dialect in novels

[Bob Haas]

Thanks, Dennis, et al, for the explanation.  Can you folks think of any
instance in which such eye-dialect flavor is not denigrating?

bob

> From: "Dennis R. Preston" <preston at PILOT.MSU.EDU>
> Reply-To: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Date: Fri, 23 Feb 2001 07:34:55 -0500
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> Subject: Re: dialect in novels
>
>> Eye-dialect refers to spellings which do not indicate any actual
>> change in  the way words are pronounced. The best example is "sez."
>> Of course, everybody says "sez" (except people who haven't learned
>> English yet, with apologies to those who speak dialects with minor
>> variations in the mid-front lax vowel). Eye-dialect is there to
>> simply give "flavor" to the speaker (and, as I have shown in several
>> articles, that flavor is always status- and intellegence-lowering).
>
> Unfortunately, some have started to use the term "eye-dialect" to
> refer to respellings which attempt to capute some fact of
> pronunciation (e.g., allegro speech forms such as "gonna" or actual
> regional prpmunciaion "tahm' for "time"). I prefer to reserve
> eye-dialect for the more limited territory outlined above (the
> original sense), but that will just prove what a conservative old
> codger I am.
>
>> dInIs