English is an old language that has seen many different variations over the centuries. Among these are the Queen’s English, Cockney and Oxford/Cambridge English. Check out a few examples below!

The Cockney Accent

This accent most commonly seen in the many different portrayals of Eliza Doolittle. Check out a few examples in the following examples:

How to do a Cockney Accent Instructional Video
Michael Caine: An Accent That Broke Class Barriers
My Fair Lady – Eliza Doolittle’s Cockney Accent
 My Fair Lady – Vowels
Performance of My Fair Lady by Covenant Christian High School, Indianapolis, Indiana Part I
Performance of My Fair Lady by Covenant Christian High School, Indianapolis, Indiana Part II

Notice the way the performer’s lips move differently as they articulate the words in the accent.

Queen’s English (Received Pronunciation) 

How to Master Proper English Pronunciation
A funny satire of Queen’s English
The London Centre of Spoken English
The Queen’s Christmas Broadcast (1957)
Queen Elizabeth II Christmas Broadcast (2010)

Notice how the first video focuses more on the movement of your lips when speaking the Queen’s English. In the second link, a young girl satirizes the differences between the different accents, but in doing so she performs a great Queen’s English accent. The third video focuses again on the differences in pronunciation between English and other languages. There are slight differences in the way we move our lips and tongues that lead to a much different sounding end result. In the final two videos, we look at a comparison between the Queen’s speech between her Christmas broadcast in 1957 and more recently in 2010!