The Press, Society and the Coming of Sound to Birmingham

Abstract

The arrival of sound on British cinema screens is perhaps more accurately described as the arrival of American sounds. Almost overnight, the sounds of American voices, accents, slang and vernacular became commonplace throughout the country. This article uses linguistic and social economic frameworks to explore the ways in which American sound films challenged the legitimacy and dominance of hegemonic forms of language within Britain. Taking the mainstream provincial press as a primary source, it discusses the ways in which the arrival of sound was seen as a nationalist threat to both industry and culture. The article uses Birmingham as a focal point and uncovers nuanced ways in which language was negotiated and deployed both by mainstream institutions as well as young people and the working classes. It argues that dominant social actors within British society – such as the press, the Church and educationists – saw talkies as almost invariably threatening, while marginalised social actors like children, teenagers and working-class Northern and Midland audiences were able to use the othered displacement of American talkies as a class-neutral space where their own social capital was bolstered.