GalacticCactus Forum
Forums => English & Linguistics => Topic started by: Porter on February 12, 2008, 11:02:58 AM
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When I lived in Utah, I heard people talk about how Utah English was "neutral" English, without a discernible accent, and thus perfect for TV, movies, etc.. No, no, said many others. Accent-wise, it's how people speak in Colorado that's most accessible to Americans.
Now, I discover that out here in western Oregon, folks think that no, it's right here where people speak without an accent.
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Yup. Everyone thinks what they speak is free from an accent. Apparently, "accentless" American English is spoken somewhere around Ohio.
This is a bit of a tangent, but are there any languages that are spoken by so few that the speakers can truly say they don't speak with an accent? In other words, so small that all the speakers pronounce the language the same and use the same vocabulary?
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Some dialects seem to be more subtle than others. Although I seem to have a midwestern accent, when speaking to friends and family I like to use my "California Drawl". (Like, ya' know?)
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To be even tangenter, I'm always surprised when I'm reminded that you're from Canada, Brinestone, because I think of you as being from Colorado.
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I'm from both.
I lived in Canada for the first six years of my life. I lived in rural Maryland for the next five. I lived in Colorado for the next six. I have now lived in Utah for almost eight years, so I guess I'm more a Utahn than anything else.
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Apparently, "accentless" American English is spoken somewhere around Ohio.
From what I understand, that's not exactly true either. The dialect that people think of as having no accent is the Midwest/West dialect, also known as General American English.
(http://www.ling.upenn.edu/phono_atlas/NationalMap/NatMap2.GIF)
And it's not that people with that dialect have no accent or have only a subtle one, but rather that theirs is viewed as the baseline from which other dialects are judged.
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So, people who speak both The Western dialect and The Midland dialect both think that theirs is the One True Dialect?
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This is a bit of a tangent, but are there any languages that are spoken by so few that the speakers can truly say they don't speak with an accent? In other words, so small that all the speakers pronounce the language the same and use the same vocabulary?
Even Scots Gaelic has different varieties in different towns. But there might be dying languages with so few speakers that there are no pronunciation differences between them.
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Eyak would have qualified up until a month or two ago.
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Everyone thinks what they speak is free from an accent.
I learned that this was not true about myself the first time I left home, as a teenager. This New York girl spent the summer in North Carolina, and couldn't open her mouth to talk without everyone around laughing.
I'll never forget when my English professor that summer asked me to recite "Rime of the Ancient Mariner" in class. I started out: "Waw-tuh, waw-tuh, everywheyah . . . " and the class (prof, too) couldn't contain their laughter. And then the professor told me that I was excused from reciting poetry in his class.
I tried really hard after that to tone down the New York accent so that people could take me seriously when I spoke. I still love the vocabulary and idioms, though, and am on a mission to get them to go mainstream.
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So, people who speak both The Western dialect and The Midland dialect both think that theirs is the One True Dialect?
I believe there's more of a gradient between the Western and Midland dialect than a sharp division. I've seen dialect maps that didn't show a split between them. But basically, yes, anyone from southern New Jersey to Seattle to San Diego could claim to speak General American English. And of course, there are plenty of people who speak a pretty standard dialect outside of those areas, too.
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Even Scots Gaelic has different varieties in different towns. But there might be dying languages with so few speakers that there are no pronunciation differences between them.
Do you speak Scots Gaelic? I tried teaching myself Scottish once with a book-and-tape set I got from the public library. Suffice it to say that it's impossible to learn a language that way in only three weeks. I still remember a couple of phrases, though.
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anyone from souther New Jersey to Seattle to San Diego could claim to speak General American English.
That works for me. ;)
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Yeah, but for you it would be a lie.
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Now wait a minute. If the people in SoCal speak General American English, and the people in Jersey speak General American English, and my accent is a blend of the two, shouldn't that mean that I speak really General American English?
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Is that the additive property of dialects?
I'm not so sure that New Jersey is GAE. I've seen other maps that put it in the Mid-Atlantic dialect. And anyway, if I remember right from the one time I met you, you sound at least a little like a New Yorker (to me, anyway). So maybe you're not from the right part of Jersey.
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I took a university course in Scots Gaelic a while ago. It was a lot of fun. All I remember now is de'n t'ainm a th'ort? what's your name?
ciamar a tha thu? how are you?
tha mi gu math. I'm ok.
I love the periphrastic way it has of forming verbs. "I see you" is "tha mi gad fhaicinn" literally "I am at your seeing".
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I took a course in Welsh, and it was much the same way.
Oes ffrynd arbenig gyda fi = is friend special with me 'I have a special friend'
I can't remember any of the really mind-bending examples, unfortunately.
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New Jersey isn't just one accent. North Jerseyans cringe at the South Jersey accent which sounds awfully Philly, and South Jerseyans cringe at the North Jersey accent, which is New York inflected.
Of course, those in the know will tell you that there is not just one New York accent. There is the upper class and the lower class, the Brooklyn, the Bronx, and the Long Island variants, the Jewish, the Italian, the Irish, the Latino, the Caribbean and the Black variants.
You hear someone talking New Yorkish, and you can tell their heritage, their address, their education and their socioeconomic status.
Blimey! I'm a regular 'Enry 'Iggins, I am!
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And anyway, if I remember right from the one time I met you, you sound at least a little like a New Yorker (to me, anyway). So maybe you're not from the right part of Jersey.
It probably has less to do with Jersey (I was 6 when we moved), and more with my dad (raised in Brooklyn, and still sounds it) and the community in which I spend most of my time, which is tainted by the pool of NYers it includes. ;)
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Tainted? More like blessed.
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My son says that he thinks there is such a thing as an Evangelical accent. He says that the television preachers have an accent in common that has more to do with their being TV preachers than with where they are from.
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I don't whether linguists would count this all as an accent or not, but a lot of what is distinctive about evangelic preachers is the cadence, and the emphasis they put on words.
And it's not just Evangelicals who do it, either. Many Mormons have a "prayer voice" way of speaking that is markedly different from their everyday speech, and is similar to others' prayer voices. We also have a "pulpit voice" which is more common among the leaders of the church (who tend to speak over the pulpit much more than others), but which can occasionally be heard from the rank and file.
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I don't think I'd call that an accent, but I'm not sure what the right term would be. Like Porter said, I think it's more about adopting a particular pattern of prosody that's expected in a certain situation.
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He says it's the same accent that Foghorn Leghorn has. So, Rhode Island, I guess.
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Huh? Foghorn Leghorn is definitely southern.
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He's a Rhode Island Red.
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He doesn't speak like a Rhode Islander, though. He speaks like a Southerner.
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And a TV preacher.
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There's definitely a cadence behind how televangelists speak. But if you were to listen to one broadcasting in say Minnesota, I don't think you'd hear the Southerness to the speech if the evangelist was a native.
Prayer voice is something I struggle with intellectually. On the one hand it's good to have a voice distinct from our normal speech that helps set prayer apart from normal speech. We should be addressing God differently than we address other human beings. On the other hand though, I find the prayer voice to be somewhat creepy now that I'm older. I find while I don't want to use phrases or terms that infer a sort of buddy familiarity with God, I do feel like we should talk to God the way we might address a loving parent. Submissive, friendly, and some other adjectives I can't find words for. The way we teach kids to speak when praying though sounds wrong to me.
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I say, I say Foghorn Leghorn has a Southern accent.
Like Porter said, I think it's more about adopting a particular pattern of prosody
How dare you sir! I never...
*goes to look up prosody*
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I say, I say Foghorn Leghorn has a Southern accent.
Like Porter said, I think it's more about adopting a particular pattern of prosody
How dare you sir! I never...
*goes to look up prosody*
Kinda odd the study of poetic verse is "prosody"
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Yeah, I thought that as well.
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Rhode Island Red is a breed of chicken. Hence the witty joke.
I think it's about time to introduce this meme to this forum:
(http://img2.ranker.com/list_img/3903/310102/full/the-absolute-best-of-the-anti-joke-chicken-meme.jpg?version=1320176212000)
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He's a Rhode Island Red.
No he's not. He's a leghorn.
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Also, I was with my grandmother once when we met this guy who said he could identify where any American was from just by listening to them speak. He went on to demonstrate with a few of the ladies in the group. Then my grandma, thinking she would stump him, said "Oh yeah, big shot? Well, where do you think I'm from?"
He glanced over and said "Green Bay Wisconsin. Don't waste my time."
(this was correct, of course, hence the re-telling of the story ;) )
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I would have loved to meet such a man. I don't think he could have pegged me down.
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I have heard many such stories. I am dubious of them, but would love the chance to have it proven to me.
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Yeah, I imagine I'd be hard to pin down as well. I have features of Canadian, general western, and even a couple of Utah. I don't know if I picked up anything from my years in Maryland, but I must have.
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You say "putt-putt" instead of "miniature golf," but that's lexical, not phonetic.
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Oh, yeah.
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Here's a quick survey: My fiancé is from the NYC area and says something that I find really odd. I wonder how many of you would say it which way.
Scenario. You're on the phone with me and we're discussing plans for you to come to my house later in the day. Which would you say to me:
A: OK, I'll go over about 6.
B: OK, I'll come over about 6.
Question 2:
What do you give people for holidays and birthdays: presents or gifts?
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Come and presents.
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I would use either, but I would always say, "at" before the word "about".
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#1: come
#2: either
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I believe that the preacher voice is an example of Register (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Register_(sociolinguistics)) (or diatype).
I still have a few southern Utah vowels hanging on (I have a very hard time pronouncing color -- I say collar) that combine with California surfer dude and American Academic (for example, a crisp, clipped enunciation).
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Zal, I wonder if you say museum the same funny way your sister does. Do you say 2 syllables or 3?
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I do not. It'd be interesting to compare our two accent profiles -- she has no Kanab in her upbringing and a lot more California.
I think one of the most interesting accents I have heard is of a young man in his early twenties who spent most of his formative years in Minnesota, but whose father is from Scotland and his mother from England (I think south England, but I don't know for sure) who also served a mission in Idaho. He has a bit of the uptalk of young LDS, some of the Minnesota Scandinavian voweling, and yet there's an underlying British thickness to how he speaks. If I didn't know his background, I would find it impossible to place his accent.
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I say /muzi^m/ Though I might end with a schwa. I've really got to learn the unicode for that at least.
We've been wondering why my children say syrup different from each other. I know I posted about this, but can't recall where. I think it's possible that the accent gets set at a particular age.
A leghorn is not a Rhode Island Red. Leghorns have white bodies and the hens lay white eggs. They are also very loud. Rhode Island Reds have auburn or even brown bodies and the hens lay brown eggs.
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You say /mu-/ and not /mju-/?
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(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v605/annekemajors/antijokechicken.png)
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I just realized that "I do not" is not an answer to the question asked. I pronounce museum with two syllables. :ninja:
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How do you say it?
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Annie's points are true, but that chicken is actually a Red Sex Link, not a Rhode Island Red.
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I just realized that "I do not" is not an answer to the question asked. I pronounce museum with two syllables. :ninja:
As does she. She says /mju 'zɪm/
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Which is weird.
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I wonder if that's related to the common Utah (and probably other places) pronunciation of idea as [ai'dɪ].
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I say eye-dee-uh. I don't understand you guys with your [ai'dI] and upside down e's and such.
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Which is weird.
It is. But assuming my deciphering of the notation is correct, I've heard it before, and more than once.
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I wonder if that's related to the common Utah (and probably other places) pronunciation of idea as [ai'dɪ].
The evil sibling to Sundɪ and Mundɪ!
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I say eye-dee-uh. I don't understand you guys with your [ai'dI] and upside down e's and such.
But your mom was a linguist! Isn't she raising you right? ;)
The evil sibling to Sundɪ and Mundɪ!
I'd write those as ['sʌndi] and ['mʌndi], with a tense vowel ("ee") rather than a lax one ("ih").
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Now I don't know how I say it naturally because my mind has been tainted by this thread. I do know that I don't say idea like [ai'dɪ].
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I've never felt that I had an accent despite the fact that I live in almost-Southern Missouri (which is notorious for early onset Southern-ish accents). Oddly, however, I've been told I sound like I'm from Minnesota or other Northern states despite having never even visited there.
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Yah, shure, yah betchah!
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I really hope I don't talk like the people in the movie Fargo. :D
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Or like Sarah Palin.
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Maybe I AM Sarah Palin.
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That's probably true. I mean, you ARE the Pink Ranger, after all. It just makes sense that you'd also be Sarah Palin.
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You betcha! ;)
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I really hope I don't talk like the people in the movie Fargo. :D
Or like Sarah Palin.
I wasn't thinking of either, snookums (http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Stargate_SG-1/Season_3#Nemesis_.5B3.22.5D).
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Ah. See. I haven't watched that show, so I didn't recognize the quote. :)
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Ah. See. I haven't watched that show, so I didn't recognize the quote. :)
An easily solvable problem.
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I looked up the chicken meme, and this is apparently anti-joke chicken.
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I prefer meme cat.
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Huh. I didn't realize that file attachments were enabled.
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I'm a trailblazer. :D
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This can't end well.
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But anti-joke chicken captures the spirit of this forum so perfectly.
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For me, dear, would you make an anti-joke chicken soup? I'd like very much if you could get it to go viral. Chicken soup is good for viral things.
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I think we might break the internet if we try that.
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I thought it was business cat. Spacepook says it's business cat. FWIW.
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Eh. Business cat. Meme cat. They're all cats to me. :p
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Various thoughts attached to this thread:
Foghorn Leghorn totally sounds like an old-school Southern televangelist! It's the bombast, I think.
I'm from Long Island, NY. I lost most of my accent through circumstances similar to Tante's, although mine happened in Provo, Utah: "Say 'talk!' Say 'hot dog!' " I remember reading a verse in a Sunday school class the first Sunday I was there and the immediate response had nothing to do with the verse, it was, "Where are you from?"
Not too many people pin me down as a New Yorker anymore, although I don't sound like I'm from Georgia, where I now live. They know I'm not from around here, and generally say I sound like a Yankee. I tell people that if they listen to Jerry Seinfeld, that was my accent. I'm a little sad that I can't reproduce it naturally any longer.
A couple of stories: After having lived away from NY for many years, I returned for a visit and was with a friend I knew in DC, where I'd been living at the time. We were sightseeing together around Manhattan and I got us lost. All of a sudden I looked up and said, "Oh I know where we are, this is Rockafelluh Centuh!" We both burst out laughing -- it had just popped out of me the way I would have said it when I was a kid.
I served a mission in Portugal and for about 6 months had Portuguese companions and spoke Portuguese exclusively. During this time I went to a meeting at the mission office and was chatting in English w/ one of the elders I knew from the MTC. He laughed at me because apparently my English was coming out all New Yorkish--way more than it had when he knew me in Provo, even though I'd been living in NY for about 8 months prior to my mission.
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I can see Long Island when I go for my run each morning. :) And my husband proposed to me in Rockefelluh Centuh. Those are just some happy thoughts associated with your happy thoughts. Oh, that and, if you're Mormon and from Long Island you probably know my friend Jacob or one of his siblings.
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:)
I don't know if I'd know your friend or not -- let's see, it's been, umm, 28 years since I've lived on Long Island. I might know your friend's parents, though, try me! ;) Last name start with "Rath" by any chance? Seems to me like they had a Jacob . . .
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Nope, the last name starts with Ol. They have like a billion kids. Or maybe 9.
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Sorry, I don't think I know them. My mom went to a 50-year anniversary/reunion of the stake I grew up in last summer.
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Foghorn Leghorn totally sounds like an old-school Southern televangelist! It's the bombast, I think.
Politician, actually. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vi_X4BFpvnY&feature=related)