Degree Project Level: Dalarna University, bachelor’s The Portrayal of the Irish English Accent in Critical Role From Mollymauk to Lucien, from Taliesin Jaffe to Matthew Mercer Author: Jacob Pettersson Supervisor: Jonathan White Examiner: Julie Skogs Subject/main field of study: English Linguistics Course code: EN2035 Credits: 15hp Date of examination: At Dalarna University it is possible to publish the student thesis in full text in DiVA. The publishing is open access, which means the work will be freely accessible to read and download on the internet. This will significantly increase the dissemination and visibility of the student thesis. Open access is becoming the standard route for spreading scientific and academic information on the internet. Dalarna University recommends that both researchers as well as students publish their work open access. I give my/we give our consent for full text publishing (freely accessible on the internet, open access): Yes ☑ No ☐ Dalarna University – SE-791 88 Falun – Phone +4623-77 80 00 Abstract The study aims to investigate the differences between Taliesin Jaffe and Matthew Mercer’s portrayals of a standard Irish English accent in Critical Role in their respective performances of the character Mollymauk/Lucien. Using previous studies on Irish English pronunciation, the presence of each established feature was investigated to find how authentically the actors succeed to produce the accent. The main features investigated were the rhoticity, plosivization of /θ/ and /ð/, lenition of /t/ and /d/, yod-dropping, diphthongs, and some monophthongs. Using transcripts to locate the instances of said features, the audio of the footage was studied to discover whether the phonemes were produced in accordance with the proposed realizations within Irish English. Both actors were found to excel and struggle with different features, with plosivization of /θ/ and /ð/, lenition of /t/ and /d/, and aspects of yod-dropping proving especially difficult to consistently produce in accordance with supraregional Irish English. The study concluded that neither accent comes close to achieving an authentic Irish English accent and that both portrayals share many similarities with each other, as well as overlapping with the actors’ native General American accent, especially in cases where Irish English and General American shared potential realizations of phonemes. Keywords: Irish English, phonetics, acting, Critical Role, accents 1 1. Introduction 4 1.1. Aim and Scope of the Study 4 2. Theoretical Background 5 2.1. The Portrayal of Accents in Media 5 2.2. Irish English 6 3. Material and Methodology 9 3.1. Material 9 3.2. Method of Analysis 10 4. Data Analysis and Results 11 4.1. Rhoticity and the realization of /r/ 11 4.2. Plosivization of /θ/ and /ð/ 12 4.3. Lenition of /t/ and /d/ 12 4.4. Yod-dropping 13 4.5. Vowels 13 4.5.1. FACE 13 4.5.2. GOAT 14 4.5.3. PRICE 14 4.5.4. CHOICE 15 4.5.5. MOUTH 15 4.5.6. NORTH 16 4.5.7. CLOTH 17 4.5.8. STRUT 17 4.5.9. NURSE 18 4.5.10. TRAP 18 4.5.11. PALM 19 4.5.12. LOT 19 4.5.13. CURE 20 4.5.14. LETTER 20 5. Discussion 20 6. Conclusion 21 Primary material 23 References 23 Transcripts 25 7. Appendix 26 2 6.1. Episode Transcripts 26 6.1.1. Episode 1 26 6.1.2. Episode 2 27 6.1.3 Episode 26 31 6.1.4 Episode 114 36 6.1.5 Episode 115 37 6.1.6 Episode 116 37 6.1.7 Episode 117 37 6.1.8 Episode 120 39 6.1.9 Episode 130 41 6.1.10 Episode 133 41 6.1.11 Episode 134 41 6.1.12 Episode 136 42 3 1. Introduction Critical Role is a weekly internet show featuring a cast full of prolific voice actors in which they play the tabletop roleplaying game Dungeons & Dragons (Critical Role, n.d.). Through the narrative-driven structure of the game, the cast has produced hundreds of hours of content over the years, spanning across two separate campaigns with over 100 episodes each (Critical Role, n.d.). Each member of the cast creates and plays their own unique character for the duration of the campaign, going on adventures and exploring the world created by the game master, Matthew Mercer (Critical Role, n.d.). In their second campaign, the hedonistic amnesiac and metaphorical peacock played by Taliesin Jaffe, Mollymauk Tealeaf, was killed in battle in the 26th episode, resulting in the rare occurrence that Jaffe was forced to create a new character (“Mollymauk Tealeaf”, 2021). Over 90 episodes later, Mollymauk, now going by his name from his life before the amnesia, Lucien, returned as a character on the show, this time played by the game master, Matthew Mercer, as a major antagonist of the show (“Lucien”, 2021). When Mollymauk was first introduced as a character on Critical Role, Jaffe portrayed him with an Irish English accent that quickly sparked a debate among fans of the show regarding its authenticity, as the cast consists entirely of American actors. Jaffe himself discussed some of the difficulties of preparing for the new role, stating that he tried five different varieties of Irish English accents before settling for the version heard on the show (Geek & Sundry, 2018, 21:23-21:35). Upon making the decision to reintroduce the character to the show, Matthew Mercer was tasked with attempting to replicate Jaffe’s particular variety of an Irish English accent. When asked, Mercer explained that his intention with the accent was to do his own interpretation of Jaffe’s accent rather than to return to its Irish English roots (Critical Role, 2021, 10:54-11:10). 1.1. Aim and Scope of the Study With the steady rise in popularity of Dungeons & Dragons content to the likes of Critical Role on streaming platforms such as twitch.tv, it is slowly establishing its place in media (Bilsand, 2015). As a result, imitations of various accents in an unscripted and improvised environment is putting people’s skills to the test and introducing an entirely new area that is waiting to be studied. By investigating imitations where there is no opportunity for multiple takes, the way accents are perceived and replicated by people, ranging from professional voice actors to complete amateurs, can be studied. Thus, it opens up new doors not previously available from conventional media forms such as TV and movies. The present study paves the way for further research on the topic to be made, by exploring an understudied field. The aim of the present study is to investigate the portrayal of Irish English accents in Critical Role through Jaffe’s and Mercer’s renditions. The accents are phonetically compared to studies about Irish English based on key features of the supraregional variety of the accent identified by previous research. Furthermore, as Mercer’s version of the accent is stated to be directly derived from Jaffe’s, the findings about both accents are also referenced against each other in order to detect similarities and differences. The study also takes development over 4 time into consideration in order to find how the accent may change as the actors grow more comfortable with the patterns and know what parts they wish to emphasize or alter. It should be made clear that the present study only aims to investigate the extent to which the actors adopt an Irish English accent and thus excludes any features pertaining to the broader dialect, such as grammar and vocabulary. Although it is likely that some dialectal features may be present in the material, the present study is only concerned with the phonetics of the utterances. ● How successfully do Matthew Mercer and Taliesin Jaffe replicate an authentic Irish English accent? ● Is the community’s perception of Matthew Mercer being better at mimicking Irish English supported by closer analysis? ● After taking over the role, does Matthew Mercer's accent share more key-features with authentic Irish English or Taliesin Jaffe's rendition of the accent? ● Due to the improvised nature of Critical Role, does the accent change as the campaign goes on, in particular between Taliesin Jaffe’s portrayal in the first and last appearance of his character? Based on the community’s perception of the two actors’ performances, it can be hypothesized that Mercer succeeds in producing Irish English features more frequently than Jaffe. A further hypothesis can be made based on the claims made by the actors in the Critical Role cast regarding the time it may take for their accents to settle in, thus causing the accents to change in several ways from the early to late episodes. 2. Theoretical Background 2.1 The Portrayal of Accents in Media Several previous studies have analysed the ways through which various accents are depicted in media such as film and television series. Some such studies cover accents native to the English language, whereas others cover foreign accents naturally found among L2 learners of English across the world. The 1995 movie Braveheart features an attempt at reproducing a Scottish accent so infamous that it was ranked first on a BBC (2013) list of poorly executed Scottish accents on film. In a study of Mel Gibson’s accent as the lead actor of the movie, Pedersen (2007) investigates the claims about the poor execution. The study notes that the film aims to tell a story based on Scottish history and thus the pressure for accuracy and authenticity was higher. It is, however, stated by Pedersen that the character Gibson portrays, Robert de Bruce, would not have spoken Scottish English but rather Gaelic, but that the producers for financial reasons opted to have the film “transposed to a simplified version of the language situation of the Great Britain today” (p.