[Ads-l] "me" = "my" in NYC

[Jonathan Lighter]

In _Gudalcanal Diary_ (1943), actor Lionel Stander (not trying to be Irish)
repeatedly says, "Where's me helmet?! Where's me helmet?!"

JL

On Mon, Jan 15, 2024 at 6:56 PM Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>
wrote:

> In the role of the character "Flossy" - a working-class woman in her
> sixties - NYC-born actress Mabel Paige ( b. 1880) consistently pronounces
> "my" as "me" in _Behind the Green Lights_ (1946).
>
> Otherwise, nothing that sounds like an  Irish accent - real or stage - to
> me.
>
> JL
>
> On Sun, Jan 30, 2022 at 12:13 PM Paul A Johnston <paul.johnston at wmich.edu>
> wrote:
>
>> Sounds like first-generation irish-American to me--plus stereotyping, as
>> what you've quoted would all be fine in Ireland.  Thst would account for it
>> becoming less popular later in the 20th century, too.  I never heard it,
>> and I lived  with a second-generation Manhattan-born grandmother, born in
>> 1879.  But her parents?
>> ________________________________
>> From: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU> on behalf of
>> Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
>> Sent: Sunday, January 30, 2022 11:38 AM
>> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Subject: "me" = "my" in NYC
>>
>> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
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>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Poster:       Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
>> Subject:      "me" = "my" in NYC
>>
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> In the movie _Flying Wild_ (1941), inimitable New Yorker Leo Gorcey
>> (1917-1969) says, "I'll give ya the back o' me hand!"
>>
>> This pronunciation "my" is stereotypically British and Irish, and I don't
>> think I ever heard it "live."
>>
>> However, it's prominent in circa 1900 accounts of lower-class life in the
>> city.  E.g.,
>>
>> 1895 Edward W. Townsend _"Chimmie Fadden" Major Max and Other Stories_
>> (N.Y.: Lovell) 166: We chases down town and meets me friend de barkeep.
>>
>> JL
>>
>>
>> --
>> "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the
>> truth."
>>
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>
>
> --
> "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."
>


-- 
"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."

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