LL-L "Language varieties" 2002.10.18 (01) [E]

[Lowlands-L]

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 L O W L A N D S - L * 18.OCT.2002 (01) * ISSN 189-5582 * LCSN 96-4226
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 A=Afrikaans Ap=Appalachian B=Brabantish D=Dutch E=English F=Frisian
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From: Ed Alexander <edsells at cogeco.ca>
Subject: LL-L "Language varieties" 2002.10.16 (06) [E]

At 04:25 PM 10/17/02 -0700, Szelog, Mike wrote:

>I live in NH and have been to some pretty rural places in the state as well
>as Vermont and Maine.
>
>I've never thought of our "accent" as an ancient Anglian dialect. I believe
>our speech to be more of an accent than true dialect, though there are
>certainly true "dialect" words.
>
>One feature of our speech which is usually universally quoted is our
>"post-vocalic r deletion"; the preceding vowel tends to become lengthened
>and in a two (or more) syllable word, can actually "evolve", if you will,
>into a pure glide, either a front or back  glide depending on the
>surrounding vowels. For example, 'there' can become 'THEY-ah' and 'door'
can
>become 'DOH-ah'. Syllables in caps indicate stress.
>
>We do indeed have a very lilting, somewhat sing-song quality to our speech
>(if spoken very broadly) and it is VERY difficult for people "from away" to
>imitate. People can learn how to properly pronounce a word in our accent,
>but when it comes time to say an entire sentence, well, let's just say if
>you weren't born here, you'll never quite get it! I'm really not sure where
>this sing-song/lilting quality comes from, though I strongly suspect it's a
>sort of remnant/carry-over from the very early Irish/Scots settlers in New
>England. Generally, the further "Down East" you go (that is, the further to
>the north east, particularly in Maine), the broader the accent becomes.

>From what I've read, the accent came into the area from the original
settlers in Boston, Massachusetts, who everyone pretty much agrees spoke
with an East Anglian accent.  Note that the original Boston is in
Anglia.  The characteristics of this speech go far beyond the non-rhotic
characteristics, but apply to a fairly distinct way of pronouncing all of
the vowels, compared to most other English dialects or accents.  To use
non-technical terms, what non-Anglian dialects pronounce as cot, sounds
like the way an Anglian would say the word spelled cart, whereas they would
say the word cot and the non-Anglian speaker would hear
"caught".  Similarly "lark" <> "lock" and so forth.  The "a" is also
generally much longer in Anglian.  And I'm sure there's many other
distinctions.  Some scholars relate the accents of East London (Cockney),
Australia, New York, Chicago, and all of New England to this dialect.  When
I say that what I hear the indigenous people speak in the mountains of
Vermont is an "ancient" Anglian dialect, I mean that it sounds much less
modified than what I hear people in Boston or New York speak.

Tell me, Mike, do folks in yoa paht of the country say "shoa" afta
practically evry sentence they way they do in Vumont?

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