What is 'Standard English'?
It's relatively easy to define standard forms of other languages:

Standard French = l'Académie Française
Standard Italian = l'Accademia della Crusca
but:
Standard English = ?????
- no Academy
- much more English spoken outside England than in England
- many local 'standard' varieties …
Unofficially, 'standard British English' (and the standard form for much of the Commonwealth) is the form used by "educated people in the South East of Britain".

It is often described as:

The 'standard form' of pronunciation in Britain is known as Received Pronunciation or R.P. However, estimates suggest that only 3-4% of British speakers use R.P. and the figure is probably on the decline!

The main traits of R.P. are:

- "a stiff upper lip",
- no open vowel sounds,
- a non-rhotic pronunciation (the 'r' sound is not sounded at the end of words)

What can we say about 'standard English'?

"One important factor [emerges] in the notion of a standard: it is particularly associated with English in a written form, and we find that there are sharper restrictions in every way upon the English that is written (and especially printed) than upon English that is spoken. …
"Standard English is basically an ideal, a mode of expression that we seek when we wish to communicate beyond our immediate community with members of the wider community of the nation as a whole, or with members of the still wider community, English-speakers as a whole.

Randolph Quirk in 'The Use of English'

But if only 3-4% of British speakers use R.P., what about the other 96-97%?

© Nigel J. Ross, 2003


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