I listen to news programmes quite a lot on the BBC World Service, and have little trouble in understanding the English of foreigners from around the world. In many cases, their accents and command of the language would put us native speakers to shame. I find it much more difficult to make out some varieties of the home-grown product. Sir Alex Ferguson, for example, is virtually indecipherable and the same goes for the rapidly diminishing pool of British footballers.
Part of the problem, I readily admit, is that I am becoming increasingly hard of hearing, or to put it another way, deaf. This was brought home to me again very forcefully the other day when I was having lunch with a group of people in a nearby country restaurant. I just couldn’t make out what people were saying unless they shouted at me, which they seemed quite inclined to do…
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