ROBERT MCNEIL
Americans thinks the Glaswegian accent is a wee stoater
LONDON, England. News has just come in that Americans prefer the Glaswegian accent to the dulcet tones of Hugh Grant and Prince William. The Prime Minister of Britainshire is expected to make a statement shortly, and police reinforcements have been drafted into the Home Counties as heavy rioting is predicted in many rural areas.
You’ll think it obvious if I point out that the foregoing is parody, but only up to a point. The first sentence is pretty much how I read it on an online international news website.
The news spread rapidly around the world, generally accompanied by pictures of (a) Robert Cedric Nesbitt or (b) a bagpiper yesterday or (c) that muscular bloke in a kilt with all the Yes stuff tattooed on his brawny particulars.
All the same, if I may be permitted to add my own coolly objective assessment of the news: haw-haw. Who’d have thought it? A survey of 1,000 Americans by British Airways found the Glasgow accent to be sexiest in these multi-countried isles.
Second came Cockney, as spoken by Dick Van Dyke in the controversial film, Mary Poppins. The “most intelligent” accent was found to be Geordie, which finds no argument with me, and the least intelligent was Essex, which is a scientific fact.
The person with the best accent in Britain was the People’s Sean (Connery of that ilk), pipping posh persons Hugh Grant and Keira Knightly to the post. It’s heartening news for decent ratepayers the world over who prefer the earthy to the rarefied.
Embra-born Connery’s accent is like a warming alcoholic drink, rich and fruity, and probably beyond most of us, even if we are fellow sons of Scotia.
Hugh Grant’s is an entirely different kettle of piscatorials, with its attractive English diffidence and a perfect enunciation of received pronunciation.
As for Glasgow having the sexiest accent, I have a question: how? By which I mean why. It must be the ease and friendliness, coupled with its lilting Highland and Hibernian influences.
Hearteningly enough, too, one presumes the cross-Atlantic cousins under advisement could understand what they were hearing. Three years ago, a Glasgow University study
‘‘ Connery’s accent is like a warming alcoholic drink, rich and fruity, and probably beyond most of us. Grant’s is a different kettle of piscatorials
found that folk in England only understood a third of what was said in Glaswegian.
Perhaps Americans have a greater appreciation of poetic diction, such as this emotional rendition by Jack out of Still Game: “It’s deid. He musta died, then they cut aff his phone, cause he didny pay his bill, cause he couldny, cause he wis deid.”
The website Clyde-valley.com provides a helpful guide for tourists, including the sound of someone drawing their attention: “Haw Jim.” Another expression visitors might encounter is “Sower-err”, which the site translates as: “The venue requested is in such close proximity as to be visible from your present location.”
A Mr Iain Cummings writes in with a personal favourite, “Awnaw-snaw”, which he interprets as: “Oh dear. Wintry conditions are upon us.”
We all enjoy translating hearty sayings into formal, pompous vocabulary. On the other hand, oddly enough, folk often deride decent, couthy persons for speaking their native tongue. Footer manager John Hughes suffers this for speaking his native Leithonian but, to me, he sounds all the more authentic for it.
Besides, if you wrote down what he said you would find that, unusually for a manager (currently at Inverness, formerly of Hibs), he appears to have some understanding of football, and that the content of his speech is spot, as it were, on.
I have to say my own badly educated Edinburgh accent did not lead to ladies falling at my feet when I visited the States. I do recall one female coming over faint, but a passing medic attributed this to the disorientating effect of my Lidl “Essence of Lavatory” after-shave, which he was surprised to learn was sold legally in Britain.
Apart from that, I also found Americans soliciting my views on leprechauns and Guinness, in the belief that I was Irish. To which I invariably asked them questions about Canada.
If you have a good Glasgow accent and are in need of a spouse, perhaps you should consider boarding a plane for the States and putting yirsell aboot. At the chat-up stage, don’t say like Jamesie Cotter: “Ah don’t think we should be gettin emoashnilly involved.” Mind you, that was to his wife of 15 years. Do say, as Connery’s Bond: “Let me tell you the secret of the world.” Answer: red wine with a white pudding supper.