When I was growing up, in the '80s, one of the obvious markers of a "West Country" accent was the continued and clear pronunciation of the letter 'r' after a vowel in a word such as 'farm'. I was aware already, however, that it carried a slight stigma; it was often mimicked with a view to suggesting the speaker was something of a rural simpleton.
(The "West Country" is itself a somewhat ill-defined concept, but it occupies a large part of the south west of England - how large is disputed. In England, historically, reference was also made to the "North Country" and occasionally the "South Country", from the point of view of the capital city, but these terms have long since fallen out of use)
Of course, like so many aspects of dialectal pronunciation, the stigma was random - there is nothing intrinsically "better" or "worse" about pronouncing a clear 'r' in a word such as 'farm'. In the United States, if anything, the stigma works the other way; New England accents are often mocked precisely because the 'r' is not clearly pronounced (in other words, the pronunciation of 'farm' in Boston and the surrounding areas is fairly close, though not in fact identical, to the current pronunciation in most of England). In fact, the stigma worked the other way around even at one stage in London: in the mid 18th century, there are several examples in written sources of complaints about the 'r' in a word like 'start' "being sunk completely" (i.e. not pronounced) - in other words, it was seen as "proper" to pronounce it.
It is this random assignment of stigmatised pronunciations, one way or the other, which often leads to their disappearance. We can see this both in England and in the United States, and even elsewhere.
For example, in the American South, the predominant pronunciation even into the post-War period was again not dissimilar to that of New England or (currently) of England - the 'r' effectively lengthened the preceding vowel but was not itself clearly pronounced. However, no doubt affected by the stigma assigned to its perceived non-pronunciation, this has shifted so that young speakers across the American South in the 21st century all clearly pronounce the 'r' as is the case in most of the rest of the United States (and in "General American").
There can be extreme cases of this. In Germany, most dialects do not pronounce the 'r' after a vowel, again using it if anything to signify a different vowel length or quality - German 'Arm' therefore sounds much like 'arm' in most of England. The farther south you go, however, the more likely it is to be clearly sounded, usually with a distinctive front trill (close to Italian), at least traditionally. The problem is that a certain speaker with a southern accent rose to prominence a little under a century ago, if anything re-emphasised this trill in his speeches (in which, out of interest, his accent was quite different from his accent when he spoke normally and informally), and thus the stigma came to apply.
In England, however, the stigma applied the other way and has therefore had the reverse effect. Where, pre-War, even numerous Lancashire accents were "rhotic" (i.e. had post-vocalic 'r' clearly pronounced; "Scouse" was once specifically noted for not doing this, whereas no one would think that odd now) and the north east of England was well known for the "Northumbrian burr" (a distinctive rhotic pronunciation often associated with union leaders or football fans), this had been assigned to the memory of grandparents even in my youth; now, even in the "West Country", the same process is ongoing so that by mid-century all of England will be "non-rhotic".
Of course, across Ireland and Scotland, the post-vocalic 'r' remains clearly pronounced, and indeed there is no danger whatsoever of this changing. That merely serves as another hint that linguistics and politics often mix in the most subtle of ways!
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