Steven Waddington), speaks in a modern British non-rhotic accent. At best, director Michael Mann is communicating to his audience in the conventions of cinema: British accent means British guy, American accent means American guy. He is either exhibiting his own ignorance, or playing to his audience’s. In reality, both of these characters would have spoken with rhotic accents, because non-rhotic speech was not yet standard in Britain.

Non-rhoticity is also used anachronistically in medieval and quasi-medieval settings where modern English didn’t even exist. It would probably be impossible to get a Robin Hood story filmed with rhotic accents, even when the cast (as in ‘Prince of thieves’) contains numerous speakers of American English. Most modern tales of Robin Hood take place in the early 1190s, when the inhabitants of England spoke very early Middle English, or medieval Norman French. If the Merry Men spoke early Middle English, we (Brits and Yanks alike) wouldn’t understand it. If an American filmmaker is going to translate the language for modern (mostly American*) audiences, there is no reason to translate it into British English. That somewhat defeats the purpose.

Even when a story is written by an American author and set in a completely-fictitious world, cinema tropes apparently demand that it be filmed with British accents, solely because the technology is medieval. Such is the case with ‘The princess bride’ and ‘Game of thrones’. ‘The princess bride’ (written by William Goldman of Chicago) features American actors Robin Wright and Chris Sarandon alongside Brit Cary Elwes, all performing British accents to portray natives of the fictitious Florin, while American Wallace Shawn uses his own rhotic accent to play a Sicilian, American Mandy Pantinkin attempts a Spanish accent, and Frenchman André the Giant uses what I take to be his own accent to play a Turk. ‘Game of thrones’ is practically an employment program for British actors (only Peter Dinklage is a North American — performing a British accent, of course). Author George R.R. Martin created Westeros as something of an anti-fantasy, challenging conventions of the genre; and yet all the actors use British accents. Bizarrely, the showrunners and actors take pains to create geographical differentiation among the characters by incorporating a wide range of accents — provided those accents all come from Britain. At least with ‘The lord of the rings’, the employment of modern British accents can be said to fit the intent of the author, as J.R.R. Tolkien was British and drawing so heavily from British culture and history. George R.R. Martin is from New Jersey.

If there is a general explanation for all of this other than ignorance, it is likely to be a cultural inferiority complex on the part of North Americans with regards to their British cousins. The British accent is taken as more sophisticated, more educated, more cultured, more dignified. With respect to the English, in any case, the idea of the arrogant Yank is quite dubious.

* Hollywood films still earn a majority or near-majority of their revenue from screenings in the United States alone. The foreign market, meanwhile, consists heavily of people who don’t speak English natively at all.

© O.T. FORD