“WE MUST TAKE MATTER OF SPEECH TRAINING IN HAND.”

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17854, 24 May 1926, Page 15

“WE MUST TAKE MATTER OF SPEECH TRAINING IN HAND.”

MASTER SAYS N.Z. IS DEVELOPING ' DESTRUCTIVE DIALECT.

“ It is high time for all teachers to take the matter of English speech training in hand. Certain well-defined provincialisms and speech defects are becoming so common amongst New Zealand children that we are well on the way to developing a distinctive New Zealand dialect—one which has not the historic associations of the dialects of the Mother Country."

The above remarks were made by Mr F. Martyn Renner. English master at Wellington Boys’ College, when addressing teachers attending the vacation school at Victoria College on the subject of “ Speech Defects in New Zealand Children." Mr Renner severely condemned affectation in speech, saving that this was synonymous with vulgarity. Mr Renner mentioned that in 1919 the Northern Peace Union, meeting at Stockholm, addressed an inquiry to representatives of countries where none of the three great languages—English, German, and French-—were spoken, as to which, in their opinion, was the most suitable language for universal use. Fifty-four replies were received, and, of these, one was in favour of German, eight of French, one of Latin or Spanish, five of Esperanto, and no fewer than 29, a majority of the whole, were in favour of English. The report of the inquiry concluded as follows:—“If English is t-o become the international language, everybody who wishes to learn it must be given an opportunity. It must be taught in all the schools of the world —optional* in elementary schools and compulsory in the higher schools,” If that was the measure of prestige which the English language possessed abroad, it surely merited more attention in the schools of the Empire, if only from the point of view of a practical asset. In New Zealand children, required by law to attend school, were surely entitled to be taught, in a scientific.and effective way the accepted speech of the Old Country.

"Now," said Mr Renner, "it is unfortunately true that some people imagine 4ha»t the teaching of standard English aims at; attaining social ‘ superiority ‘and, indeed, there are certain schools, here in New Zealand, where a distinctly ‘ mincing ’ and affected style of - pronunciation is being developed. For that kind of thing one cannot help feeling contempt. It is the height of affectation, and affectation is synonymous with vulgarity. Vv'hat I have always claimed is that the , inability to speak standard English is an index of lack of culture. Scholastic attainments, education at college or university, are all futile unless they- have placed the young man or the young woman beyond the reach of vulgarity of thought or action: and I have no tiesitation in saying that true refinement of speech is, in a subtle manner, an index of a mind developed along true cultural lines.’’

Although he agreed that our speech on the whole was purer than that of Australia or of America, he denied that a remarkably pure form of English was spoken in New Zealand. After many years’ experience and close observation of all types of children, he would say that about 20 per cent of the children in the secondary schools spoke tfie English tongue unmarred by anyone of. the commonest defects; in other words a very small proportion of the post-primary children spoke reasonably good standard English. Authorities had come to the conclusion that the proper standard of English was the speech of the English upper middleclass of the South of England, particularly in regard to the pronunciation of certain of our vowel sounds—a pronunciation free from provincialism and vulgarisms: THE COMMONEST DEFECTS. "Judged by this standard." added Mr Renner. “ we find that the commonest defects in the speech of New Zealand children are the following:—(1) The pronunciation of the ‘a’ sound of ‘ day:,’ ‘ praise,’ ‘ raise,’ etc., as something approaching the ‘i’ sound of ‘die.’ ‘my,’ etc.; (2) the pronunciation of the ‘ i ’ sound of ‘ my,’ ‘ I ’ as some, thing approaching the ‘oi ’ sound of ‘ boil,’ ’ toil/ etc.; (3) the pronunciation of the ‘ ou ’ and ‘ ow ’ sound of ‘ bough/. ‘ how.’ etc., as an ’ eou ’ sound, viz., ‘ bcough/ ’ lieow ’; (4) the pronunciation of the final ‘ o ’ sound in words like ‘go.’ ‘.no,’ as a distinctly thin ‘o’ with no roundness or fullness in it: (5 > the pronunciation of words beginnirg with ‘ wh/ so that the ‘ h ’ is elided, e.g.. 4 white ’ is pronounced exactly like ‘ wight ’ in ‘ Isle of Wight ’: (6) the mispronunciation of certain typical final syllables as in 'picture/ ’nature/ ‘ soldier,’ ' statue,’ and in general the blurring of non-accented final or initial syllables; (7) lack of care in pronouncing clearly and distinctly those consonants that ought to be pronounced, e.g.. ‘.strictly,’ ‘ and.’ ” Mr Renner said that many of the defects in. colonial English were due to slackness of the organs of speech. “ Compare the normal lip and tongue movements in French with those in English, and you will find that in French they are carried out with almost mathematical precision to their fullest extent. English practice always shows a relaxation of effort. In other words, the characteristic of English speech, particularly in the matter of vowel sounds, is slackness of the organs of speech and a blurring -of unaccented vowels in general. Now it will be readily agreed that any language which has such characteristics must be peculiarly liable to dialect variations unless such predisposition is counteracted by training and exercise in correctness of speech. Failure of lull lip movement, the dropping of the velum behind the back palate, are. the two main features of all modern dialect forms cf English, and while they are extraordinarily noticeable in the English of America and Australia, they are making headway in the language of New Zealand."

After traversing the first five defects which he had enumerated, Mr Renner said that if his contention was correct that many of the defects in speech were due to the characteristic slackness of the organs of speech and a relaxation of effort, particularly with re gard to the lips, then teachers should be able (other things being equal) to counteract any tendency* to degeneracyin the speech of the mother tongue. He suggested : (1) The adoption of a standard; (2) the devotion of ten minutes or a quarter of an hour during the English lesson to phonetics; (3) class singing under competent instruction. "That evil, ‘ lip-laziness/ cannot rear its head if singing is well taught," said Mr Renner. Class singing under competent instruction was one of the most powerful agents in obtaining correct speech. “The lips must come open. Roundnese and fullness of utterance is induced, slack muscles are toned up, and every tendency to relaxation of effort in speech production is checked. I can quite truthfully say that I have never yet heard a good cheir mispronounce vowel sounds.”