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You Say Potato

A Book About Accents

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You Say Potato

By: Ben Crystal, David Crystal
Narrated by: David Crystal, Ben Crystal, Jane Savage, Hilton McRae
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About this listen

An authoritative, entertaining book about our accents and what they say about us.

Some people say 'sconn' while others say 'schown'. He says 'bath' while she says 'bahth'. You say 'potayto'. I say 'potahto'. And - wait a second, no one says 'potahto'. No one's ever said 'potahto'. Have they?

From reconstructing Shakespeare's accent to the rise and fall of received pronunciation, actor Ben Crystal and his linguist father, David, travel the world in search of the stories of spoken English. Everyone has an accent, though many of us think we don't. We all have our likes and dislikes about the way other people speak, and everyone has something to say about 'correct' pronunciation.

But how did all these accents come about, and why do people feel so strongly about them? Are regional accents dying out as English becomes a global language? And most importantly of all: what went wrong in Birmingham? Witty, authoritative, and jam-packed full of fascinating facts, You Say Potato is a celebration of the myriad ways in which the English language is spoken - and how our accents, in so many ways, speak louder than words.

©2014 Ben Crystal and David Crystal (P)2015 Pan Macmillan Publishers Ltd. Linguistics Political Science Politics & Government Social Sciences Witty
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What did you like most about You Say Potato: A Book About Accents?

This book is brilliant! As an English philologist and non-native English speaker, I have enjoyed every single chapter. If you are interested in linguistics, phonetics, history, accents and English language, this book is a must.

Fantastic book about accents

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You Say Potato is a wonderful mix between linguistic research and great anecdotes. Interesting and thoroughly enjoyable - not least because of David and Ben Crystal’s voices.

Thoroughly enjoyable

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I feel like this could have been an excellent book if it didn't focus a lot on theatre and acting. It ruined the pacing in my opinion and it could have done without it. Furthermore, I feel like exploring the sounds of different accents was not explored to its full potential even though it could have. I did enjoy this book and I thought David Crystal and Ben Crystal are excellent narrators. I only wish they focused a lot more on original pronunciation. I will definitely be listening to this a few more times in the future.

A very interesting book but with a ton of waffle

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Loved this! David and Ben are fabulous. So much interesting research shared. Very useful for my profession

Fantastic

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Well written and well read. I love the idea of having my sat nav voiced in OP!

Loved it.

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