Schriftliche Hausarbeit zur Ersten Staatsprüfung für die Laufbahn der

Realschullehrer/-innen in Schleswig-Holstein

South-East English Working Class Speech in Film

Dem Prüfungsamt vorgelegt

von Simone Staake

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Contents

1.

Introduction

2.

History and Features of Post-War British Cinema

3.

South-East English Working Class Speech

3.1

Cockney

English

3.1.1

Social Aspects

3.1.2

Linguistic Aspects

3.1.2.1

Rhyming Slang

3.1.2.2

Phonological Aspects

3.2

Estuary English

4

Appearance of Working Class Speech in Films

4.1

Hue and Cry

4.2

Quadrophenia

4.3 Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels

4.4

Chicken Run

5 Cockney as Dramatic Instrument

6 Conclusion

7

Bibliography

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1. Introduction

"Class is one of those phenomena like love, depression

and the feel-good factor which resists definition, though

we know it when we see it."1

This work will try to refute this claim, persisting that class is an

indefinable and merely personal criterion of post-war British movie. It will be

spotted that especially the working-class is, by using typical speech patterns,

a major marker when a film deals with the British class system.

To enlighten in which surrounding the British post-war movie is set, a

brief introduction of the cinema history will be given. This will not only look at

the development in British cinema, but also relate to the country′s historical

and economical changes from the post-war to modern time. As cinema is

always of international concern, relations to other developments in other

countries will be given a short insight when necessary.

As already stated in the quotation above, class and class markers are not

easy to confine. An overview will be given about the British class system and

its importance throughout the history. As this is a characteristic of British

culture and the way of life, some examples of how this self-assurance marks

life will be given by quoting a native sociologist. The focus will lie on the

working class, as this work deals with specific dialects that derive out of the

same. This includes an overview over the history of London′s working class

and special criteria it has to fulfil.

When operating with working class speech, the main dialects for

south-east England will be described, as well as the fundamental idea of the

term

dialect

. This will be included in the historical and sociological

development of both examples being given ­ Cockney English as main

emphasis and Estuary English.

1 Gillett, 2003, p.8

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To analyse speech in movies, special features have to be filtered out. This

will comprise the presentation of specifically Cockney or Estuary English

features, as well as joint markers. It will be shown that only Cockney English

fulfils the decisive factors of a class language and that Estuary English is

more the realisation of a national and sociological shift of language, away

from class or education.

The final part will deal with four post-war British movies.

Hue and Cry

,

Quadrophenia

and

Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels

will form the base,

as they roughly cover the development of British cinema from early post-war

times to present day cinema.

Chicken Run

will be analysed regarding

Cockney English as an instrument in animated children′s Cinema. All movies

will be highlighted concerning the used language. As base, examples will be

given and if possible phonetically transcribed. With this corpus and the

knowledge of the historical and sociological background of each movie, it will

be analysed how the language serves as class marker and dramatic

instrument to transport meaning.

The conclusion will draw back to the quotation above. It will be pointed

out, if it can be refuted and if class can be highlighted in cinema by using

speech as a tool.

2.

History and Features of Post-War British Cinema

During and after World War II the British film found itself in the shadow

of two major influences. The first was the documentary movement with its

understatements, avoidance of excess, and not questioning the social norms,

which developed out of the

People′s War Spirit

; "One of the myths that arose

from war-weary Britain [as] a belief in the unity and equality of the

community. The myth continued for a brief time after the war, fuelled by

hopes for the Labour government′s experiment, when recovering English

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society felt the possibility of continuing the unity experienced in the "people′s

war" to solve the nation′s massive social problems."2

The second overwhelming influence came from America in the shape

of Hollywood, providing the film market with the majority of movies. The term

British Film

was coined when in 1927 the British government reacted to the

latter, and the

Cinematograph Films Act

became law. This was the first time

the government intervened in the commercial film industry to protect it from

being overpowered by international markets. The law obliged renters and

exhibitors to a fixed quota of British films in their yearly offerings and made

exhibitors to accept exactly this quota in their annual programmes. To avoid

confusion the term

British Film

had to be specified. So it had one to be made

by a British company, one to represent the British Empire, and the majority of

the company directors had to be of English nationality. Additionally the

scenes had to be shot in the Empire, and the labour wages had to go at least

by 75% to English staff.

Even in the post-war period of the developing English cinema the

American market had a great influence on the distribution of films. A tax crisis

in 1947 drove the British government to impose a 75% tax on the earnings in

foreign countries ­ especially in the United States as the main market. This

resulted in an eight month boycott of the British market in America. All efforts

to stabilize the economic market, for example the

quota quickies

, low-budget

movies without any artistic content or values, could not save the British

movie. These efforts produced an opposite result and gave the national

cinema a poor representation. The act was modified in 1938, and finally

repealed in 1960.3

After World War II the British film market was formed by the

organization of film companies and the personalities behind it. The Ealing

studios, although already reopened in the early 30s, is a good example for

this, as it not only continually provided the nation with English films, but also

determined the movie landscape until the late 50s. "Hue and Cry was the first

2 Williams, 2007

3 Napper, 2000, p. 114

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of what have become known as the Ealing comedies and it began the fantasy

premise of community."4 The person behind this cinematic movement

towards the above quoted

People′s War Spirit

was Michael Balcon, who

"produced these films as `fantastic escape′"5. The movies in the post-war

years were dominantly realistic, a phenomenon that derived from the former

movements. "Realism was identified with black and white, straight forward

narrative characters. It was heavily influenced by Britain′s documentary

heritage."6 They had to be correct in speech and topic and not to criticise the

establishment. Only some films in post-war times covered another genre -

the melodramas. People suffered from two world wars, economic depression

and the cold war; this kind of movie offered what they lacked in life, like

peace, security, and comfort. "Their appeal for better or worse, was their

location within the parameters of Hollywood popular cinema and their

resistance to documentary realism."7

In the 50s the British feature film faced a critical prestige. It appeared

to be not strong enough to survive neither on the national nor the

international market. British movie-makers started to accept co-productions,

mainly with America, to produce big-budget films for the international market.

These films did mostly not follow any ideals, as they were mainly profit-

orientated. The

New Wave

movement brought an incline in moral restrictions

and releasing class. "The New Wave′s gritty, spare aesthetic of kitchen sink

realism is heavily indebted to the documentary style of Free Cinema, which

focused on depictions of the English working class."8 The film left realism as

the main aim and allowed pleasure and recreation. Nevertheless the number

of cinema-goers declined in the end of the 50s. People became aware of a

new mobility that gave them the possibility to choose from a variety of free-

time activities. A more important technical advance was the spreading of the

television set. The prices had fallen that much, that even middle-class

families could afford them. Often people decided to stay home and rather dig

4 Williams, 2007

5 Williams, 2007

6 Williams, 2007

7 Landy, 2001, p. 65

8 Lowenstein, 2001, p. 225

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into fantasy-worlds indoors. At the beginning of the next century many

cinemas had turned into ballrooms and Bingo halls.

The 60s made a big change for the British movie, as the public

tolerance towards minority opinions increased. The films could be more

precise, critical and freer in speech. Even

The British Board of Films Censors

had to admit that it could not refuse the release of films, only because they

were criticising the establishment.9 The so called

high-culture

years of the

cinema had started. Films were discussing contents as the question of what

Britishness or national identity meant. Even life on the social periphery could

be demonstrated.

Being still far away from prosperity, the British film industry had to face

the next problem ­ the invention of the video recorder. Now people could not

only watch their programmes at home, but they could even make a choice of

what to see. Far too late (in 1984) the Government tried to react on this, by

releasing the

Video Recording Act

. By using the nation′s youth as an excuse,

it said that no recordings should be hired unless they were classified by

censorship. This could not save the industry.

In the 1980s Hollywood experienced a boom, but by the middle of the

decade, the cinema in Britain was in deeper crisis then ever with declining

audiences for all types of films10. The only partial success it could achieve

was the international success of productions that projected images of

Britain′s colonial heritage. The rest of the world seemed to share the English

sense for nostalgia and cultural imperialism. This tendency can still be

spotted in the "nostalgic representation of Englishness and class to be found

in key examples of the stylish and brash

Brit

flicks of the late 1990s drawn

from the gangster cycle or the so-called `post-heritage′ films"11. The later

discussed movie

Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels

is one example for

this new genre in British cinema.

9 Richards, 2001, p. 26

10 Ellis, 2001, pp. 95

11 Dave, 2006, p. xiii

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3. South-East

English Working Class Speech

One must focus on the meaning of certain terms in detail and in

combination, To isolate the specific dialects this work deals with.

When speaking about south-east England one normally refers to the

counties Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire, Berkshire, Hampshire, Surrey, West

and East Sussex, Kent, and Greater London. This work will deal in first

instance with the region of Greater London and when required its outer

periphery. The two dialects that are pointed out for this region are

Cockney

English

(CE) for London′s East End and

Estuary English

(EE) for Greater

London, the surrounding counties and sometimes Britain in general. The

problems with pointing out the geographic boundaries will be described when

dealing with the specific dialects below.

Also the term

dialect

must be refined. The meaning of the word

dialect

includes grammatical and lexical features. Dialects are always intelligible

versions of a language, and are often related to the social background of the

speaker.

Accents

are mostly part of dialects, but can also occur in language

without representing a dialect. An accent refers often to a particular

geographical region ­ regardless of any specific country. Another word that

needs explanation is

slang

. Slang is a blending of the two words

s(ecret)

and

lang(uage)

. Out of this derives the meaning; slang is the result of altering a

language to make it understandable for only a small group of persons.

"Common to many languages, it is the lingo of the gutter, the street, the

market-place, the saloon [...] ­ indeed almost anywhere where men work

and play. [...] A thriving and developing language has plentiful slang."12 This

will become important when dealing with the

Cockney Rhyming Slang

in the

next chapters. Other examples for slang would be

backslang

or

Pig Latin

. By

using backslang, people simply pronounce words from back to the beginning

(

ecilop

for

police

), whereas Pig Latin is a highly developed system to alienise

language. Therefore people alter the suffix and use it as prefix and add the

ending

­ray

to the new creation. The rules for this have various exceptions

and additional rules, which will not be explained here.13

12 Cuddon, 1999, p. 834

13 Ayto, 2003, p. ix

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