Hogwarts students and dialect

[Andrea]

No: HPFGUIDX 45641

--- Pippin wrote:
> Colin and Dennis Creevy, on the other hand,  have no working 
> class accent.   Wouldn't JKR be perpetuating a stereotype if they 
> did?  As for Hagrid,  Hagrid's dad could have clung to his 
> regional accent despite his Hogwarts education (Never be 
> ashamed of who yeh are) and encouraged his son to do the 
> same. 

You know, something has occurred to me.  Everyone is saying that Hagrid's
accent is indicative of his low education, because after all, he never
even finished Hogwarts and certainly all students who went to the same
school for seven years would have similar accents by the end of it. 
Well...by *that* logic, shouldn't Hagrid's accent be one of the *most*
refined of the "Hogwarts" accents, second only to Dumbledore and some of
the older professors?  After all, even if he didn't finish his Hogwarts
education, Hagrid has LIVED on Hogwarts grounds, eaten meals in the Great
Hall, and socialized with professors and students alike for over fifty
years, not the mere seven of students.  

Personally, I've always pictured Hogwarts peppered with a wide variety of
accents, from Irish and Scottish to Liverpudlian and Cockney.  As a
writer, I rarely given "speech tags" to my characters, phonetically
sounding out what the accent should sound like.  Most of the variations
are too small to really do that with anyway, and the end result would be
extremely difficult to read!  I'll generally just assume an accent
commensurate with the background I've given the character -- whether
Southern belle or upper-crust British -- and only point something out
specifically if the accent is either particularly strong or if the person
uses an accent unusual to their background.  For example, I have a
character who's from the southern US, but thinks accents make you sound
stupid, so she is very careful about toning down her accent as much as
possible.  When I'm writing her, I'll mention that, and I generally play
up her brother's accent as much thicker just for contrast.

Ahem.  Sorry for the digression.  What I'm basically trying to say is that
just because JKR rarely writes out an accent doesn't mean we should assume
it isn't there.  The characters with written-out accents have *stronger*
ones, certainly, and we should examine exactly why JKR felt that was
necessary, but to assign the rest of the wizarding world a single accent
just because no others are written out seems silly to me.



Andrea


=====
"Reality is for people who lack imagination."

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