Retroflexion [was: McWhorter on "Negro English"]
Geoffrey Nathan
geoffnathan at WAYNE.EDU
Fri Jan 15 11:22:16 UTC 2010
Retroflexion with the accompanying affrication of the intervening /t/ is a marked feature of all varieties of Hawaiian English as well. It occasionally shows up in jocular spellings in newspapers, and a couple of 'Pidgin' poets who attempt to represent HE phonology, such as Joe Hadley have written, for example
<shchreeng> for [StSriN].
Geoff
Geoffrey S. Nathan
Faculty Liaison, C&IT
and Associate Professor, Linguistics Program
+1 (313) 577-1259 (C&IT)
+1 (313) 577-8621 (English/Linguistics)
----- "Laurence Horn" <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU> wrote:
> From: "Laurence Horn" <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> Sent: Thursday, January 14, 2010 11:44:54 PM GMT -05:00 US/Canada Eastern
> Subject: Re: McWhorter on "Negro English"
>
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster: Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
> Subject: Re: McWhorter on "Negro English"
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> At 11:27 PM -0500 1/14/10, Wilson Gray wrote:
> >I've not noticed this in BE, myself, though I find it to be quite
> >common in the speech of whites.
>
> We have discussed this in the past, I'm pretty
> sure--reading Herb's and Wilson's comments I get
> the strong feeling of d�j� lu, so I'll add what I
> no doubt did on other occasions, which is that
> I've noticed this retroflexion in the speech
> patterns of a number of white New York City area
> speakers including those from areas (like Long
> Beach on the south shore of Long Island, where I
> went to high school) where I didn't notice
> hearing it 40 years ago. A number of speakers
> who have the "shchreet" pronunciation seem to be
> of Italian-American backgrounds (e.g. both Mike
> [Francesa] and the Mad Dog [Chris Russo] back
> when they were together on sports talk radio) but
> I have no way of knowing whether this was
> statistically significant. On the other hand,
> another Italian-American sports talk host on the
> same station, Joe Benigno, doesn't (I don't
> think) have the retroflex clusters but, on the
> other hand, he does have positive "anymore",
> which always strikes me as going oddly with his
> non-rhotic delivery...
>
> LH
>
> > Unfortunately, now that this claim has
> >been made, there's no way for me to check it in my own speech,
> because
> >I'll be monitoring it. As a WAG, I'll say that it's not present in
> my
> >speech, because the act of retroflexion appears to require special
> >effort and, no doubt, if that was a normal feature of my speech, the
> >retroflexion would be automatic and, therefore, would seem to
> require
> >no special effort at all. But, of course, you never know.
> >
> >I have the horrible example of my friend who says "skreek," unless I
> >bring it to his attention. Then he says "street" and maintains that
> he
> >never uses any other pronunciation, apparently with no conscious
> >knowledge of the way that he speaks when he's not monitoring
> himself.
> >
> >-Wilson
> >
> >On Thu, Jan 14, 2010 at 10:11 PM, Herb Stahlke <hfwstahlke at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >> ---------------------- Information from the
> >>mail header -----------------------
> >> Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> >> Poster: Herb Stahlke <hfwstahlke at GMAIL.COM>
> >> Subject: Re: McWhorter on "Negro English"
> >>
> >>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >>
> >> Retroflexion of /s/ in /str/ and even /spr/ onsets is fairly
> common
> >> across American dialects, but I've noticed it more consistently in
> the
> >> speech of African-American speakers like both Obamas, Powell,
> Rice,
> >> Eugene Robinson, Clarence Page, etc. Is it a marker of a social
> >> variant of African-American speech? Or has it simply spread
> widely
> >> enough that it doesn't mark much of anything?
> >>
> >> Herb
> >>
> >> On Thu, Jan 14, 2010 at 5:44 PM, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >>> ---------------------- Information from the
> >>>mail header -----------------------
> >>> Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> >>> Poster: Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
> >>> Subject: Re: McWhorter on "Negro English"
> >>>
> >>>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >>>
> >>> Stick to your guns, Terry! I'm with you. If people feel that the
> >>> opinion of any random BE speaker from the 'hood fails to meet
> their
> >>> academic standards, let them talk to to the Johns, Baugh and
> Rickford.
> >>>
> >>> McWhorter is the academic equivalent of Michael Steele, the
> titular
> >>> head of the Republican party. They both probably sleep with The
> Bell
> >>> Curve under their pillows and cry themselves to sleep.
> >>>
> >>> As I've said before, considering Obama's background, IMO, his
> speech
> >>> patterns are surprisingly black, whatever the circumstances
> under
> >>> which he may have cause to open his mouth in public. The fact
> that I
> >>> don't like McWhorter for my own reasons doesn't prevent me from
> >>> acknowledging that his more-or-less pointing out that, for most
> >>> non-blacks, a black person who doesn't sound like Steppin
> Fetchit,
> > >> Andy Brown, or Willie Best is speaking the
> >>> non-existent-except-in-Fowler "standard" English is spot on. Have
> the
> >>> speech patterns of Gen. Colin Powell already been forgotten? Did
> > >> nobody pay attention to the way that he spoke as well to what
> he
> >>> spoke? In contrast to Powell, Obama sounds downright Chicago
> >>> inner-city, beyond any doubt. You don't have to see him in order
> to
> >>> notice this. His speech is, therefore, unworthy of any special
> notice
> >>> as though it were, somehow, distinct from the speech of any
> relatively
> >>> well-educated Northern black man. But, somehow, the speech of
> Powell,
> >>> IMO, all but non-distinct from the speech of any well-educated
> >>> Northern *white* man, drew - and draws - no comment, AFAIK.
> >>>
> >>> If you, as a white person, find anything "articulate" in the
> speech of
> >>> Obama distinct from the speech of any other black person, but
> notice
> >>> nothing worthy of note WRT about the pattern of Powell's speech,
> you
> >>> are, then, consciously or subconsciously, racist WRT your concept
> of
> >>> what constitutes black speech or maybe even WRT what constitutes
> a
> >>> black person. Isn't Powell a well-known speaker of English
> generally
> >>> regarded as a black man and not as a white man? So, where's the
> >>> discussion, the comparison and contrast, of their speech
> patterns?
> >>>
> >>> 'N' why *didn'* none a yawl never notice
> >>>nuthin' special 'bout Powell speech?
> >>>
> >>> Well, as a reasonably late-comer to the set, perhaps I should
> search
> >>> the archives before posting. But, like Willie, I gits ti'ed.
> >>>
> >>> -Wilson
> >>>
> >>> On Wed, Jan 13, 2010 at 3:05 PM, Terry Irons
> >>><t.irons at moreheadstate.edu> wrote:
> >>>> ---------------------- Information from the
> >>>>mail header -----------------------
> >>>> Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> >>>> Poster: Terry Irons <t.irons at MOREHEADSTATE.EDU>
> >>>> Subject: Re: McWhorter on "Negro English"
> >>>>
> >>>>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >>>>
> >>>> I retract my comments about his view on AAVE. It is more his
> >>>> conservative views on victimology and race that I find
> troublesome. In
> >>>> that context, citing the passage from Matthew is appropriate for
> him. I
> >>>> think he fails to see that sometimes the log in the other guy's
> eye is
> >>>> more the problem than the speck in my own.
> >>>>
> >>>> Gordon, Matthew J. wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>>>I'm not sure where you got that impression,
> >>>>>Terry. McWhorter's views are pretty much in
> >>>>>line with the received wisdom within
> >>>>>linguistics. For example in the piece
> >>>>>linked in this thread, he says, "Black
> >>>>>English is as systematic as standard
> >>>>>English, and what we hear as "mistakes" are
> >>>>>just variations, not denigrations."
> >>>>>
> >>>>>-Matt Gordon
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>>On 1/13/10 1:13 PM, "Terry Irons" <t.irons at MOREHEADSTATE.EDU>
> wrote:
> >>>>>
> >>>>>See Matthew 7:4-6 or Luke 6: 41-42.
> >>>>>
> >>>>>While McWhorter is well published, he views AAVE as a degenerate
> form of
> >>>>>standard English, not a legitimate variety of language.
> >>>>>
> >>>>>------------------------------------------------------------
> >>>>>The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>
> >>>> --
> >>>> Fraternally, Terry
> >>>>
> (*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)
> >>>> Terry Lynn Irons t.irons at morehead-st.edu
> >>>> Voice Mail: (606) 783-5164
> >>>> Snail Mail: 150 University BLVD UPO 604 Morehead, KY
> 40351
> >>>>
> (*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)=(*)
> >>>>
> >>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
> >>>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> >>>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> --
> >>> -Wilson
> >>> ---
> >>> 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
> >---
> >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
------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
More information about the Ads-l
mailing list