American accent test

[Wilson Gray]

Someone from suburban NYC who has an "extra-nasal twang." Whoa! I'd
like to hear that!

-Wilson

On 3/24/08, Barnhart <barnhart at highlands.com> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
>  Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>
> Poster:       Barnhart <barnhart at HIGHLANDS.COM>
>
> Subject:      Re: American accent test
>  -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>
> This is what it said about me:
>
>  "You have a Midland accent" is just another way of saying "you don't have
>  an accent." You probably are from the Midland (Pennsylvania, southern
>  Ohio, southern Indiana, southern Illinois, and Missouri) but then for all
>  we know you could be from Florida or Charleston or one of those big
>  southern cities like Atlanta or Dallas. You have a good voice for TV and
>  radio.
>
>  My mother was from Wisconsin; my father was born in Missouri and raised in
>  eastern Kansas.  I was born in suburban Chicago.  But we moved to suburban
>  NYC when I was 4 years old.  I spent by Freshman year in college at Beloit
>  (s. Wis.) and the remainder of my undergraduate days in Syracuse.
>
>  During orientation at Syracuse, a graduate student who was surveying
>  incoming transfers and freshmen for the school of speech, questioned my
>  need for speech therapy.  The supervising professor dismissed my "speech
>  impediment" as just extra-nasal twang.  Nevertheless, I received a summons
>  to attend speech therapy classes.  I was so exacerbated that I tore up the
>  post card and never thought about it again until just before graduation
>  when one gets the warning about returning all library books and fulfilling
>  all "other" requirements.  I sweating out getting my orange diploma.  It
>  came in the mail about two months later.
>
>  Regards,
>  David B
>
>
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>


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