In the next 100 years, a majority of Brits might be Talking Like a Roadman’ as a result of language change. It is believed that Multicultural London English (MLE), which includes words such as ‘peng’, ‘wagwan’, and ‘bare’, could become the dominant dialect in the UK in the near future.
Working class people in London now speak this dialect as the main dialect, replacing Cockney, which developed from several languages mixing in London. Younger generations will continue to use the MLE dialect well into adulthood and pass it on.
As a result, the dialect will remain one of the most popular dialects in Britain for a long time to come.
In Early 1980s
The multicultural London English dialect was born in the British capital in the early 1980s, but its roots go back to the Windrush generation, according to research by Professor Paul Kerswill of the University of York.
An amalgam of different kinds of English merged in the East End of London in highly multilingual areas with a lot of immigration.
There is a lot of slang in MLE that comes from Jamaican, but it also owes much to languages from other communities that settled in London, as well as pronunciation.
There are some similarities between MLE and Northern or Scottish dialects, including how MLE pronounces the “H” that Cockney drops.
Despite the fact that most MLE words have been adopted as slang by the wider population, MLE descendents are most Talking Like a Roadman it as a second language.
National London English Artists
Multicultural London English has been made more popular by grime artists such as Stormzy. Image credit: Alamy
Grime artists such as Stormzy and Dizzee Rascal are pioneers of this dialect.
The more Talking Like a Roadman words appear in entertainment, the more likely they are to become more widely used, though it won’t erase the use of other dialects.
By speaking the same type of language as their peers, the speaker can identify with them.
“This is an in-group vocabulary, so other accents won’t be bulldozed by it,” explains Kerswill.
In interviews, George the Poet sounds quite standard despite having the accent and using the slang.
Others will speak it for fun, while others will speak it to be seen.
In terms of MLE’s future, he said, “I suspect it will evolve as language does. For now, it certainly has the upper hand.”.
“Slang will remain a youth language. Older people do not use it very often, or they only use it when they are with their own group.”
The development of Multicultural London English over the next 100 years is expected to have a significant impact on our language,
