Christopher
Since Christopher gives his address, we know quite precisely where he lives. For young people in Swindon, the presence of West Country features is very slight. Nonetheless, it’s a good idea to poke around on the Swindon page.
Below, I’ve gathered a few samples that can give you more grounding in what school age children in Swindon sound like:
Jack
Jack is a student at St Joseph’s College, a Catholic School in Swindon. He speaks with what I would call an Estuary accent. I can’t really detect any of the distinctive Wiltshire features that I’ve heard elsewhere, and that’s further evidence that young people in Swindon may have no traces of West Country sounds.
Also, when you see this video touring the school…this school is loaded!
Head Boy and Head Girl
so perhaps these are not the students Christopher mixes with.
Commonweal School
Here’s a video from the Commonweal School in Swindon. The school seems more inclusive and supportive than Christopher’s school, but
1) it further demonstrates the variety of accents in Swindon, and 2) It’s a fantastic short film made by students:
and here’s the staff and students talking about the school:
James Cocks
I found this oral history interview with a young man named James Cocks. His accent seems very much in a London mode, but he does say at the top of the interview that he grew up in Swindon, but has been living in Cardiff for a few years.
here’s an audio clip:
I do think it’s worth watching the video, though, since he has a slightly awkward style that might be interesting to contemplate. I couldn’t get the video to embed, but you can watch it here: