I would never dream of describing anyone’s accent as ‘lower-class’(!) and I dispute that speaking with an accent necessarily creates ‘negative’ associations.
This indicates to me that you never experienced anyone making snap judgments on your speech or appearance. I have and its my sore point. Accents are the first weapon in class war. I've seen it up close.
Its not the accent that I have a problem with in the book, its the way it is presented. Why not include a teacher at Hogwarts with such an accent? Why not Hermione, Ron, Ginny, Neville or Luna? To write that it would be tedious to do so would be to denigrate the efforts of Mark Twain or Anthony Burgess and numerous other writers who have made their character's accents a point to notice in their books.
The fact that any noticeable "accent" is attributed to characters who seem to be the underclass is a little disturbing. The fact that this was a common practice in "pre-war literature" makes no difference to me. We no longer live in that world and hopefully are more egalitarian in our views. No doubt, 50 years in the future, people will be better and practice better standards in everything than we do now. To hark back to the past as a golden age is dangerous. Because the past wasn't always a panacea to everyone involved.
Yes, like Hagrid, Stan is associated in part through his accent with simplicity and a certain innocence.
Again that has a note of being infantilizing and patronizing to working class/middle class people. They are innocent and must be protected by someone like Harry. They may be there as a point against an unjust society. But so far none of the heroes, with the exception of Hermione (at times), think that there is anything wrong with the WW as is. As far as Harry is unconcerned now, the WW is fine by him (if he didn't have a psychopath stalking him).
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2007-01-17 03:20 pm (UTC)This indicates to me that you never experienced anyone making snap judgments on your speech or appearance. I have and its my sore point. Accents are the first weapon in class war. I've seen it up close.
Its not the accent that I have a problem with in the book, its the way it is presented. Why not include a teacher at Hogwarts with such an accent? Why not Hermione, Ron, Ginny, Neville or Luna? To write that it would be tedious to do so would be to denigrate the efforts of Mark Twain or Anthony Burgess and numerous other writers who have made their character's accents a point to notice in their books.
The fact that any noticeable "accent" is attributed to characters who seem to be the underclass is a little disturbing. The fact that this was a common practice in "pre-war literature" makes no difference to me. We no longer live in that world and hopefully are more egalitarian in our views. No doubt, 50 years in the future, people will be better and practice better standards in everything than we do now. To hark back to the past as a golden age is dangerous. Because the past wasn't always a panacea to everyone involved.
Yes, like Hagrid, Stan is associated in part through his accent with simplicity and a certain innocence.
Again that has a note of being infantilizing and patronizing to working class/middle class people. They are innocent and must be protected by someone like Harry. They may be there as a point against an unjust society. But so far none of the heroes, with the exception of Hermione (at times), think that there is anything wrong with the WW as is. As far as Harry is unconcerned now, the WW is fine by him (if he didn't have a psychopath stalking him).