American Accent

>>How come it doesn't have any German sounding placenames? Cedar Rapids, Boone, Council Bluffs and Waterloo don't sound at all Germanic to me, while Des Moines and Dubuque sound positively French!<<

For starters, the French placenames date to the era in which the Upper Midwest was under (at least nominal) French rule. Little to nothing remains of that period here other than the placenames, such as those you mentioned. As for why there aren't many Germanic placenames, I'm not sure. I know that in the more Scandinavian parts of the Upper Midwest there are a good number of placenames with the Scandinavian suffix "-by". Aside from those areas, though, there are at least some Germanic-ish placenames or at placenames that are reminders of German settlement, such as Berlin, New Berlin, Germantown, Kiel, Rhinelander, and New Holstein. Even then, though, there really aren't that many such placenames here for whatever reason.

Lots to say... First of all, the reason that the regional dialects of Britain (or any European nation, for that matter) are so diverse is because they had had centuries to develop... When the English began migrating to America, they typically spoke a standardized variety of English (not necessarily "Standard English English" or whatever, standardized meaning they all spoke the same dialect) and that is why the differences in American regional dialects are less drastic as those in England.

America has many places with German-sounding names... Fredericksburg, Vicksburg, Luckenbach, Boerne, etc.

While it's true that "legal" vs. "illegal" immigrants is a matter of government policy, it is by no means arbitrary. It is not a "pretext for underlying racist nativism," it is a means by which the government can keep track of who has to pay it taxes and who doesn't, in other words, who gets to benefit from government services and who doesn't. It's not racist, it's one of the money faults of having governments... And taxes.... and other evils of the world...

Thanks for your posts about the American Middle West and it's people and their origins. If there's one country in the entire world with a population drawn fom all over the globe then it's the USA, as we all know.

I'm really trying to work out exactly how the name Aberdeen sounds German? It doesn't appear remotely German to me, but there again it wouldn't, would it? :-) "Aber" in placenames means the situation at the mouth of a river, an estuary, or a place situated at the spot where one river flows into another. The city of Aberdeen is situated on the mouth of the River Dee.

Scotland is heaving with placenames beginning with Aber.... Abercrombie, Aberlady (yes, honestly!) Aberfeldy, Aberdour, Aberfoyle, Abernethy, etc etc.

Wales has even more Abers littering the map - all connected with rivers (as in Scotland) - Aberystwyth, Aberdare, Abergele, Abertawe, Abergynolwyn, Abersychan, Aberdaron, Aberdaugleddau, Abergwyngregyn.......etc etc. Don't you just love Welsh placenames? They look even more mystical than our own Scottish "Abers"! Wait till you see all those amazing "Llans" all over the place in Wales......Wales has the longest roadsigns in the world I reckon, not only because of the amazingly long place names, but also because all roadsigns, not just place names, have to be bilingual.

In areas where the Welsh Language is strongly upheld all the Welsh signs take precedence over English on all roadsigns - in other areas where English predominates then English appears above the Welsh equivalent. The instant you cross the border into England all Welsh signs vanish altogether.

"Aber" is Celtic in origin, and simply means a place connected with a river.

oops - I have misappropriated this American accent thread totally! So sorry! I just love anything to do with regional differences, no matter where they occur. To bring in a little bit of an American flavour to this post - I know for sure that Americans really appreciate the very clear differences they see when crossing over fom England into either Scotland or Wales (more so in Wales, where bilingualism is so much more evident than it is in Scotland until you get right up into the Gaelic speaking areas).

"First of all, the reason that the regional dialects of Britain (or any European nation, for that matter) are so diverse is because they had had centuries to develop... When the English began migrating to America, they typically spoke a standardized variety of English (not necessarily "Standard English English" or whatever, standardized meaning they all spoke the same dialect) and that is why the differences in American regional dialects are less drastic as those in England."

Yeah, although with the spread of Estuary (which has been the liguisting bombshell in the UK over the past 25 years that GenAm was in the states post-WWII), I'm not so sure this will be the case in decades hence. I read a book on English dialects that posited that within the next forty years most of the small, rural accents in England will be replaced variants of the nearest big-city speech. And even some of those will probably somewhat altered by the spread of Estuary--twenty-something brummies tend to sound pretty London these days.

>>Yeah, although with the spread of Estuary (which has been the liguisting bombshell in the UK over the past 25 years that GenAm was in the states post-WWII), I'm not so sure this will be the case in decades hence. I read a book on English dialects that posited that within the next forty years most of the small, rural accents in England will be replaced variants of the nearest big-city speech. And even some of those will probably somewhat altered by the spread of Estuary--twenty-something brummies tend to sound pretty London these days.<<

That is the opposite of the pattern within North American English, which clearly points at dialect divergence; there are some dialects that are dying out such as coastal southern dialects, but there is large-scale dialect diversification in the works in other areas. Even General American proper is dying out as a living dialect group, being severely impinged by spread of the cot-caught merger, Canadian Raising, and the Northern Cities Vowel Shift.

<<"Legal" versus "illegal" is just a matter of arbitrary government policy. There really is nothing inherently morally "right" about such policy - political power simply comes out of the barrel of a gun, to quote Mao. In this case, it is just a pretext for underlying racist nativism more than anything else.>>

This man lives in an ivory tower with absolutely no sense or understanding of macroeconomics.

Unfettered illegal immigration will eventually cause irreparable damage to the economy.

As to the other point--aren't all laws "arbitrary government policy"? When you become a crime victim, we'll see if you understand the importance of respecting the law.

Sorry, Travis, I have to agree with Guest on this one.

Illegal immigration, in my opinion, is an economic issue, not a racist one. Illegal immigration is not new, nor specific to the USA; I've heard that Germany is having a terrible problem with illegals from the former Soviet Union; those citizens work under the table for less wages than German citizens, who cannot find jobs. Similarly, France is having a terrible problem with it too--perhaps worse than ours. It's a problem there for the same reasons as in Germany, with the additional problem that they're severely draining the social network system. China is having a problem with illegal immigration from North Korea; lawbreakers are immediately deported without a hearing. America had its own problem during the Depression with illegals from Europe--Bruno Hauptmann was an illegal immigrant from Germany.

I don't believe any person--anywhere in the world-- has the right to immigrate to a country unless they're invited. There's nothing racist about it.

>>I don't believe any person--anywhere in the world-- has the right to immigrate to a country unless they're invited. There's nothing racist about it.<<

I said that it is commonly used as a pretext for racism. I have seen plenty of racism against Hispanics here without any real knowledge of their immigration status which is based on just the implied idea that most Hispanics are illegal immigrants.

That said, the thing is that I am against national borders and the idea of citizens versus non-citizens to begin with. Of course then, I am against states in and of themselves, but that is a whole nother subject which I won't go into further here.

>>As to the other point--aren't all laws "arbitrary government policy"? When you become a crime victim, we'll see if you understand the importance of respecting the law.<<

Law is not morality. Law is just that enacted by those in power, plain and simple; in the end it just comes down to plain force, as such is really made so by the police and military and is powerless without such.

>>This man lives in an ivory tower with absolutely no sense or understanding of macroeconomics.

Unfettered illegal immigration will eventually cause irreparable damage to the economy.<<

Massive European immigration during the late 1800s and early 1900s did not destroy the American economy at all, and that was on a far greater scale than Mexican immigration (regardless of legality) in the US today. And you should also remember that these European immigrants were often quite poor, just like most Mexican immigrants today, even though very many of their descendents are not today.

<<I said that it is commonly used as a pretext for racism. I have seen plenty of racism against Hispanics here without any real knowledge of their immigration status which is based on just the implied idea that most Hispanics are illegal immigrants. >>

Travis! That one stings. I'm one of the least racist persons I know. While it might be racist to some anti-illegal immigration people, it's certainly not in my case--and others with whom I've had this discussion. I've already given you many examples of illegal immigration across the world. Indeed, in our own back yard, we have illegals from China in SanFrancisco, and Haitian illegals. I see this as a terrible drain on our social network. Hospitals near the Border are already in deep financial trouble from having to deal with patients who can't pay.

As to the "law/arbitrary force" argument, you seem to be advocating anarchy!

If that's true, we'll have to have a gentleman's disagreement on that issue.

Immigrating to the US in the late 1800s was not difficult, the US actually invited anyone from any country to come... The US had huge tracts of land between California and Oklahoma that it was ready to give away (or sell VERY cheaply) just to get people to immigrate. We did not have a large enough workforce.

That is no longer the case... That is why we have to control it.

So JKF was wrong in saying that America is a land of immigrants.

Just about every American can trace their ancestry to someone who wasn't born here. So, no, he wasn't wrong.

The point is there are reasons for the legal/illegal immigrant labels.

***And even some of those will probably somewhat altered by the spread of Estuary--twenty-something brummies tend to sound pretty London these days****

Hee hee! I liked that bit! I'm not sure how true that is, but I reckon it's just a wee bit of an exaggeration even though it's true that Estuarisation (can we legitimise that noun form now?) has slowly spread across much of this country, even back home in Scotland to a certain degree. Even so, I think Estuarisation has managed to occur without radically changing the overall local accents/dialects. It all centres on the glottal stop mainly, so that Brummies by and large can still adopt their own form of Estuary without losing the distinct character of Brummiespeak. From what I know of the Birmingham/West Midlands/Black Country region (the home of Brummiespeak - I've only passed through Brum by train and been to the city centre once) I guess it's not on the agenda for them to "sound pretty London" at any time in the future. At least I hope they never will. Some forms of "pretty London sound" are anything but pretty to my Scottish ears.

Immigration (whether legal or illegal) is now a major problem in all developed Western countries, and is very much a hot potato here in the UK now. Politicos are th same the world over, and now we see an Opposition Conservative Party leader here in Britland by the name of David Cameron who, finding himself slipping down in the opinion polls, seizing on the issue of immigration and now promising the earth and the whole constellation of stars and sun and moon to solve the whole problem of "mass immigration" in less time than it takes to get a Scotsman to part with a 50p piece.

Front page banner headline in one of today's UK national boadsheets, Thur 30/08/07:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=LKSEF0ZZAJYZJQFIQMFCFFWAVCBQYIV0?xml=/news/2007/08/30/nmigrants130.xml