Wales has two languages, Welsh and English. Our recording is of a bilingual speaker stuydying at the University of Cardiff who is very proud to be Welsh. After the Norman invasion of England in 1066 the Normans slowly took over the parts of Wales nearest to England. By the 1290s Wales was virtually an English colony. King Henry the VIII united England and Wales under the 1536 Act of Union. All this meant that English became a linguistic force in Wales.
The most noticeable thing about Welsh English is its
sing-song intonation. Welsh speakers are supposed to drag out their consonants
but our speaker does not seem to do that. The speaker's vocabulary seems to be typical of the speech of young people throughout the UK unlike our Geordie and Scottish speakers.
(http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archivo:Animated-Flag-Wales.gif)
