0: Good morning, good afternoon and good evening! Welcome to Smashing English!

4: Before we start this video be sure to subscribe because we make new videos all the time

10: and I don't want you to miss any, so with that said let's get on with the videos!

19: Today we are talking modern cockney, what is modern cockney? I will tell

24: you. People from the east end of London traditionally speak with a cockney accent,

30: although London is very multicultural nowadays, there are loads of different accents there.

34: A good example of a traditional cockney accent would be something like this:

45: However language evolves, accents evolve, so now we have a new kind of modern London

53: cockney accent that is spoken by a lot of different people and that is what we are

57: looking at today because as you know if you are learning English you need to be able to understand

63: loads of different accents because not everyone speaks English in the same way, this will improve

69: your listening skills and your overall fluency. So as you can tell I don't speak with a modern

75: cockney accent, so I'll need a little bit of help and I was thinking hmm who would be a good

81: example of a modern cockney speaker so I chose someone who normally has an American accent!

89: This is Moonknight it's a new TV series from Marvel on Disney Plus,

94: it's amazing if you like fantasy superhero stuff watch it so good, and in Moonknight,

101: Oscar Isaac plays the lead, he also does a modern cockney accent, however this isn't his natural

108: accent his natural accent is more like this: I remember sitting reading on his iPhone, the new

114: Star Wars movie while he was just sitting in front of me at this cafe in Paris. I believe he's Cuban

119: and Guatemalan but he definitely speaks with an American accent, so his modern cockney accent in

125: Moonknight is really useful for us to use because I can show you when he does it really really well

131: and when sometimes it slips a little bit so without further ado let's delve into this accent,

138: see some of the features that you might hear if you encounter this accent so that you don't get

143: confused, let's go! Okay so the first feature I want to draw your attention to is the T now with

150: modern cockney unless the T is at the beginning of a word most of the time we don't say it they just,

158: T is a sad little lonely child in the family who doesn't get much attention, much love,

165: unless it's at the beginning of a word so listen to how Oscar Isaac does it in this scene:

173: So he said morning Gus my little one fin, wonder my little little little, no T, no T it's not

181: little, little. This is so super common it would be the same if we said something like forgot we

189: wouldn't say forgot we'd say forgot so it becomes something like this: I forgot my little cat,

196: I forgot my little cat. However if you have a word like tattle we do say the T at the beginning but

204: not the others tattle tattle tattle, this is so super common in a modern cockney accent and in a

211: traditional cockney accent so you've got to get used to listening to this because I can imagine

216: it would be super confusing if you've never heard it before. Now let's move on to the TH now I want

221: you to have a listen to how Oscar Isaac does a voiced TH, a voiced TH is something like this:

229: so if there's vibration in your throat, that's voiced, so have a listen to how he does this one:

237: Bit hard with one fin innit? But he doesn't say that he says

242: bit hard with one fin init, with one fin, with one, with one, with, with, with,

249: so a lot of the time voiced TH's turn into a V, but not commonly at the beginning of a

255: word like I don't hear a lot of 'these' for example but if it's at the end of a word,

261: yes. This isn't all the time but it happens a lot, so get your ears ready to hear a V,

267: that's a W, to hear a V when it should be a TH. Okay now let's listen to an unvoiced TH so if a

274: voiced TH is an: unvoiced TH is: no vibration, no voice, so listen to how he does an unvoiced TH:

291: Okay so you might have heard there that the TH when it's unvoiced turns into an F

297: so he says ten thousand, like he has to get the ten thousand steps in, ten thousand, F F ten

303: thousand, thousand, so a lot of the time if you've got a TH beginning or end of a word it's going to

309: turn into an F if it's unvoiced, again this isn't all the time but it happens a lot so you need to

316: get ready to listen to it. Okay let's stick with the T sounds and listen to how he does this T:

326: Okay so this is not something that's just common in modern cockney, it's also in a lot of accents

333: in Britain, in the States, a lot of places, it's really really common, now this is something that

339: a lot of my students struggle with so we've got a word that ends in a T then a consonant straight

345: after it, don't know, what always happens is students struggle to be clear but also not sound

352: robotic because if we say I don't know what I'm doing, I don't know, it's quite hard to get that T

359: and the N in as well, don't know, it's very robotic. So what you do if you have a T followed

365: by a word that starts with a consonant is this go to make the T, so if you were going to say

373: where does your tongue go? Does it go to the top of your alveolar ridge here?

381: It should do, get your tongue in that position.

385: But don't release that just get your tongue in that place

391: like someone is stopping you halfway through a T, okay? That's all we do and it should sound a

396: little bit like this- I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, so hear that little gap

404: in the middle where I'm going I don't know, rather than holding that on for 10 seconds,

410: just do it for as long as it takes you to throw something and catch it, I don't know,

416: I can't catch, so it's very hard to illustrate this because I can't catch, I don't know,

422: so I'm starting the T, but I'm not completing it or we might say something like um a fat dog,

430: a fat dog, a fat dog, fat dog, don't do the whole T, just do half of it and that's how you

438: sound not robotic and you sound like a native! Okay let's move on to another feature of the

442: modern cockney accent and that is the fact that it is a non-rhotic accent, if you don't

448: know what a non-rhotic accent means, basically accents can either be rhotic or non-rhotic,

455: rhotic means we pronounce our R's, so we say avatar, avatar like that,

462: however non-rhotic, hello! It means we only pronounce an R if it comes before

468: a vowel sound any other R we don't say it, so in a word like this we would say avatar, avatar,

475: avatar like that is just open, open, open, however if the R was at the beginning of a word like road,

482: we do still say an R, R, road. So listen to Oscar Isaac's non-rhoticism:

493: Hear that? So he says avatars avatars blue people avatars, avatars and he also says blue people.

502: this is a really common feature of cockney, so he doesn't say blue people with a dark L,

509: blue people, he says blue people, people, people, it's like an OW sound, people, people,

518: OW, and this is the same for a lot of dark L ending words, so we've got things like, little

524: or crumple or small or well, so where you would normally have a dark L, if you're listening to

532: a modern cockney or a cockney speaker it's going to sound a lot more like an

536: OW, that kind of sound okay? Now I want to talk about the times where the accent isn't as perfect,

544: I'm not trying to be offensive Oscar Isaac you do you did a very very very good job

549: I could not do an American accent, you're doing fabulous and also if you watch the TV programme,

555: he's not supposed to have a perfect British accent, I don't want to spoil it for you,

560: but watch it and you will see why it's kind of very correct that his accent shouldn't be perfect

567: because it's part of the story but I don't want to ruin it for you, so we're just going to look at

570: some little times where it's not quite correct so that you can see what is correct and what isn't.

575: So have a listen to this little sentence and I'll tell you where it just went a little bit wrong:

582: So this is almost perfect but for my liking I think he pronounces the G a little bit too much

589: on coming and for RP or standard English, that would be fine, coming in coming in, we link the

597: sound coming in with like a nasal link. However modern cockney speakers don't like that G

604: they cut it out a lot, coming in, so we take it away completely, coming in,

609: when I was coming in this morning morning morning, like it ends with an N, so when you have ING,

616: a lot of cockney speakers will remove the G, not all the time, but a lot of the time.

621: Listen to this next clip and see if you can hear something that isn't quite right.

629: So what he does here is a lovely liquid U, he says super super group super, and this is a feature

636: that would have been really really common a long time ago you know if we think back to

642: maybe the 1910s or something I'm sure we would say a lot of super and tune and Tuesday, however

650: with accents like modern cockney that liquid U is just disappearing, they would say super

657: super, su, rather than sue, can you hear the difference there? Or they would say something like

664: Tuesday instead of Tuesday or tune instead of tune, so it's not

670: incorrect to make that sound but with a modern cockney accent you won't hear it very often, it's

676: dying out bit by bit. Okay now this next quote is possibly the most British thing I've ever heard

684: in a Marvel production, it's it's just feels so real, it really made me laugh because I

691: was like wow this is Marvel and they're saying this! So have a listen to this little phrase:

699: So he says bonkers bruv, bonkers bruv, bonkers just means crazy, wild and bruv is just a way of

708: saying like mate and it's really common in London, however the way he says bonkers is annoying me,

714: so if we take away the S and we say bonker, it's not a word but let's imagine it is, so let's say

720: we can have one bonker and two bonkers, it's not really a thing but we're going to pretend,

726: we would do the open R sound that I was telling you about earlier, so we would say bonker bonker

733: bonker, however when you put an S on the end to make it plural, we don't keep it as open as that,

739: we don't say bonkers which is slightly what he's doing, he's going like bonkers bonkers,

744: what you want to do is make it UZ, bonkers bonkers UZ, UZ, short it's little, it's not bonkers

753: bonkers bonkers, same with water, waters, and this again is the case with a lot of UK accents,

761: definitely cockney, but also most UK accents as well. Okay let's look at one more why not?

771: Again this is almost perfect I'm just slightly concerned with how he says demon, he says

777: demon which is quite American, demon demon but we want demon demon, same with like m-o-n Monday,

788: money, that sound, that schwa is so common in modern cockney and in a lot of accents in the UK,

796: uh-uh-uh Monday Monday. And there you go I hope this was useful for you I hope I have

804: helped unlock an accent for you so that it's a bit less crazy and a bit less confusing,

810: if you enjoyed this video please give it a like, if you'd like to follow us on instagram you can do

814: so there: and if you want an online one-to-one English lesson with me or my partner Bez,

820: the link for that is down below, thank you so much for watching and I will see you next time,

839: tata!