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How do you pronounce these disputable words?
>> Southerners often seem to retain a lot of features that the rest of us would consider old-fashioned or hillbilly -- imagine our surprise to hear them alive and well in the more urbane settings of the UK! <<
Well, both Southern USA and Southern England have a very fronted /u/ sound. I don't think that anyone notices much though.
Milwaukee, Wisconsin, US
1. anti- = a) antai (an-ty) / b) anti (like 'auntie') a) [ˈɛ̞̃(ɾ̃)ae̯]~[ˈɛ̞̃(ɾ̃)ăĕ̯] in most cases but b) [ˈɛ̞̃(ɾ̃)i(ː)] is also permissible 2. coupon = a) ku-pan / b) kyu-pan a) [ˈkʰupã(ː)n] myself but b) [ˈkʰjupã(ː)n] is also very common here 3. direct = a) diREkt / b) daiREkt / c) DAI-rekt a) [dʁ̩ːˈɜʔkt] 4. either = a) ai-ther / b) ee-ther b) [ˈiːðʁ̩(ː)] 5. February = a) febyuari / b) februari a) [ˈfɜːb̥juːɛ̝ːʁi(ː)] 6. forehead = a) forrid / b) four-head b) [ˈfɔʁhɜːd̥] 7. grocery = a) grossary / b) groshery b) [ˈgʁoʃɹ̠i(ː)]~[ˈgʁoʃʁi(ː)] 8. library = a) laib-rary / b) lai-berry a) [ˈʟ̞ae̯b̥ʁɛ̝ːʁi(ː)]~[ˈɰˡae̯b̥ʁɛ̝ːʁi(ː)] 9. mischievous = a) MISchivus / b) mis-CHEE-vious a) [ˈmɪʃʲtʃʲɨːvɨs] 10. often = a) ofen / b) off-tn a) [ˈɒfn̩(ː)]~[ˈɒfɨ̃(ː)n] but many others here would have [ˈɑfn̩(ː)]~[ˈɑfɨ̃(ː)n] 11. resource = a) RI-sorce / b) RI-zorce a) [ˈʁisɔʁs] 12. route = a) ru-t (root) / b) raut b) [ˈʁɑ̝̆ŏ̯ʔ(t)]~[ˈʁɑʔ(t)] but a) [ˈʁuʔ(t)] in certain cases (particular roadway names) 13. suggest = a) sujest / b) sug-jest a) but partly reflecting b) [səˈd̥ʒːɜsʲtʲ]~[səˈd̥ʒːɜsʲː] but one may also hear b) [səg̥ˈd̥ʒɜsʲtʲ]~[səg̥ˈd̥ʒɜsʲː] here at times
<<Southerners often seem to retain a lot of features that the rest of us would consider old-fashioned or hillbilly -- imagine our surprise to hear them alive and well in the more urbane settings of the UK! >>
Isn't that the truth, Uriel! I used to hear hillbillies (as opposed to speakers of Inland Southern English) who would pronounce "stupid" as "styoo-pid"; it always evoked sniggers. Imagine my surprise when I heard speakers of RP say it that way! (I still think it sounds hillbilly, though.)
The following quoted from above:
>>13. suggest = a) sujest / b) sug-jest a) but partly reflecting b) [səˈd̥ʒːɜsʲtʲ]~[səˈd̥ʒːɜsʲː] but one may also hear b) [səg̥ˈd̥ʒɜsʲtʲ]~[səg̥ˈd̥ʒɜsʲː] here at times<< sbould really be: >>13. suggest = a) sujest / b) sug-jest a) but partly reflecting b) [səːˈd̥ʒːɜsʲtʲ]~[səːˈd̥ʒːɜsʲː] but one may also hear b) [səːg̥ˈd̥ʒɜsʲtʲ]~[səːg̥ˈd̥ʒɜsʲː] here at times<<
>><<Southerners often seem to retain a lot of features that the rest of us would consider old-fashioned or hillbilly -- imagine our surprise to hear them alive and well in the more urbane settings of the UK! >>
Isn't that the truth, Uriel! I used to hear hillbillies (as opposed to speakers of Inland Southern English) who would pronounce "stupid" as "styoo-pid"; it always evoked sniggers. Imagine my surprise when I heard speakers of RP say it that way! (I still think it sounds hillbilly, though.)<< Due to diphthongization of /u/ after coronals, one can sometimes hear historical /uː/ after such pronounced as [ˈy̯̆ŭ]~[ˈy̯u] when strongly stressed (even though the typical pronunciation would be [ˈʉ̯̆ŭ]~[ˈʉ̯u] here); when not listened to carefully, this can sound like [ju(ː)]. Hence one can on occasion get pronunciations of "stupid" that sound quite reminiscient of such here even though they have lost historical /j/. In particular, there is one girl I have known who would pronounce "stupid" in such fashion so that I thought was specifically imitating RP or Mid-Atlantic pronunciation, as she had very significant amounts of stage experience and she had been taught to use Mid-Atlantic pronunciation. However, though, it still did not make sense, in that her idiolect is otherwise extremely close to my own (aside from her tending to favor more careful pronunciations) and seems to have no overall Mid-Atlantic features. In retrospect, it seems that how she actually pronounced it as [ˈsʲtʲy̯̆ŭpɨːd̥] without any Mid-Atlantic influence, and I had simply mistook the presence of a [j] in there, being more accustomed to [ˈsʲtʲʉ̯̆ŭpɨːd̥],
It privately amuses me that RP, which is supposed to be the "vanguard' of the English language, has a pronunciation in common with the rankest hillbilly.
For what it's worth, the pronunciation of "stupid" is exactly the same between the two, not merely a misperception.
Boston, MA (or er the inner suburbs) for my main dialect forming years though Chicago, IL of late
1. anti - b Though I too must mention that I would NEVER say auntie with the same vowel as anti. Long a words like aunt, bath and ask have been my mother's big bug bears since she moved to Boston in the 70s and she spent much futile time trying to convince me and my brother that we should say aunt and ask the standard American way. 2. coupon - a No yu for me but, um, what Lazar said about the -on bit. I think I may be saying "what Lazar said" quite a bit here. 3. direct - a 4. either - a I don't say b that I can think of, but I do occasionally use the related pronunciation of nee-ther. 5. February - a I do use the b pronunciation sometimes. Since it is my birth month I probably think about that one more than strictly necessary. Being from Massachusetts that meant that I never had to go to school on my birthday (woot February vacation!). 6. forehead - b 7. grocery - a 8. library - a I certainly don't say lie-berry, but I'm a bit confused by your syllabification in option a. I would go with lie-brary. 9. mischievous - a I try not to have pet peeves because I know they have no linguistic basis and I'm just projecting, but b drives me mad and no amount of rationalization helps. 10. often - a 11. resource - a 12. route - a I noticed that since I've moved to the midwest I say rowt more than I used to, but I still say root at least 90% of the time. 13. suggest - b
I have to go slightly offtopic for my forthcoming comments; I beg the indulgence of the moderators.
Travis, I remember hearing hillbillies pronounce the "s" sound in words as an "sh". Example: "100 pershent government inshpected beef"—a term used by a hillbilly during the 1970s Wendys/worm scandal. Where do you think this usage originated? Would a German-American pronounce those words that way? In spite of its dubious aesthetic value, the hillbilly dialect fascinates me because some of the pronunciations seem utterly unique in American speech.
>>Travis, I remember hearing hillbillies pronounce the "s" sound in words as an "sh". Example: "100 pershent government inshpected beef"—a term used by a hillbilly during the 1970s Wendys/worm scandal.<<
Actually, just that occurs in the dialect here in a slightly different form, as "percent" [pʰʁ̩ˈsʲɜ̃ʔ(t)] and "inspected" [ɨ̃nˈsʲpʲɜʔktɨːd̥]. The only real difference here is that palatalized sounds are used rather than postalveolar sounds, and said palatalization tends to spread to adjacent phones (subject to rules I will not explain here). >>Where do you think this usage originated? Would a German-American pronounce those words that way?<< It leads me as well to strongly suspect German substratum influence, and of course German substratum influence is very plausible for a wide range of dialects in the northern US. For instance, what I described above occurs in almost exactly the positions one would expect it in a southern German dialect, to the point of not occurring for /sk/ (unlike what one would expect were it an English innovation), aside from occurring in some extra cases that do not show up in German dialects but which are easily generalized from such. Even the dialects between such in, say, the dialect here and such in southern German dialects can be explained once one views things in terms of native German dialect-speakers trying to speak pre-General American correctly, but with their native phonological biases introducing subtle articulatory compromises which are unlikely to be corrected; in my own dialect's case that would be compromising between dialectal German postalveolar and English alveolar sibilants by using alveolar sibilants but giving them non-salient palatal secondary articulation.
I was once watching a talk show where Anthony Hopkins was being interviewed. He said that a southern U.S. accent was easy to pick up, but that he had lots of trouble when trying to speak in a Boston accent.
At the time, I thought it would be the opposite.
Can anyone think of other words that are prounounced in different ways among native speakers?
Halifax, Nova Scotia
In a lot of cases it depends: 1) a (when anti is used as a prefix, especially when hyphenated) and I pronounced the "i" more like a schwa when anti is more integral to the word, like antidote and antipode 2) b 3) a, sometimes b or c for emphasis 4) a 5) usually a, even though I know b is correct 6) b, and I've never even heard a before 7) b 8) again, usually b, even though I know a is correct (oh the shame!) 9) b 10) a, sometimes b for emphasis 11) b 12) a, although I would use b when talking about American interstates, that's what I hear them using 13) a 1. anti- = a) antai (an-ty) / b) anti (like 'auntie') 2. coupon = a) ku-pan / b) kyu-pan 3. direct = a) diREkt / b) daiREkt / c) DAI-rekt 4. either = a) ai-ther / b) ee-ther 5. February = a) febyuari / b) februari 6. forehead = a) forrid / b) four-head 7. grocery = a) grossary / b) groshery 8. library = a) laib-rary / b) lai-berry 9. mischievous = a) MISchivus / b) mis-CHEE-vious 10. often = a) ofen / b) off-tn 11. resource = a) RI-sorce / b) RI-zorce 12. route = a) ru-t (root) / b) raut 13. suggest = a) sujest / b) sug-jest
What interests me the most about the Southern/Northern dialect dichotomy the most is how those dialects sound so mutually nasty to each other. I suspect there's some cognitive dissonance going on in the brain due to mutually incompatible sounds.
The one American dialect everybody seemed to like belonged to a man I met in the Service—a man who was from somewhere in a little town south of Boston. The whole flight gently teased him about his accent because we all loved it. (For those who don't know about this accent, it sounded very similar to Bette Davis or Katherine Hepburn.) If there ever is a Received Pronunciation endeavor in the United States, his accent would be a good place to start.
I don't know, Travis -- i can't picture a lot of German influence in Appalachia.
Speaking of pet peeves, here's one of mine -- people who say Appa-latch-ee-a. It's Appa-laysha, dammit! And those are the Appalayshan Mountains. Where you can find the Appalayshan Trail. Do you say Tchicago, too?;) |