[Ads-l] Dorchester

Amy West medievalist at W-STS.COM
Fri Apr 22 13:10:53 UTC 2016


The /woostah/ pron is an approximation of the native pron., so you will 
still hear that variant, but it's marked as an 
approximation/imitation/exaggeration/foreign pron. There is a /wistah/ 
variant also from northern Worcester county. That's in the sticks.

Dorchester is a part of Greater Boston, very urban, and again, I think I 
hear /duhchestuh/ (I mistranscribed the final syllable last time) among 
the native Bostonians. (I'll have keep my ears open and try to elicit 
some instances, like from my uncle.)

---Amy West

On 4/22/16 12:00 AM, ADS-L automatic digest system wrote:
> Date:    Fri, 22 Apr 2016 01:53:30 +0000
> From:    Joel Berson<berson at ATT.NET>
> Subject: Re: Dorchester
>
> I suspect Amy is right about origins -- the New Englanders and Marylanders I think came from different parts of England.  And New Englanders were dissenting Protestants, while Maryland was open to Catholics and perhaps also attracted Church of Englanders.
>
> P.S.  Amy, of Worcester, hears "Well, it's not/wooster/, it's WUH-stuh. And I think I hear DUH-chester
> among the non-rhotic."  But that's in the sticks?  I, not from Massachusetts, rhotic, and hearing the cultured (not cultchah'd) broadcast announcers of the metropolis, hear wooster and door-chester.  But perhaps, having grown up in New York City, I can't hear non-r's.
>
>
> Joel


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