Standard US English Dialect?

[Paul Johnston]

Do you get some localized features like /o/- and /u/-fronting with
those DC suburbanites?  It's quite pronounced in both MD (including
Balmer and ITS suburbs) and VA, and seems to go up the social scale a
fair bit, especially among female speakers.

Yours,
Paul
On Apr 15, 2008, at 1:41 AM, Dennis Preston wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Dennis Preston <preston at MSU.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: Standard US English Dialect?
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> ---------
>
> Indeed. I have three nephews who grew up right on the Bethesda border
> with DC. WI mother and CA father. They were distinct from both (no
> NCS; no low-back merger) but otherwise unremarkable. Odd I never
> thought much about them. Plenty of tapes of the little buggers (now
> full-grown); maybe I'll give an ear (well, a machine).
>
> dInIs
>
>> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
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>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Poster:       RonButters at AOL.COM
>> Subject:      Standard US English Dialect?
>> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
>> ----------
>>
>> DC is also such a mixing bowl that one tends to get a lot of
>> leveling, right?
>> Particularly in the suburbs. Over the years, when I couldn't place
>> a white
>> Duke student's accent, I would guess "DC suburbs" and very often
>> got it right.
>> (African American and even Asian students were generally much more
>> difficult to
>> place, for a variety of sociolinguistic reasons.) Of course, Duke
>> has a lot
>> of students from the DC suburbs, but Duke also gets a lot of
>> students from
>> suburban Chicago, Detroit, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, etc.
>>
>> In a message dated 4/14/08 11:45:24 AM, preston at MSU.EDU writes:
>>
>>
>>>  Yes, DC always does surprisingly well, but the East Coaster the
>>> South
>>>  is the better it does as well. SC higher than GA, GA higher than
>>> AL,
>>>  etc....We actually have some qualitative evidence for this; some of
>>>  the fieldworkers asked respondents why they ranked the DC area so
>>>  high, and many said that they figured good English was spoke in the
>>>  capital. This seemed truer of southern and south midland
>>> respondents
>>>  than of northern ones (who know they speak the best English).
>>>
>>>  dInIs
>>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
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>
> --
> Dennis R. Preston
> University Distinguished Professor
> Department of English
> Morrill Hall 15-C
> Michigan State University
> East Lansing, MI 48864 USA
>
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> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org