"Give owa' - ye divvent kna' what ya' talkin' aboot!" That's what Auf Wiedersehen, Pet brickies, Dennis and Oz, would surely say about the results of a new study into UK regional accents.
A survey of 2,000 adults conducted by language learning platform Preply reckoned the Tyneside accent was the second hardest to understand, behind Glaswegian and just ahead of Liverpudlian. By way of contrast, most folk reckoned the soft tones of the Bristol accent were the easiest to understand.
It's 40 years since the smash-hit comedy-drama series Auf Wiedersehen, Pet introduced the full-on, unabashed Geordie accent to nationwide television audiences for the first time, courtesy of actors Jimmy Nail (who played Oz), Tim Healy (Dennis), and Kevin Whatley (Neville). Earlier TV and film representations had often smoothed off the local lingo's rough edges.
READ MORE: Tyneside in 1978 - 10 photographs from around our region 45 years ago
The 1983 series, depicting unemployed British workers grafting on a German building site, featured characters who hailed from across the UK - Tyneside, Liverpool, Birmingham, Bristol and London - and spoke with contrasting regional accents. Since then, the likes of Ant and Dec, Cheryl Cole, Alan Shearer and Robson Green - all prominent figures on national television have ensured our own regional tongue is frequently heard on the small screen.
It's not always the easiest regional accent for 'outsiders' to get their mouths arounds and imitate, although Kent-born Brenda Blethyn gamely gives it her best shot as North East TV detective Vera, while Newcastle United's Paraguayan star Miguel Almiron does a very passable "why aye, man" in our short Twitter video clip.
Despite the regular exposure, the results of this latest survey point to some people around the country still being perplexed by Geordie. Glasgow takes the lead as being the hardest UK accent to understand, with 39% of votes; Tyneside emerges as the second most difficult with 20%; and Liverpool follows in third with 18%.
Bristol, meanwhile, arose as the easiest UK accent to understand, with only 4% voting it difficult to decipher. The Glasgow accent was voted the hardest to understand by men at 43%, while both men (21%) and women (20%) more or less equally agree Newcastle was difficult to understand.
The nationally representative online survey of 2,000 UK adults aged 18 to 55-plus was conducted by Censuswide on behalf of Preply during February 2023, to uncover British attitudes to language learning, as well as cultural attitudes towards accents and dialects.
Other findings in the study included Geordie being the 'second most desirable accent' after London; and the 'third most attractive or romantic accent' behind London and Liverpool accents. Find out more about the survey in this link.
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