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Why Are Fantasy World Accents British?
kodiaktau writes "An interesting article from the BBC News Magazine explores the reasons why most fantasy worlds use British as their primary accent. Citing specific examples from recent and upcoming shows and movies like Lord of The Rings, The Hobbit and Game of Thrones, the article concludes British accents are 'sufficiently exotic,' 'comprehensible' and have a 'splash of otherness.' It would be odd to think of a fantasy world having a New Jersey accent, or even a Mid-West accent, which tends to be the default for TV and movies in the U.S., but how do UK viewers feel about having British as a default? More specifically, what about the range of UK accents, like Scottish, Welsh, Cockney? The International Dialects of English Archive shows at least nine regional sounds, with dozens of sub-regional pronunciations in England alone. In the U.S., there have always been many regional accents that might be used in interesting ways. Filmmakers should consider looking at speech accents from other areas of the world to create more interesting dialects."
I have to agree with this article, I've always assumed it was just the American preconception of "old worlde". Different enough to be remote but still in the same language.
On the other hand as an Irishman I often find it hard to find escapism in Irish TV and to a lesser extent, film. The familiarity of it all doesn't work as well while on the other hand so much of our media is American that even when I visit the USA there is an element of otherworldliness about the whole experience.
I never get used to these constant resurrections
Lots of places have a north.
Mark Anthony Collins
Do we even need to be asking such an obvious question? British is the foreign language that Americans are most likely to understand...
For Americans, I would assume it's because we associate fantasy with the Old World because that's where most of our myths and legends originate. And they have castles. And among the Old World, England is our closest tie (as well as speaking the same language). The majority of fantasy settings are basically just medieval-Europe-plus-wizards-and-dragons even if a location isn't given (or it takes place on another world)
Of course the Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit use British accents -- they're written by an English author and are fundamentally ABOUT England (a.k.a. the Shire).
One does not merely walk into Parliament.
However, one can try to merely tunnel under Parliament with a good bit of gunpowder...
You wouldn't use terms such as "poofter" and "rodgering" unless you were a closest Brit. Admitting it would be the first step towards healing.
Imagine The Lord of the Rings where all the Hobbits had Brooklyn accents.
Other enough to be unusual but still understandable but evoking an entirely different genre (mafia crime drama).
Westeros is transparently (if not particularly faithfully) based on a fantastic reinterpretation of Britain, right down to the the Wall and the . And all the knights and chivalery (and non-chivalery) and so on are clearly Arthurian legend, which is unquestionably British even if it owes a big debt to France — which, speaking of, is of course right across the "narrow sea". Middle Earth is less literal with the geography, but Tolkien has said (were it not already obvious!) that the Shire is rural Britain in spirit, so of course the hobbits speak with the appropriate accent.
Ouch, that's pretty harsh on them thar Texans.
Absolutely correct, and yet also so wrong. Yes, there are regional British accents, but when considered as a whole they are clearly distinct from American ones. Any fool can identify that someone from Cornwall or Glasgow is clearly not American, and if you take someone from New Jersey or Texas nobody is going to mistake them for someone from Yorkshire.
XML is a known as a key material required to create SMD: Software of Mass Destruction
"For Americans, I would assume it's because we associate fantasy with the Old World because that's where most of our myths and legends originate."
Yes, but we associate wrong because modern American English actually sounds more like old English than does modern British English.
I think that's because an Irish accent is the only one that Colin Farrell can do. So they had all the other actors match him so that he didn't seem out of place.
- Free healthcare to all, at much cheaper rates than the US private healthcare system. I've tried both, and I'd take the NHS in a heart-beat.
The NHS has its ups and downs but we count ourselves very lucky for having it as well as private healthcare providers like Bupa.
- Significantly subsidized education. You don't come out of college desperate to find a job to pay off your immense loans.
Desperate to find a job, maybe, but our student loans aren't taken out privately - for the most part - so the repayments are actually quite reasonable. In fact, the first £15k (around the $23k mark) of your earnings are disregarded when it comes to calculating repayments.
- They're not currently at war with any chemicals, nouns, or indeed any nation-states as far as I'm aware.
Some chemicals are very much targeted, but punishments are nowhere near as harsh as those in the US. Words... well, so long as you aren't encouraging violence, intolerance, etc. you're pretty much free to say what you want, including insults directed towards the Royal Family (see point the First). As for nation-states that depends entirely on who the US is after at the moment :P, but suffice it to say we don't have it in for Cuba; it's 4,500 miles away.
- There's no gate-rape or sanctioned government-grope at the borders
Nope, free travel between EU nations in particular is a wonderful thing and we've learned to take the rough with the smooth. We have enough home-grown nutcases anyway.
- They don't have 1 in every 31 adults behind bars or on parole / being monitored. Think about that for a second. One in Thirty-one.
Amen to that. That statistic is quite saddening and I'm given to understand that many inmates are imprisoned for relatively minor drug offences.
- They live longer, and have less infant deaths
A double-edged sword, since we're careening towards the same pension crisis as many other nations. Infant mortality, however, is a bad thing however one looks at it.
- They have a genuine choice in politics - left, center, or right. As opposed to right and crazy-town here in the US.
LOL! Our choice is basically pro-business toffs (Tory - blue), pro-union spendaholics (Labour - red) and the Liberal Democrats, whose yellow ties should give some indication as to their character.
(I actually vote LD for their progressive social policies and attitude toward proportional representation... and partly because I'm curious to see how they would screw things up)
- Their police won't handcuff you, lie you on the floor, then shoot you dead on a subway train.
Generally, no they won't, and the fact that most of them don't carry firearms, but the ones that do have been known to shoot people before boarding a subway train. That was a dark day, but in our defence most of the nation was in uproar over it.
- No metal-detectors needed at schools. Schools, for $deity sake!
Not yet, thankfully, but we need to sort out the problem of knife crime, which is preferable to gun crime but still lethal.
- There's no software patents :)
Yes, but given that the blues are in charge and the reds seem keen on the idea too I think it's only a matter of time even without US pressure.
All told, the UK society seems to be functioning as well as any enlightened Western society should, unlike the USA. On th
If God forks the Universe every time you roll a die, he'd better have a damned good memory.