Non-coda r-loss in Southern speech?

[Bill Palmer]

Greetings Wilson.
I'm afraid I've just about exhausted my current inventory of East Texasisms.
Too many intervening years in too many other places (including Boston).  And
I only lived there 2 years (5th & 6th grades).

I was always taken with the unusual names for various beverages in Boston:

Soda = "tonic"
Ice cream soda = "cabinet"
Milk shake = "frappe"

or at least that's my memory  of those terms.

Bill

----- Original Message -----
From: "Wilson Gray" <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
To: <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
Sent: Wednesday, June 17, 2009 11:41 PM
Subject: Re: Non-coda r-loss in Southern speech?


> ---------------------- Information from the mail
> header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: Non-coda r-loss in Southern speech?
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Heighdy, Bill!
>
> Yes, I did use "aught." It goes way back. I''m 72 and I learned it
> from my grandmother, born in the 1890's!
>
> If you feel like chatting about East Texas talk, get in touch with me or
>
> Lee Murrah <mclee at murrah.com>
>
> either here or privately. He's originally from Lufkin. I'm a native of
> Marshall, but now I live in Boston. They don't use ahra's around here,
> neither, but it's a whole 'nother dialect.
>
> As a hobby, Lee is compiling a lexicon of (East) Texanisms.
>
> BTW, do / did y'all use _potentest_, pronounced like "pote-niss"? As
> in: "She('s) just / jes'  the potentest thing (pote-niss thang)! =
> "She's really cute / pretty /etc.!"?
>
> That blows the mind of New Englanders!
>
> -Wilson
>
> On Wed, Jun 17, 2009 at 4:19 PM, Bill Palmer<w_a_palmer at bellsouth.net>
> wrote:
>> ---------------------- Information from the mail
>> header -----------------------
>> Sender: Â  Â  Â  American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Poster: Â  Â  Â  Bill Palmer <w_a_palmer at BELLSOUTH.NET>
>> Subject: Â  Â  Â Re: Non-coda r-loss in Southern speech?
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> Thanks Wilson
>>
>> Did you (or do you?) use "aught" for "zero"?
>>
>> Your mention of Joe Louis's ""th' ough" reminded me that, when I was a
>> boy
>> in Orange, boys (all of them white, in my experience) would threaten each
>> other that they would "knock your teeth down your th'oat"
>>
>> Bill
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: "Wilson Gray" <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
>> To: <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Sent: Wednesday, June 17, 2009 4:10 PM
>> Subject: Re: Non-coda r-loss in Southern speech?
>>
>>
>>> ---------------------- Information from the mail
>>> header -----------------------
>>> Sender: Â  Â  Â  American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>> Poster: Â  Â  Â  Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
>>> Subject: Â  Â  Â Re: Non-coda r-loss in Southern speech?
>>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>
>>> Heighdy, Bill!
>>>
>>> My family, when I was a child, at one time or another, lived in
>>> Beaumont and Port Arthur (we called it "Po' Daahthuh." I was *shocked*
>>> when I learned how to read.) However, we never lived in Orange, so we
>>> didn't complete The Golden Triangle. :-)
>>>
>>> When the late, great Joe Louis, a native Alabamian, was asked about
>>> the future of Floyd Paterson, after he lost to Sonny Liston, Joe
>>> replied, "He th'ough!" But, even in street-level black speech,
>>> something like *thrr-* is the "standard" pronunciation. If you - i.e.,
>>> anybody, not just Bill - can stand it, check out any
>>> neo-blaxploitation flick.
>>>
>>> -Wilson
>>>
>>>
>>> On Wed, Jun 17, 2009 at 11:40 AM, Bill Palmer<w_a_palmer at bellsouth.net>
>>> wrote:
>>>> ---------------------- Information from the mail
>>>> header -----------------------
>>>> Sender: Ã, Â Ã, Â Ã, Â American Dialect Society
>>>> <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>>> Poster: Ã, Â Ã, Â Ã, Â Bill Palmer <w_a_palmer at BELLSOUTH.NET>
>>>> Subject: Ã, Â Ã, Â Ã, Re: Non-coda r-loss in Southern speech?
>>>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>
>>>> I lived in extreme East Texas (Orange, to be specific...about 25 mi
>>>> from
>>>> Beaumont) as a boy, and, as Wilson has pointed out, "throw" was never
>>>> heard,
>>>> only "chunk". Ã, Also, in class, the word "zero" seemed to be
>>>> unknown..."aught" (or, I suppose, "ought") was used exclusively. Ã,
>>>> This
>>>> was
>>>> early 1950s...I wonder if that's still the case.
>>>>
>>>> Bill Palmer
>>>>
>>>> ----- Original Message -----
>>>> From: "Wilson Gray" <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
>>>> To: <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>>> Sent: Tuesday, June 16, 2009 8:35 PM
>>>> Subject: Re: Non-coda r-loss in Southern speech?
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>> ---------------------- Information from the mail
>>>>> header -----------------------
>>>>> Sender: Ã, Â Ã, Â Ã, Â American Dialect Society
>>>>> <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>>>> Poster: Ã, Â Ã, Â Ã, Â Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
>>>>> Subject: Ã, Â Ã, Â Ã, Re: Non-coda r-loss in Southern speech?
>>>>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>>
>>>>> Sigh! Dialect is as weird as language. Down home in East Texas, though
>>>>> "throw" was known to us local-BE speakers, *chunk* - presumably
>>>>> originally *chuck* - was by far the preferred term. The pronunciation
>>>>> of *throw*, when it was used, as "th'ow" [Tow] was also very common.
>>>>>
>>>>> When we moved up (relatively) North to Saint Louis, I found that
>>>>> *chunk* was rare to the vanishing point, usually a feature of the
>>>>> speech only of those of us who were FOB - "fresh off the [Greyhound]
>>>>> bus" - from behind the Cotton Curtain and not yet assimilated. *Very*
>>>>> rarely, Saint Louis BE-speakers dropped the /r/ in thr-: "th'ow
>>>>> (throw) th'ee (three)," etc. But the Spanish-like long, trilled [R]+
>>>>> Ã, was definitely the standard in this environment.
>>>>>
>>>>> When I first moved to the Northeast, where people pronounce /r/ in
>>>>> thr- as [r](?), so that, e.g. "three" sounds, to my ear, like *thuree*
>>>>> [Tri], I was freaked out. I simply couldn't figure out how it was done
>>>>> without inserting a fully-vocalized schwa, as in the Army's [T at Rijp],
>>>>> used by some NCO's in counting cadence. Even in that pronunciation,
>>>>> though, the trilled [R] was used.
>>>>>
>>>>> (I'm pretty sure that "R" means something different in the *real* IPA.
>>>>> But, what can you do? So, gimme some slack, if you gnome sane.)
>>>>>
>>>>> -Wilson
>>>>> .
>>>>> On Tue, Jun 16, 2009 at 12:39 PM, Joseph Salmons<jsalmons at wisc.edu>
>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>> ---------------------- Information from the mail
>>>>>> header -----------------------
>>>>>> Sender: Ãf, Ã, Ãf, Ã, Ãf, Ã, American Dialect Society
>>>>>> <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>>>>> Poster: Ãf, Ã, Ãf, Ã, Ãf, Ã, Joseph Salmons <jsalmons at WISC.EDU>
>>>>>> Subject: Ãf, Ã, Ãf, Ã, Ãf, Non-coda r-loss in Southern speech?
>>>>>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>>>
>>>>>> There's a set of cases where clusters with a voiceless fricative + r
>>>>>> lose the r in some Southern speech. DARE gives r-less 'from' mostly
>>>>>> from African-American speakers, but I'm betting that it exists in
>>>>>> among white speakers -- almost sure of it.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> A few I have (still today, in unguarded speech) are with the
>>>>>> voiceless
>>>>>> interdental fricative -- notably in 'through, throw (throwed/threw/
>>>>>> thrown)'. It's probably lexical for me at least, since most words
>>>>>> sound bizarre without the r: Ãf, 'three, thread, throttle, throne',
>>>>>> etc.
>>>>>> In a few, I can imagine variability but it's hard to tell up here so
>>>>>> far from home: 'throes, throat'. Or maybe some part is
>>>>>> phonological --
>>>>>> lose the r before tense /u/ (but a rare enough combo that you can't
>>>>>> be
>>>>>> sure), variably before tense /o/, with the r-less 'threw'-form by
>>>>>> analogy.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Anyway, that's just a long clumsy prelude to a simple question: Does
>>>>>> anybody know anything about this general pattern?
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Joe
>>>>>>
>>>>>> On Jun 16, 2009, at 11:10 AM, Mark Mandel wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>>>>>>> -----------------------
>>>>>>> Sender: Ãf, Ã, Ãf, Ã, Ãf, Ã, American Dialect Society
>>>>>>> <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>>>>>> Poster: Ãf, Ã, Ãf, Ã, Ãf, Ã, Mark Mandel <thnidu at GMAIL.COM>
>>>>>>> Subject: Ãf, Ã, Ãf, Ã, Ãf, Re: Ahra-lessnes in white-Southern speech
>>>>>>> (UNCLASSIFIED)
>>>>>>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> On Tue, Jun 16, 2009 at 10:42 AM, Jonathan Lighter
>>>>>>> <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> My friend from rural Middle Tennessee - a distinguished attorney -
>>>>>>>> always
>>>>>>>> says "fum."
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Other than that and maybe one or two other items, he's got all his
>>>>>>>> r's.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> And even that isn't r-lessness (arrhoticity), which AFAIK refers to
>>>>>>> loss of *postvocalic* /r/.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> m a m
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>>>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>>>>>
>>>>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> --
>>>>> -Wilson
>>>>> Ãf¢?"Ãf¢?"Ãf¢?"
>>>>> All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
>>>>> come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
>>>>> -----
>>>>> -Mark Twain
>>>>>
>>>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>>>
>>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> -Wilson
>>> â?"â?"â?"
>>> All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
>>> come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
>>> -----
>>> -Mark Twain
>>>
>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>
>
>
>
> --
> -Wilson
> â?"â?"â?"
> All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
> come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
> -----
> -Mark Twain
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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