New York accent?

Oiboy   Wed Feb 28, 2007 11:32 pm GMT
Wot u call dat fink U R w'iting vere? U call vat da langwidge of Propuh? I shpeak Propuh 2.

Init... Oi.
Skippy   Wed Feb 28, 2007 11:54 pm GMT
It's an interesting accent, and it's easy to make fun of... Not to say anything bad about New Yorkers, but that accent rubs me the wrong way...
alyssa   Thu Jul 26, 2007 8:50 pm GMT
i've been to toronto so many times, and I've NEVER heard them say hat dag. Always hot dog. It's just a stereotype...like the way you've explained most of the accents. Accents are regional.
Mike   Sun Nov 04, 2007 4:21 pm GMT
I think New York accents have little or no relation to those spoken in Toronto. I would say it's much more neutral...with exceptions...mostly with the "ou" pronunciation that people outside seem to notice. To make a U.S. comparison, you're more likely to hear a "working class" Tororontonian speak like someone from Minnessota (sp?) than anything from the northeast.

And nobody I know here says "hat dag"...to us that's a U.S. accent.
Milton   Sun Nov 04, 2007 6:26 pm GMT
--I've NEVER heard them say hat dag.--

most people from Toronto pronounce it as /hAt dAg/
/hQt dQg/ is also possible.

They are some regularities of low back merger in Canadian English:
/k/ and /s/ seem to favor /A/: talk /tAk/, lost /lAst/ but
nasal consonants /m,n/ and /l/ favor /Q/: mom /mQm/, Tom /tQm/, dollar /'dQl@r/

But then again, some people use only /Q/ and some people only /A/, while other people might use them interchangeably, with no difference, whatsoever...

in traditional NYC English, words hot and dog do not share the same vowel,
in Canadian accents, words hot and dog share the same vowel, that's the difference. Canadians who have /Q/ in Hot and Dog, don't use the NYC ''dog'' vowel /O/. Canadians who have /A/ in Hot and Dog, use the NYC ''hot'' vowel /A/.
Milton   Sun Nov 04, 2007 6:30 pm GMT
''you're more likely to hear a "working class" Tororontonian speak like someone from Minnessota (sp?) than anything from the northeast.''

That's right, but in Minnesota, Canadian vowel shift is not common, so you won't find many people in Minnesota using a rounded vowel /Q/ in words like ''doll, dollar, mom, long''...they prefer /A/. Nevertheless, it's more of a phonetic difference than a phonologic one...
Guest   Sun Nov 04, 2007 7:28 pm GMT
<<Yes, Toronto accent sounds more Californian than Midwestern>>Mr. Nice

Are you sure about this? It seems like Torontoans do a lot of vowel-raising like Midwesterners; by contrast, a big feature of California-speak is vowel-lowering, except some of the short "a"s..
A Real Lawn Guylander   Thu Nov 08, 2007 6:42 pm GMT
Having a "Lawn Guyland" accent myself, I have pretty much heard all the dialects from the immediate area from where I grew up.
My father had a thick Brooklyn accent. He said things like(non-nasal): "Close dAt front daw! Yaw lettin' all da heat outta da house. Sit down an' have a cup of cAWffee o' a soda. Have a frank, too."

Where I would say(nasal):"Close the front daw! Yaw lettin' all the heat out of the house. Sit down and have a cup of cAWffee or a soda. Have a frankfuter, too"

My friend from Flushing would say (nasal-er):"Close thAAAt front daw! Yaw lettin' the heat out of the house. Sit down and have a cup of cawffee or a soda. Have a frankfuter, too."

My Boston friend would say(very nasal): "Close thAAAt front dawah. Yawah letting awl the coold Aya get into the house, end the hEEEEAt OUt. Sit dOWn and hAve a cUp of cOffee or some pOp. HAve a hOt dawg while yawah At it."*LOL*
I can easily gain a Boston accent.....
Maurizio   Thu Nov 08, 2007 9:32 pm GMT
Real Lawn Guylander, you made me laugh my socks off!!! :)
Lo   Fri Nov 09, 2007 5:37 pm GMT
I'm from Upper East Side Manhattan and the "Noo Yawk" accent (i.e. stereotypical New York accent) isn't very common nowadays. I must admit though I didn't live most of my life in Upper East Side but in Boston but I traveled there really often visit my grandmother, so I do know what I'm talking about and I'm quite used to New York accents because both my mom and dad are from there.

First off all, the non-rhoticity (that is R-dropping) is extremely uncommon amongst young people nowadays, most people younger than say 35, 40 have rhotic accents.
Secondly, even though most of the features most people here have attributed to New York accents are present, the higher the social status the less of these features they present. I have as an example both my mom and dad and they would never do stuff like:

- Non-rhoticity.
- Changing /T/ and /D/ into /t/ and /d/ respectively.
- Transform /t/ into /tS/ like some speakers do.
- Use the dark L /5/ when /l/ should be used.
- Raise /O/ to /O:/ (Although this may not be as consistent as the others.)
nick   Sun Nov 11, 2007 4:43 pm GMT
oh, man, I feel so bad. I live in Lower East side of Manhattan, I never realize this problem. I should pay more attention to this.
native New Yawker   Thu Nov 29, 2007 7:46 am GMT
I was born in the Bronx, lived in Queens and currently live on Long Island. My grandparents, born and raised in NYC had strong NY accents, especially my grandmother who lived in "Hell's Kitchen". She would say "earl" for oil and many of the old fashioned strong accented words you hear in the old movies.
As for me, I believe my accent was stronger when I lived in the Bronx, and when I moved to Queens, it became less strong, I also worked on it, but there are things that I still do and can't lose like "cawfee", "howa" (hour), "warta" (water).
I also have noticed when visiting "the city" (when I lived in the Bronx, we called it "downtown", Queens and LI call it "the city"), that I don't hear the NYC accent as much because of all the people who came from other parts of the country that are living and working there. Of course you hear it from working class people, like police officers. I also feel that television and 24/7 news broadcasts have set an example of "non-accented" speech (mid western) that children copy (as well as myself). When I was a child, we didn't watch as much TV, perhaps simply because there wasn't cable and not as much children's television on.
I have travelled to different countries and have purposely spoken slowly (we NYers do tend to speak fast!) and try to not have as many regionalisms, but if I'm at home and speaking fast, oh my does my NY accent come out in flourish!!!
LOL, of course there is a different sound in "merry, marry, and Mary"!!!!