Why the classic Noo Yawk accent is fading away

NY Post ^ | February 6, 2010 | SHEILA McCLEAR

[Scanian]

The first thing theatergoers will notice about the revival of "A View of the Bridge," Arthur Miller's 1950s drama about a working-class Italian-American family in Red Hook, is that the characters are speaking a different language: Brooklynese. You got a problem with that!?

You can hear the mellifluous — some might say grating — dialect being celebrated on Broadway by Scarlett Johansson and Liev Schreiber. But that may be the only place. Linguists say features of the classic accent are heard less and less in the city itself, especially among the younger generation. Mocked and stereotyped, the long o's and w's have fallen out of favor, unless you're auditioning for a mob film.

Will old Noo Yawk become a museum piece, the subway token of language?

[firebrand]

I have noticed that people from Colorado and Nevada pronounce the name of their state with a flat a, as in “had.” People from outside the state can pronounce it as if it were Spanish: Colorahdo and Nevahda. Bob Dylan pronounced Colorado right in “Man of Constant Sorrow,” but he was from Michigan, close enough to get it right.

[Scanian]

Yeah, I’m half Cuban and some of my Puerto Rican friends call me “Alturo” (I’m on the tall side, so that makes me chuckle. “Don Alturo” makes me feel old!). In Lares, PR, there is a Corsican influence so, you used to hear hear people saying “sa com e?” which is perfect Italian for “sabe cómo es?” and “lechi di poti” for “leche de pote.” And the Cubans of Havana are way different from the Cubans from the Santiago area, who are more like the folks from the eastern Caribbean. Isolation will do that for you.

I was an only child and my folks used to leave me in the crib with a dog in the room for company and a big console radio playing. After a while, people started saying, “hey, that kid talks like a radio announcer.” I guess I did. I liked big band music too.

[Darnright]

This is the New York accent that is never heard anymore and it's a crying shame.

[surrey]

I was born in Brooklyn and also grew up on Long island. I’ll admit that I do have an accent but it’s not Brooklynese. What drives me crazy is when I tell people that I’m originally from Long island they always say Long G-island? My kids have all grown up in MA. and have no accent of any kind and neither do their friends.

[raccoonradio]

Ah, interesting.
What gets me is how I grew up hearing “coyote” pronounced as “ky-OH-tee” but then I hear some people, perhaps from the west, say “KY-oat”.

(Barbara Cameron’s RR Theme song):
Road runner, that ky-oat’s after you
Road runner, if he catches you you’re through.

(somehow doesn’t seem the same that way!

[Canedawg]

Mel Blanc briefly discussing using the Brooklyn/Bronx accent he used for Bugs:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wGO0n5ui2xU

[raccoonradio]

Ah! I always thought it was pronounced like it was spelled, WOAD-house...almost like if Elmer Fudd decided to sing a Doors classic: Woadhouse Blues :)

[One_Upmanship]

Thank goodness there's a pronunciation guide for MA towns:

Arlington

AR-LING-TON

This is the incorrect way to say it.

AH-LIN-TIN

This is the correct way to say it.

Ashland

ASH-LIND

This is the incorrect way to say it.

ASH-LAND

This is the correct way to say it.

ASH-LUND

This is how the name is pronounced by people trying to be sophisticated.

Ayer

EYE-YERE

This is the incorrect way to say it. Robert Urich was heard to use this pronounciation in an episode of 'Spenser for Hire'

AIR

This is the correct way to say it.

Bedford

BED-FORD

This is the incorrect way to say it.

BED-FUD

This is the correct way to say it.

Billerica

BRICK-AH

This is the correct way to say it. This the a short form of the name often used by locals.

BILL-ERICA

This is the incorrect way to say it.

BILL-RICK-AH

This is the correct way to say it.

Chelmsford

CHEMS-FID

This is the correct way to say it.

KEMS-FORD

This is the incorrect way to say it.

CHELMS-FORD

This is the incorrect way to say it.

Concord

CONK-ERD

This is the incorrect way to say it.

CONK-ID

This is the correct way to say it.

Framingham

Framington

A frequent misspelling

Farmingham

A frequent misspelling

Farmington

A frequent misspelling

Groton

GROW-TON

This is the incorrect way to say it.

GRAWT-N

This is the correct way to say it.

Lowell

Low-ell

This is the incorrect way to say it.

LOEWL

This is the correct way to say it. One syllable only.

Malden

MAL-DIN

This is the incorrect way to say it.

MAUL-DON

This is the correct way to say it.

Marlborough

MALL-BOROW

This is the incorrect way to say it.

MALL-BROW

This is the correct way to say it.

Medford

MED-FORD

This is the incorrect way to say it.

MED-FERD

This is the incorrect way to say it.

MEH-FUH

This is the correct way to say it. This is how the name is pronounced by town residents

MED-FUD

This is the correct way to say it. This is how the name is pronounced by students who live in town

MEF-FID

This is how someone in Somerville would say it

Natick

NAT-ICK

This is the incorrect way to say it.

NEIGH-TIK

This is the incorrect way to say it.

NAYDK

This is the correct way to say it.

Newton

NEW-TON

This is the incorrect way to say it.

NEW-UN

This is the correct way to say it.

NEWT-UN

This is the correct way to say it.

Pepperell

PEPPER-ELL

This is the incorrect way to say it.

PEP-ER-AL

This is the incorrect way to say it.

PEP-RIL

This is the correct way to say it.

Reading

READ-ING

This is the incorrect way to say it.

RED-IN

This is the correct way to say it.

RED-ING

This is the correct way to say it.

Sherborn

SHER-BORN

This is the incorrect way to say it.

SHER-BIN

This is the correct way to say it.

Somerville

SUM-MER-VILLE

This is the incorrect way to say it.

SUM-MA-VILLE

This is the correct way to say it.

SLUM-A-VILLE

This is how the name people use to put it down

Stoneham

Stoneum

This is the correct way to say it.

STONE-HAM

This is the incorrect way to say it.

STONE'M

This is the correct way to say it.

Tewksbury

TWOKS-BURY

This is the incorrect way to say it.

TWEEKS-BURY

This is the incorrect way to say it.

TOOKS-BURY

This is the correct way to say it.

Waltham

WALL-THUMB

This is the incorrect way to say it. This is said by people trying to sound like they have been saying it for years

WALL-THAM

This is the correct way to say it.

The Watch City

Winchester

WIN-CHESS-TER

This is the incorrect way to say it.

WIN-CHESS-TUHR

This is the correct way to say it.

Woburn

WOE-BURN

This is the incorrect way to say it.

WOO-BIN

This is the correct way to say it.

[discostu]

National TV and radio is killing regional accents. It used to be when a kid grew up in area X 90% of the voices they heard were people from there, with that accent, so that’s how they learned to talk. Now with radio and TV a good 60 or 75% of the voices a kid will hear have that semi-midwestern accent TV heads in the 60 decides was the “generic American” accent.

But we still have regional cooking.

[arasina]

Brooklyn’s Bernie Goldberg (at least I think he’s from there) has joked on air about pronunciations like 33rd street as “Tirty Tird street”

Deh yooztuh be a bird stoah on Tirdy Tird street, no kiddun. Bird at Tirdy Tird and Tird. Yuh could get cockatoos or parakeets, all kinzuh birds.

Some people would pronounce it Boid at Toidy Toid. Popeye, maybe? Wonder where he was from.

[ClearBlueSky]

Thank you! That’s true about N.O and N.Y. When I went to Oklahoma once to visit a friend who worked for the FAA she called her work buddies over to hear me talk!( And I, by no means, sound like the natives with real ‘accents’. They argued that I was from N.Y., not N.O. They even tried to guess which neighborhood and which part! It cracked me up. As well traveled as they were they were surprised.
They really expected a southern ‘drawl’, like Georgia, I suppose.Nope- no one talks like that in N.O.
It’s the ‘Yat Speak’ here that is so much like Brooklyn-ese, maybe its a port thing? I don’t know, but the accent is celebrated here!
“ Dawlin, gimme a po-boy sammich and dress it with mynez. I gotta make my groceries, hawt, ersters are on sale!”

[Cvengr]

(going around the email chains)

A teacher in a Detroit kindergarten class asked the kids what kind of sound a pig makes.

Little Tyrone stood up and yelled:

“FREEZE, MUTHAF**KA!!”

I guess there aren’t many farms in Detroit .

[squarebarb]

That’s an interesting observation. That styles of speaking for announcers changed from the assertive to the grandfatherly and comforting.

FDR’s accent was interesting. I can’t say exactly what it was.

I taught a seminar once and in it were three young women from various parts of the country and they all spoke exactly alike -— that awful Valley Girl accent. One was Janapese-American from Hawaii, one was a native-born San Antonian (Texas) and a third was from Michigan. They all spoke Valley Girl.

It has become the standard.

As for the NY accent in New Orleans, there is a Deep South way of speaking that says ‘choice’ for church and ‘noisse’ for nurse. That is in Mississippi and new Orleans both.

It seems to me there is a coastal pehnomenon of lack of R’s -— final r’s at any rate, that streches from New Jersey to New Orleans, right around the lowland coasts of the Atlantic.

But I am no expert.

I once got off a train in Jacksonville Mississippi andthe taxi driver that had been sent to pick me up said, as I thought ‘How was your dead rat?’

I finally figured out he was saying ‘How was your train ride?’

[Madame Dufarge]

Don't forget:

Quincy = Kwinzee

Haverhill = Havrl

[exDemMom]

What gets me is how I grew up hearing “coyote” pronounced as “ky-OH-tee” but then I hear some people, perhaps from the west, say “KY-oat”.

I grew up in California, saying "ky-oh-tee." My husband, from Utah, says "ky-oat."

I think that, as a result of living most of my adult life in Maryland, I do not have a specific regional accent. In both CA and MD, people ask me where I'm from. Now I live in TX, and no one asks me that. I only know one person with an obviously Texan accent; everyone else has the "generic" accent peppered with mild regional flavors hinting at their true origin.

[One_Upmanship]

Isn’t it more like QUINS-EE?

[FelixFelicis]

Question: I’m from the New York area but I speak standard “newscaster” American English. (When I travel and tell people where I’m from, I’m asked time and again, “Where’s your accent?”) But there’s one thing I don’t get. What’s the significance of spelling “New” like “Noo” when simulating the New York accent? To me, they sound the same. Folks from elsewhere, what’s your take on this? Do you perhaps say “nyew?”

[AmericaUnite]

My dad used to say earl for oil and terlet for toilet. He would totally deny it! And he was from Brooklyn.

I once visited my brother in British Colombia. Everyone was so nice. Or so I thought. Someone said to me, "I hear everyone is talking to you to hear your accent. They think you sound like Rhoda (Valerie Harper's show)".

Thank God hubby wasn't turned off. He's from Batavia, NY and always talks about "pop" instead of the correct "soda". LOL

[andy58-in-nh]

That's a very good sampling of Massachusetts place names whose pronunciation immediately informs you if you are addressing a local or an import. There are others as well: Chatham = "Chat'm"; Nahant = "Nuh-hahnt"; Scituate = "Sit-u-it", Barnstable = "Bahn-st'bull, and Lawrence= "El Barrio del Norte". Just kidding. Sorta.

[andy58-in-nh]

It’s definitely “Quin’zee”, as in “Jawn Quinzee Ad’mz”