Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2021/01/21/watch-this-dialect-coach-speak-in-different-u-s-accents.html
…
3 Likes
That was actually quite informative, and though I’m no expert, I thought he hit the accents pretty well. I’m most familiar with Boston, and that was a pretty good version of it, as well as Rhode Island and how it varied slightly.
Deducting points for not trying a Maine accent, though. Adding points back in for not trying a Maine accent and doing it badly, so that’s a wash.
6 Likes
Holy cow this guy knows his scheidt. A rare thing to marry the whole with the deconstructed parts. Well done!
3 Likes
Came for the Pittsburgh accent, pleasantly surprised that it wasn’t totally incorrect.
To clarify, it’s less about “the placement of the tongue” than it is “Pittsburgh-ese is incredibly lazy, and should be spoken like you just woke up from a nap.”
Replace some of those Ls with Ws for extra fun.
“Gimmea minta grab mah wawwt and will go dahn 'na storen getcher chips.”
“Give me a minute to grab my wallet and we’ll go down to the store and get your chips.”
4 Likes
Interested to hear that the lack of uptick in a question is associated with African Americans in DC, as I had been told it was a characteristic of the NY accent (not that the two are mutually exclusive) and certainly seems to be, since it’s something I seem to do (and I’m from NY and have been singled out for my accent)
1 Like
I’m originally from the Georgia Piney Woods, and his impression of it is pretty good. He’s right (rat) that there are even more subdivisions of that accent. People in Nashville, GA sound different from people 35 miles up the road in Fitzgerald. I do wish he’d used Jimmy Carter to demonstrate the non-rhotic Southern accent instead of Englishwoman Vivian Leigh.
1 Like
Wouldn’t the headline be better as “Listen,” rather than “Watch”?
No. I’m definitely going to watch! #eyecandy
6 Likes
laughing As an ex-pat Maineiac I support this point system.
Have heard accent-wise it’s frozen a lot of Elizabethan English in amber, so to speak.
3 Likes
I’m looking forward to seeing how they move forward with other regions, just generally proceeding west or if they’ll focus on other places with connected accents as their own videos. As an example, the white Cleveland accent is much more closely tied to the other Great Lakes port cities through the Northern Cities chain shift than it is to Columbus (Midlands accent), but it is much harder to understand the development of the black Cleveland accent without understanding accents in parts of the south.
2 Likes
He’s great at accents but the geography kind of sucks, as evidenced by that map of the UK and Ireland which appears to have Wales and the Isle of Man mixed up? Weird.
Also worth noting/praising: Singer isn’t doing this alone, but giving voice/platform to a lot of other linguists and dialect coaches. I’m pretty sure he could do passable versions of a lot of the non-white accents he talks about, and show his work with all the details of phonology and syntax, but why open that can of worms? Instead, he brings in POC, to talk about their own research and backgrounds. Well played.
7 Likes
This is the first video of a series. Starting in Boston and leaving Northern New England behind is a bit surprising from a geographical standpoint, but it’s early times yet. He doesn’t do much with the Midwest yet (not that it’s especially similar to Maine and Northern New England), but he does mention eventually getting to Canada.
How different is the Mainer accent from those of the Maritimes?
2 Likes
Yeah, since he’s white, and because accent is such an integral part of identity as everyone is emphasizing, him doing all the non-white accents as well could very easily be perceived badly. I think it was a good choice, but I would have liked to hear longer examples from the other speakers, who usually only gave a word or two, while Singer would gives several sentences for each one that give us a better feel for what it sounds like.
4 Likes
I watched for a while, Gullah was interesting, but was disappointed I didn’t see Pittsburgh, so went back thanks to you and skipped till I found it.
1 Like
Most distinctive is Outer Banks? Methinks he’s forgetting Newfoundland (undoubtedly to be touched on in a future episode).
1 Like
Maine is also non-rhotic like Boston, but there’s some other difference in the accent I can’t define (want to see if he covers what it is), and there’s a use of older variations of words. My favorite is the use of “stove” in Maine. It’s not just for cooking on.
“You heard about Bud?”
“Ayuh. Heard he stove up his cah wicked guhd.”
Note: I can’t even begin to spell how my father pronounces “heard.” It’s more like “hahd,” but that doesn’t quite capture it.
In this case, stove is being used in a much older way as a past tense and past participle of the word “stave”, as in “to crush or smash inward.” No other region of the United States I’ve visited outside of Maine uses stove that way, it’s an archaic hold over from British colony days.
1 Like
Came for Mid-Atlantic (Philly to Baltimore) and it was…different. He identified the line in NJ very well, but the examples sounded odd. It seemed like accents more from the south than anything I hear from speakers in those areas. The way he said hoagie and ocean were startling. Maybe that’s because accents from specific areas in Philly and Baltimore get a lot of focus vs. the rest of those metro areas, Maryland, Eastern PA, or South Jersey.
1 Like
So much this!!
That left me poking around Youtube to find out what a Bermudian accent sounds like.
1 Like
