Merkins

[Beverly Flanigan]

Although first language acquisition is pretty much complete by age 5, the
same is not true for dialect acquisition, which can continue to change
fairly easily until adolescence and even somewhat after that (as in your
college years).  Complete mastery of a new dialect ("native speaker
competence") may not be possible, esp. if you and your parents are from
somewhere else, but a high degree of adaptation is possible.

BTW, my in-laws were from Ballmer, Meralin (again, I'd put a schwa in
there), so I'm quite familiar with that dialect (plural 'yous', 'wait on' =
wait for, 'on' pronounced 'awn', etc.  The last pron. is common throughout
the South Midland, so-called, including PA, MD, WV, eastern OH, eastern KY,
etc.--the same Don/dawn --> dawn phenomenon discussed earlier on this list).

Are you from eastern CT or western CT?  Are you r-less or r-ful?  Generally
New England splits down the middle on this; and it would surely affect your
alphabetic principle-based pronunciation rules!

Beverly Flanigan
Linguistics
Ohio University
(lived in MN first 25 years, since then in MO, IN, and OH)

At 01:02 AM 10/20/2006, you wrote:
>I've never consciously heard "merkins" for "Americans" until a post I got
>from an Australian who spelled it out so I suppose they say it that way in
>the outback.  I do know folks from Philly call the state of Maryland
>"Merlin".
>
>It would be a good thing to see where our personal dialects are from.  I've
>put my name, country and years lived in various states in my personal
>signature.  I assume from what I gather here, that dialect is locked in at
>age 5.  All agree?  Personnally I find that after college in TN my speech
>changed there and changes to a southern drawl when I go back there or to a
>Southern state.
>
>Tom Z
>
>Tom Zurinskas   USA CT20, TN3, NJ32, FL-4+
>See truespel.com and the 4 truespel books at authorhouse.com.
>
>
>
>
>
>>From: Beverly Flanigan <flanigan at OHIO.EDU>
>>Reply-To: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>>Subject: Re: Merkins
>>Date: Thu, 19 Oct 2006 22:27:04 -0400
>>
>>---------------------- Information from the mail header
>>-----------------------
>>Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>Poster:       Beverly Flanigan <flanigan at OHIO.EDU>
>>Subject:      Re: Merkins
>>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>>At 12:40 PM 10/19/2006, you wrote:
>> >I don't think changing traditional spelling (tradspel) is doable.  Ted
>> >Roosevelt in consort with Andrew Carnegie tried and couldn't change a
>>word,
>> >even through an executive order.  Webster was the last success, at least
>>in
>> >USA.
>> >
>> >So the only thing possible to influence is pronunciation, keeping it
>> >consistent with tradspel to help learners by maintaining letter sound
>> >correspondance.  But I see no mechanism to do that except for our
>>schools.
>> >Now that "phonemic awareness" (Stanovich) is seen to be the "single most
>> >important attribute exhibited by successful readers" (to paraphrase),
>>there
>> >may be more action in that area.  I think the trend away from phonics in
>>the
>> >past for early reading teachers has fostered disparate pronunciations.  I
>> >advocate for USA English the Writing to Read approach by IBM of the 80's,
>> >only using truespel, which has no special symbols.
>> >
>> >"Merkins".  Is that an Ausy term?
>>
>>No, no--'Merkins' is a tried and true American English
>>pronunciation!  Listen to Newt Gingrich (if you can stand to), and you'll
>>hear him call us "Mer(a)kins" (I'd put a schwa in there).  It's
>>Philly/Baltimore/east Pennsylvania dialect, and maybe more (NJ? Del?).  The
>>first syllable is the same as in 'Murray'.  Recall our
>>Mary/merry/marry/Murray discussion a while back?  Another problem with the
>>alphabetic principle--people just won't obey it!
>>
>>
>>
>> >Tom Z
>> >
>> >
>> >>From: RonButters at AOL.COM
>> >>
>> >>Do you advocate, then, quite different spelling conventions (more than
>> >>the=20
>> >>trivial differences that we now see) for the England, Scotland, Wales,
>> >>Irela=
>> >>nd,=20
>> >>Jamaica, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, India, etc.? Or should
>>they
>> >>a=
>> >>ll=20
>> >>have to speak Merkin? It seems to me that this would make English a MUCH
>> >>mor=
>> >>e=20
>> >>DIFFICULT language to learn as a 2nd language.
>> >>
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>> >
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>
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