 There are two main varieties of English spoken in the United Kingdom. They are associated with England and Scotland. In this e-lecture, we will concentrate on the English spoken in England and we'll discuss its main phonological dialect received pronunciation. We will first of all provide a short overview of RP and we'll then look at each phoneme of RP in detail pointing out typical aspects that distinguish RP from other phonological dialects of present-day English. Let us start with a brief overview of RP. Early in the 20th century, Daniel Jones, who you can see over here, described RP as the accent spoken by the socially and economically dominant London society. This clearly reflects the social considerations of his time. He initially named it public school pronunciation. By 1926, his label had become received pronunciation or in short RP. Later, it has also been referred to as BBC English, public school English or even standard English. By the way, the term received originally meant that what is generally accepted or that accepted by the best society. RP is also the accent that Americans and possibly other foreigners would probably refer to as the typical British accent. Over the years, a number of distinctions even within RP have been proposed by various linguists. Here are some of them, mainstream RP, upper crust RP, adoptive RP, near RP, conservative RP and even general RP. Regardless of the differences within it, RP is a phonological dialect commonly recognized and one that has been taught as the standard English pronunciation model in schools for years. Thus, it can be considered as a reference system for all other phonological dialects used in England. Well, let us now look at the sound system of RP. In RP, we can define 12 monophthongs. There are 8 diphthongs and 24 consonants, so a total of 44 phonemes. And the degree of roticity, we will discuss that later, is very low. The monophthongs can be subdivided into tense and lax monophthongs. Now, the tense monophthongs are produced with a greater muscular energy during articulation and lax monophthongs involve little muscular energy during articulation. Even though there is no phonemic length distinction in RP, the tense monophthongs are generally marked by the addition of the colon, since they are generally longer than the lax ones. But we've shown that in other e-lectures, that length is a critical factor as far as the monophthongal system of RP is concerned. Let us now look at the phonemes, use one keyword in each case and listen to an audio example produced by a native speaker of RP and point out the special properties of his pronunciation. Let us start with the long or tense monophthongs. Now, this vowel, C, is slightly diphthongized in RP. You can clearly hear that, C. Most non-native speakers of RP use a true monophthong E instead and often make it too high. The second monophthong, bra, is clearly a low back vowel and it is not problematic for many foreigners. The or, as in caught, caught, is clearly a mid monophthong, a mid vowel in RP. And then there is a high back vowel, too, as in too. And again, the vowel in too, like its front counterpart, is slightly diphthongized. Most non-native speakers of RP use a true monophthong U instead. And last but not least, there is a central monophthong, fur. And this vowel is truly central. The orthographical R is not realized phonetically in RP. Let us now add the short or lax monophthongs. There are two mid-high ones. One of them is the E, the short E, bit. And it is not problematic at all. Sometimes it is made a bit too high by non-native speakers of English. And its counterpart in the back is the U, put. And again, this is a relatively unproblematic phoneme for most non-native speakers of RP. The same applies to the short E, bet. As in bet, however, it is often made too high by non-native speakers of English. The next one is a problem case. Bat. It is truly a low front vowel. And it is a problem case for many speakers of other languages, since they either raise it towards A or replace it by a low back R. Few languages realize it like RP as a low front vowel, which is very, very low indeed. Listen again. Bat. Okay. Now the O, the low back vowel, is unproblematic, caught. And finally we have two central vowels, the wedge, but, which sometimes may be a little bit problematic because it seems to become more and more centralized in RP, approaching the schwa, which occurs in unstressed position, letter, as in letter. So this is the vowel system of present day English, to be precise, the monofongal system of RP. Let us continue with the diphthongs. Depending on the tongue position of the second vowel, the so-called offset, the eight diphthongs can be grouped into three ingliding diphthongs and five up-gliding diphthongs. Let us start with the three ingliding diphthongs. They have in common that the words in which they occur all have a post-vocalic orthographical R, which is phonetically realized by the diphthongal offset schwa. So here we go. Near. The first one is near and the first diphthongal element in RP, a mid-high front E, is often produced too high by non-native speakers of English. So let us listen again. Near. A pretty low onset. Here is the second ingliding diphthong. Here. Here. And the first diphthongal element in RP is pretty low. It is clearly a mid-low front vowel, a bit lower than the lax monofong E as in bed. And the final one is... Sure. Sure. Where the first diphthongal element in RP is a mid-high back U, but again it is often produced slightly too high by non-native speakers of RP. Let us now look at the up-gliding diphthongs. So let's start with this one here, the A say. As in say, this diphthong looks simple, but it is often monofong guys by non-native speakers of English, even though it should not. There are tendencies in English to monofong guys this diphthong, but not in RP. The I by is relatively unproblematic. It is a diphthong starting with a low central R ending in short E. Maybe many non-native speakers make the offset a little bit too high in some cases. And the last front up-gliding diphthong is the boy. Oi as in boy. Now this diphthong is unproblematic however, if a language has not got diphthongs at all, it may be the case that the Oi is split into two monofongs with a glide in between, making it Oi instead of Oi. Well and then we have two back up-gliding diphthongs. Here is the first one. Now. Ao as in now. And this diphthong is relatively easy to produce since all languages have both diphthong elements as monofongs. And the last up-gliding one is a typical RP case. No. No where the first diphthong element in RP is clearly a schwa and many non-native speakers of RP like myself produce it often too much in the back region towards all. So instead of saying no, they often like myself say no. Here are the consonants. Now the consonantal system of RP clearly exhibits a concentration of consonants in the alveolar region in using distinctive features I would say in the anterior coronal region. To study all consonants with their alophones I recommend that you visit the virtual linguistics compass and the unit the sound system of RP where all consonantal phonemes can be accessed including a sound sample in each case and are exhibited with their precise alophonic structure. In this e-lecture let us concentrate on some selected consonantal phonemes of RP. For example the r phoneme which involves complemented distribution in the case of the d-voiced one which occurs only after voiceless plosives as in trick and free variation the two alophones the alveolar approximate and the alveolar flap or even the alveolar trill as in ferry versus ferry to give you one example. Another interesting phoneme is the alveolar lateral phoneme which is the classical case of complementary distribution. We discussed this in the e-lectures about phoneme so we do not have to add many more comments about this particular phoneme here. The labiovela approximate is another interesting case on the one hand it is in its alophonic structure contextually relatively restricted and on the other hand it is difficult to place on the consonantal chart because it is labiovela so where shall we put it? Well we decided to put it into the vela box here even though it is classified as a labiovela consonant. And then we have two special alophones associated with the two nasal phonemes the bilabial nasal m. Well as you can see here we have a labiodental alophone if the bilabial nasal is followed by a labiodental fricative as in comfort. And the same applies to the alveolar nasal consonant where we have the same alophone if the alveolar nasal is followed by a labiodental fricative as in information, information. This may suffice about the consonantal system. Let us finally say something about roticity. Now RP is generally defined as a non-rotic accent of English that is as an accent where the post-vocalic R that is an R that occurs after vowels in writing is not pronounced. So we are not saying mother but mother. We are not saying here but here. However there are two contexts where the R can optionally be inserted. One of them is referred to as the linking R. This is a feature that applies to most phonological dialects of present-day English. It is a process where an orthographically present post-vocalic R is pronounced. In such cases even non-rotic varieties of English, for example RP, tend to pronounce the final R of mother and here as a linking R if the next word starts with a vowel. So if you add and in both cases you can optionally get mother and father or here and there. The second case is the so-called intrusive R. Now this is clearly confined to RP. Here the phoneme R can be inserted between two vowels even if it is not represented orthographically. The condition is that the final vowel of the first word must be a low back vowel or a schwa. So again we would of course say India and law but if we add a word that starts with a vowel like and we could get something like India and China or law and order. Hence in summary RP is not totally non-rotic but very low on the scale of roticity. Let us finally exemplify RP on the basis of a text read by a native speaker. As usual in our e-lectures about a particular language or a variety of it, this sample text read by a native speaker will be presented and as usual I am using the story of the North Wind and the Sun so here is the RP version. The North Wind and the Sun were disputing which was the stronger when a traveller came along wrapped in a warm cloak. They agreed that the one who first succeeded in making the traveller take his cloak off should be considered stronger than the other. Then the North Wind blew as hard as he could but the more he blew the more closely did the traveller fold his cloak around him and at last the North Wind gave up the attempt. Then the Sun shined out warmly and immediately the traveller took off his cloak and so the North Wind was obliged to confess that the Sun was the stronger of the two. Well a nice impression of RP. So let us summarize. Even though RP has often been critically judged as a social dialect which is not used by a large percentage of the population, it is still the accent that most learners of present-day English use as a reference model for the pronunciation of British English even in the context of English as a global language. This is why any approach towards the teaching of English should include a detailed analysis of the sound system of RP in the first place. I hope that this e-lecture and the numerous interactive options on the VLC which are ready for use are helpful in this respect. Thank you.