I speak two stigmatized dialects of English

<I am not an English teacher, and I have little interest in serving as an example for "correct" English.>

We're not talking about "correct" English in the prescriptive sense. We are takling about clear communication.

<And on that note, I will not change things ranging from the transcriptions and usage examples that I provide to how I myself write simply for the sake of eliminating things outside Standard English (and English standard varieties) lest non-native speakers pick them up. >

Again, we are not talking about Standard English, but about clarity. If there's only you who can understand you "message", where does that leave communication?

This is simply unclear communication, Trav:

"Yes - a dialect is a speech variety associated with a location which someone speaks, and an accent is how someone perceives someone else's speech."

Try and run it through a thread of its own. See what folks here have to say about it.

Typo edit:

<Again, we are not talking about Standard English, but about clarity. If there's only you who can understand you "message", where does that leave communication?>

Again, we are not talking about Standard English, but about clarity. If there's only you who can understand your "message", where does that leave communication?

Joe:

I'm not sure if you're still following this thread, but I heard some people on Judge Judy the other day from Maryland. I thought the dialect quite pleasant; enough Southern not to sound cloying, but enough GenAm not to sound "country" or "twangy".

I wouldn't worry too much, Joe; if you speak the same dialect as these speakers, you sound pleasant. :-)

<<Yes - a dialect is a speech variety associated with a location which someone speaks, and an accent is how someone perceives someone else's speech.>>

Travis, what would you answer here?

'It was not the Campaign for a Cornish Assembly which was "lost" but the mantra emanating from the perpetually revolving door of ministers, which ultimately became impaled upon the monumental failure at the North-east of England referendum in November 2004.'

Was it the lost mantra or the revolving door that was impaled on the failure?

I don't think that was the best link to use in this forum, Josh. You're a moderator, after all. We have to be careful about the English we use with non-native speakers.

Sorry about the delay, I wasn't able to get on for a few days, but let me answer all questions now. As for dialect or accent, I'd say accent is the correct word. I have perfect Yorkshire pronunciation, but I don't use a whole lot of the slang, having spent most of my life in the United States. I do, however, occasionally say a few Anglicisms, like a few days ago without thinking I said "ice lolly" rather than "popsicle". Even though I don't use the Anglicisms too much I understand them perfectly; I always get a smile on my face whenever an American doesn't know what a "lorry" is, or gets the wrong idea when they hear a British person talk about "smoking a fag" (for those who don't know, a fag is a gay person in the US, but a cigarette in England.) As for whenever I read, I find that if I'm reading a book set in the US I hear an American accent, but in the UK a British. When I read Sherlock Holmes novels I heard pure British accents, for example. However, if it is something neutral, like this website, I hear American. In other words, I usually only hear British if it's set in Britian; otherwise it's American I hear. The funny thing is that when talking to an English person, I have a tendency to gravitate towards the Yorkshire accent. I used to work at Subway where I live now(southern California) and in walked a woman who was definitely from southern England, although I could not tell where. When taking her order, I asked her "are you from southern England?" and she was surprised, because I was speaking to her in my American accent (which I had to try hard to use, my brain kept wanting me to speak British but I didn't want to get laughed at by my coworkers). She said she couldn't believe an American would know the difference.

And I'm glad that at least some people love the Maryland accent; while it's not overly stigmatized (at least not as much as some like the southern accent), I doubt I'd be the first choice as a newscaster (unless it was in the Maryland area). Living in southern California though, I often get people asking me if I'm from the south, which surprises me.

>>'It was not the Campaign for a Cornish Assembly which was "lost" but the mantra emanating from the perpetually revolving door of ministers, which ultimately became impaled upon the monumental failure at the North-east of England referendum in November 2004.'

Was it the lost mantra or the revolving door that was impaled on the failure?<<

My guess here would be that it is the mantra which got impaled; note that this is partly due to the use of "which" here. If "who" were used here, though, I would probably guess "the perpetually revolving door of ministers".

<My guess here would be that it is the mantra which got impaled; note that this is partly due to the use of "which" here. If "who" were used here, though, I would probably guess "the perpetually revolving door of ministers". >

So, you had to guess, right? Do you think it's a good idea to leave your readers guessing?

<<<<<Yes - a dialect is a speech variety associated with a location which someone speaks, and an accent is how someone perceives someone else's speech.>> >