Fwd: 16.1469, Sum: American Dialects

[Laurence Horn]

crosspost of potential interest...

Larry
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LINGUIST List: Vol-16-1469. Mon May 09 2005. ISSN: 1068 - 4875.
Subject: 16.1469, Sum: American Dialects
Date: Mon, 09 May 2005 13:24:32
From: Stan Anonby < stan-sandy_anonby at sil.org >
Subject: American Dialects

Regarding query: http://www.linguistlist.org/issues/16/16-1402.html#2

Hello,

The question I had was why uneducated white people on the sitcom Home
Improvement speak like southerners.

There were various interesting, interrelated answers, which I'll list.

1) There exists a "redneck accent", the speech of rural whites. This accent
    is perceived as funny and/or irritating.

2) A related reason given was that there is a "hillbilly accent". This
    hillbilly accent has been around TV since the Beverly Hillbillies, and
    has been very successful in sitcoms.

3) Many working class white people in the North are descended from
    Southerners who immigrated during WWII. An example given was Ypsilanti,
    a suburb of Detroit was nicknamed Ypsyntucky because so many of its
    residents were immigrants from Kentucky.

4) Many African Americans immigrated north around the same time and joined
    the working ranks. Their speech is similar to that of white southerners,
    and features of it spread throughout all the working class.

Stan Anonby
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LINGUIST List: Vol-16-1469



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