Regional and social differences in New Zealand: phonology

The beginning of the main European settlement of New Zealand is usually dated from 1840, when representatives of the British government signed the Treaty of Waitangi with about 430 Maori chiefs. From 1840 to 1880 the European population of New Zealand grew from about 2,000 people to half a million and by the 1880s the number of New-Zealand-born in the non-Maori population had exceeded the number of immigrants. In this period between 1840 and 1880 the immigrants came mainly from the British Isles; 49% came from England, 22% from Scotland, 20% from Ireland and 7% from Australia (McKinnon 1997). The first immigrants came to planned settlements, established by the New Zealand Company, where there was some attempt to control the mix and the nature of the colonists. This soon proved to be ineffectual, and in 1861 with the discovery of gold thousands of immigrants arrived in an unplanned way, including considerable numbers of Irish Catholics, a group the original planners had tried to exclude. In the 1860s, there was a period of conflict, now known as the New Zealand Wars, between Europeans and certain North Island Maori tribes, which saw large numbers of soldiers brought into New Zealand. They were given land when they were eventually discharged and they also became settlers. In the 1870s, large numbers of immigrants arrived, recruited and paid for by the New Zealand government. In 1874 alone, 32,000 assisted immigrants arrived in New Zealand.

The early settlers were a diverse collection of people who had come to New Zealand for a better life. We know that in spite of different circumstances, historical events and social situations, in a relatively short period of time very different individuals in all parts of the country were beginning to develop a common language, so that by the end of the 19^th century complaints were being heard all over New Zealand of a “colonial twang”, something akin to “Austral English” (though not quite so bad) the product of “the home and the street”. Throughout the early part of the 20^th century the complaints grew in number and ferocity. The new New Zealand accent was said to be an abomination, so bad that it could even cause “minor throat and chest disorders” (quoted in Gordon and Deverson 1998: 162). At the same time there were consistent complaints about New Zealanders who tried to emulate Received Pronunciation (RP). A member of a Commission on Education in 1912 complained: “What hope is there for change when we find two of the Principals of the largest secondary schools in New Zealand in giving evidence, using these expressions: ‘taim-table’ for ‘time-table’; ‘Ai’ for ‘I’; ‘may own’ for ‘my own’; ‘faive’ for ‘five’; ‘gairls’ for ‘girls’.” (Appendices to the Journal of the House of Representatives, E-12: 624).

Recent research at the University of Canterbury has shown that the earliest manifestations of the New Zealand accent probably occurred much earlier than the appearance of written complaints. The analysis of a 1940s archive of recordings of old New Zealanders, some born as early as the 1850s (the Mobile Unit archive), shows that the rate of development of the NZ accent depended very much on social factors. Speakers from homogeneous towns, like Milton or Kaitangata in Otago for example, where the majority of the settlers came from Scotland, were more likely to retain features of Scottish pronunciation and syntax. Speakers from towns with a very mixed population, like the Otago gold-mining town of Arrowtown, for example, were more likely to develop early manifestations of New Zealand English.