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Gillian Blackiston
English Grammar Usage
Dr. Costanzo
December 10, 2015
Hagrids Speech Patterns
Rubeus Hagrid is a big, friendly half giant who befriends Harry Potter very early on in
the Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling. Throughout the series, the readers learn how much
Hagrid cares for the main character Harry Potter. Hagrid is the first person from the wizarding
world that Harry meets so the first impression is quite impressive here. However, Hagrid talks
differently than any other character in the series so Harry has to adapt to Hagrids speech patterns
as well as a new world and society. For my research project, I tried to figure out if there is a
distinct dialect that Hagrid speaks and if his speech patterns have to do with his personal
background.
First, I looked at Hagrids background to see if any speech features were unique to him.
Hagrid is a half-giant who lives amongst wizards. A half-giant is someone who is born to parents,
in which one is a giant and the other one is a human. Hagrids mother was a giantess named
Fridwulfa. His mother left him and his father when he was merely three years old. His father was
a wizard who passed away when he was twelve while he was off at school. Hagrid attended
Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry until his third year when he was unfortunately
expelled. Since his expulsion, he has lived at Hogwarts on the grounds and became the Keeper of
Keys and Grounds of Hogwarts. Later on in his life he became the Care of Magical Creatures
professor at the school. Since he lives at the school year round and mainly interact with students
aged 11 to 18 and the faculty, his English may not be fully standard like the rest of the wizarding

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society. His English is not like the rest of society because many people view him as being
uneducated given his expulsion at such an early age. Another reason his speech patterns are not
like everyone else's is that he does not fit in with them. The wizarding community looks down
upon half-giants because they fear that there is more giant blood in them than there is human
wizard blood.
Right off the back I knew that Hagrid spoke differently, however, I did not know if it was
based off of a certain dialect in England. I have found out that J.K. Rowling gave a unique
dialect to Hagrid in the series. J.K. Rowling stated in an interview that Well, Hagrid's sort of
West-country - yokel - which is where I grew up - the part of Britain where I grew up, I didn't
grow up in Scotland, I grew up on the border with Wales. So Hagrid's kind of ... 'Yes Harry
Potter, sir' - like that - very slurred words - it's the accent English people always put on to sound
stupid ... [laughs] Hagrid /isn't/ stupid, but he's got that kind of very country - you know, way of
speaking (J.K. Rowling Interview Transcript). Hagrid himself grew up in the Forest of
Dean area, which resides in the West Country part of England. It makes sense why J.K. Rowling
gave Hagrid this accent. She stated that this specific dialect makes people sound stupid, and that
is how some of the characters portray Hagrid in the series. Usually, it is the Slytherin students
that mock Hagrids speech patterns and oftentimes call him names similar to stupid. I found out
that most of Hagrids speech patterns do correspond with the West Country dialect patterns. In
contrast, the rest of the characters talk in Standard English.
Of course, not all the characters talk in Standard English either, but none of them talk just
like Hagrid. For example, since Hagrid is half-giant, I took a quick analysis of how the fullblooded giants talk in the series to see if they have any similar patterns to Hagrid. The giants do
not speak English at all and use a variety of grunts and different vocalizations to communicate.

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However, some of the giants do know how to talk in English as they were able to translate things
from Hagrid to the chief giant. During this little interaction, the reader can conclude that Hagrid
does speak English because he was raised by his father who was a wizard and lived his life
surrounded by humans who spoke English. Hagrid also never spent quality time with full-blood
giants. This is also evident when Hagrid tries to teach his half-brother, Grawp, to speak English.
Hagrid has his work cut out for him. If Hagrid had grown up with his mother instead of his dad,
he probably would not be speaking English.
One other comparison that I did was to Madame Maxime. Madame Maxime is the only
other half-giant in the series that the readers are told about. Hagrid has many conversations with
her because he fancies her, so it was a little easy to compare how their speech patterns are similar
or different. Madame Maxime is the headmistress at the Beauxbatons Academy of Magic and
was probably educated there herself. So far, she is more educated than Hagrid, so I expected her
speech patterns to reflect that where Hagrids does not. However, upon looking at her speech, I
noticed that her patterns are more tailored to a French person trying to talk in English. One
example is I 'ave nevair been more insulted in my life! 'Alf-giant? Moi? I 'ave - I 'ave big
bones! (Goblet of Fire 429). First, Madame Maxime leaves the h off at the beginning of her
words, where Hagrid drops the end off of his words. Madame Maxime also slips in French words
instead of the English equivalent, like moi for me and nevair for never. Hagrid does not
really speak in replacement words. Overall, Madame Maxime and Hagrid do not have similar
speech patterns despite both of them being half-giants.
Second, I took a look at all the grammatical issues with Hagrids speech to see how that
corresponded to his dialect. The five grammatical issues I have found in Hagrids speech are: his
use of the second pronoun you, contractions, his use of the first person pronoun, dropping the

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end off of words, and other irregularities. When I first looked at Hagrids speech, I noticed that
there was a lot of the pronoun you used. The differences even varied per line of speech.
Hagrids most common uses of you in some form are: yer and yeh. He oftentimes
combines these two uses into contractions. In most cases, yer stands your or you are, while
yeh stands for you. One example from Harry Potter and the Sorcerers Stone is Yer a
wizard Harry (Rowling 39). In this statement the yer should be you are in Standard English.
Hagrids form of you are is incorrect because it is the improper use of the second person verb
tense of to be. Another example of yer used two different ways in the same sentence is Yer
not on yer own? (Chamber of Secrets 55). In this passage, the first yer stands for you are
and the second yer stands for your. The first case is the same reason as the first example
above. The second case shows the possession of the character that Hagrid is talking to, which in
this case is Harry Potter. Another way that Hagrid misspeaks you are is in Harry Potter and
the Prisoner of Azkaban: Yehre ter go back up ter the castle (Rowling 328). For Hagrid yeh
is his proper form of you so in this example, he is using his proper contraction for you are.
This form of the contraction is different than the other yer because it cannot be confused with
your like the other form can be like in the above examples. Hagrids use of the improper use of
you is consistent throughout the series and does not change for any given audience.
The second major speech pattern I found that Hagrid uses is contractions. He seems to
make contractions a lot with the pronoun yeh. He says yehve and yehll the most. One
example where Hagrid says yehve is when he is talking to his Care of Magical Creatures
class: Yehve got ter stroke em (Prisoner of Azkaban 113). This is an example of his
contractions when he is talking to his students in a formal setting. Yehve stands for you
have which follows his use of the second person pronoun. He says yehll when he is talking

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to Madame Maxime about looking at some dragons: Yehll enjoy this (Goblet of Fire 325).
Yehll is the contraction for you will. In this passage he uses this contraction when he is
talking to someone that has a higher class than him and who is also a half giant. Hagrid does not
seem to use different contractions when he talks to different people and different statuses. Most
people in society will rather have a different form of contractions or would not use contractions
at all depending on who they are talking to. Another contraction that Hagrid uses is very odd. He
says, Isn it beautiful (Goblet of Fire 326) when he is describing the Hungarian Horntail
dragon to Madame Maxime. In this passage the contraction in Standard English would be isnt
which translates to is not. However, Hagrid uses this contraction to mean is it not beautiful.
He seems to just put the comma in the wrong place and therefore pronounces it on the wrong
syllable.
Hagrid also speaks contractions that are less regular and less common than Standard
English. For example, he connects two with would by forming twod. This contraction is
seen when he is talking to Ron and Harry about mistreating Hermione: . . . I thought you two'd
value your friend more'n broomsticks or rats (Prisoner of Azkaban 274). In Standard English,
most people would not make a contraction out of the two words. They would just say the two
words separately. Another irregular contraction of Hagrids is thas. This use of the contraction
is irregular because Hagrid drops the end off of the first part of the contraction. In Standard
English the contraction is written and spoken as thats. Despite the two forms of the
contraction being said differently, they both mean that is. Hagrids use of this contraction is
when he is talking to Ron and Harry and is finishing up a rant he was giving them: Tha's all
(Prisoner of Azkaban 274). There is not really a clear reason why Hagrid uses the contractions
that he does.

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The third kind of nonstandard speech that Hagrid uses is an incorrect form of the first
person pronoun. I have found only one time when he uses the improper form of the pronoun. He
is talking about his father to someone else. The example takes place in Harry Potter and the
Goblet of Fire when Hagrid is talking to Madame Maxime: Me dad was broken-hearted when
she wen' (Rowling). In Standard English this sentence should read My dad was broken-hearted
when she went. Hagrid instead uses the wrong pronoun of the first person. Me is most
commonly used as the first person objective form which is usually seen as an indirect object in
sentences. In the above passage, Hagrid is not receiving anything from anyone. He is trying to
show possession of his dad but does not use the correct pronoun. Since he is trying to show
possession he should have used the possessive form of the first person pronoun which is my.
Despite Hagrid mixing up his pronouns the reader can still tell whose father Hagrid is talking
about and that he is not in fact the indirect object of the sentence.
Hagrids speech pattern includes dropping the end off of words. He tends to drop off the
last letter and it is usually the g of past participles. An example of the incomplete past
participle is I was lookin fer a flesh-eatin slug repellent (Chamber of Secrets 55). Here the
g is dropped off of the word looking which is a past participle because it follows a form of to
be. However, Hagrid does not always drops the ends off of a past participle. Flesh-eatin is
missing the g at the end so it looks like it should be a past participle but it does not follow a
form of the infinitive to be. Hagrid does tend to drop off occasional ends off of words that could
be past participles but in reality are not. I am not sure why he does this, but he seems consistent
in dropping off the same end off of his words and is not doing it to just some of them. Another
example where Hagrid drops the end off of a word is . . . Quidditch ev'ry hour o' the day an'
night. . . (Prisoner of Azkaban 274). In this passage Hagrid drops the d off of and. This is a

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unique case because it does not follow his previous pattern of dropping the g off of past
participles or similar words. He drops the end off of a conjunction that connects part of a
sentence together. Hagrid also drops the end off of a past tense verb: Me dad was brokenhearted when she wen' (Goblet of Fire). He simply leaves off the t of went. I have not
found anything as to why he drops the t off and how it compares to his use of g dropping.
Another instance where Hagrid drops a t is at the end of a preposition. He drops the t off of
the word about in the following sentence, Ah, well, people can be stupid abou' their pets,
(Prisoner of Azkaban 274). I think that this is just an irregular dropping off that Hagrid does
when he talks.
At the end of my research I have found that Hagrids speech pattern does have a few
irregulars that do not fit into another category or there is not enough examples to warrant a
separate category. One irregular that Hagrid says is switching up the vowels in the verb been.
He changes the form of the verb, which is not uncommon in other dialects. One example where
Hagrid uses this incorrect of the verb is Bin wonderin when youd come ter see me thought
you mighta bin professor back again (Chamber of Secrets 144). Hagrids speech pattern of the
verb been is different than the Standard English, however, his pattern follows more along the
line of some of the more native languages like creole. In class, we were shown examples of how
Hawaiian Creole uses bin in their language. The bin seems to replace the past tense form of
the verb in all the tenses. According to a table on the classes Verb Tense handout bin is used in
the past, the past perfect progressive, conditional perfect, and the conditional perfect progressive
tenses of the Hawaiian Creole speech patterns. Hagrid however, seems to leave parts of the verb
tense out when he uses bin instead of been. For example, when he says, bin wonderin he
means to use the present perfect progressive, but he leaves out the helping verb have. When

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Hagrid says, you mighta bin, he includes a modal which only comes before an infinitive. He
should have said You might have been in which might acts as an auxiliary modal to the verb
tense of the present perfect progressive for the verb.
Another irregular speech pattern that Hagrid follows sometimes is changing the verbs to
slang. The two words that Hagrid changes to slang are to and for. For both of these words,
Hagrid changes the o to an e. An example of his changed to occurs in Harry Potter and
the Prisoner of Azkaban: Yehve got ter stroke em (113). I think that J.K. Rowling uses ter
as slang to go along with the rest of Hagrids speech patterns. Since Hagrid uses it, it adds more
charm to his unique dialect in the series. He also uses fer as the slang for for. An example of
this slang is I was lookin fer a flesh-eatin slug repellent (Chamber of Secrets 55). Hagrid just
replaces the vowel with another vowel to make it slang. He does this in part of his specific
dialect. Many dialects use slang for certain words for many reasons.
In conclusion, Hagrids speech patterns are irregular when compared to Standard English
speech patterns. Hagrids main patterns are incorrect use of the second person pronoun,
contractions, the first person pronoun, dropping the end off of words, and irregulars. In all, my
research has shown that Hagrid has a very special speech pattern that the rest of the characters in
the Harry Potter series do not have. It was enjoyable to dive into the patterns to figure out if
there was a certain reason for them. I think that JK Rowling just wanted to highlight the different
dialect of England and to show how his uneducated self communicates with the rest of society.
Another joy of researching the way that Hagrid speaks was to relive some of his best moments. I
have found his speech patterns to be quite enjoyable because they are so different than ours and
the rest of the characters. His speech helps me remember who he is apart from the other
wonderful qualities he possesses.

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Works Cited
J.K. Rowling Interview Transcript. The Connection. WBUR Radio. 12 October 1999. Web. 9
December 2015. Transcript.
Rowling, J. K. Harry Potter and the Sorcerers Stone. New York, NY: Arthur A. Levine,
1998. Print.
Rowling, J. K. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. New York, NY: Arthur A. Levine,
1999. Print.
Rowling, J. K. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. New York, NY: Arthur A. Levine,
1999. Print.
Rowling, J. K. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. New York, NY: Arthur A. Levine,
2000. Print.