The US Island That Speaks Elizabethan English

BBC ^ | Brian Carlton

[nickcarraway]

Native Americans, English sailors and pirates all came together on Ocracoke Island in North Carolina to create the only American dialect that is not identified as American.

I'd never been called a "dingbatter" until I went to Ocracoke, North Carolina for the first time. I've spent a good part of my life in the state, but I'm still learning how to speak the Hoi Toider brogue. The people here just have their own way of speaking: it's like someone took Elizabethan English, sprinkled in some Irish tones and 1700s Scottish accents, then mixed it all up with pirate slang. But the Hoi Toider dialect is more than a dialect. It's also a culture, one that's slowly fading away. With each generation, fewer people play meehonkey, cook the traditional foods or know what it is to be "mommucked".

In an effort to put his "America first" stamp on the nation's speech, US President Donald Trump recently signed an executive order making English the country's official language. It marks the first time in the US's nearly 250-year history that the nation has had an official language. Yet, on this small 9.6-square-mile island surrounded by the swirling waters of the Atlantic, residents still speak what is arguably the most English version of English in the country – and many Americans don't understand it.

As the island's official website proudly proclaims: "With origins dating back to the 1600s, Ocracoke brogue is about as American as it gets."

Located 20 miles from the North Carolina mainland, Ocracoke Island is fairly isolated. You can't drive there as there are no bridges, and most people can’t fly either as there are no commercial flights. If you want to go there, it has to be by boat.

[Jamestown1630]

I don’t think so; but Smith Island is famous for crab cakes, and the State Cake of Maryland:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RO64xpP5L9c

[packagingguy]

Used to live in Tidewater area of VA and on the coast of NC and yep, you’d hear people speak this way.

One guy in my Buddhism class at university, when we were discussing that monks wouldn’t eat sentient beings, asked “Wha abohte eh plunts?”

The professor didn’t understand, so the guy’s friend translated “what about the plants”. True story.

[heavy metal]

i lived there for almost 20 years...

vacationing adults mumbled the language at all of the bars scattered across the place...

check out “seacrets”...

[Jamestown1630]

My ancestors originally settled in the Tidewater and stayed for hundreds of years before leaving for Maryland, DC and other parts of VA only last century.

[No name given]

Pronto.

[suasponte137]

Are you talking like the Beaufort area or Emerald Ile, or further south such as Kure beach?

[Jamestown1630]

The Gullah/Geechee people of the South Carolina ‘low country’ have a charming dialect:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCd5W4gwJsI

[Adder]

The way the locals say “Eff off and leave!” is pretty endearing...

[Southside_Chicago_Republican]

I used to have family in SC and traveled there a lot but never ran into any Gullah speakers. I am a language nut and have always been interested in the varieties of English. Thanks for sharing.

[Jamestown1630]

I love some of their expressions - like ‘Clean Day’, for ‘Dawn’. There seems a world of wisdom in that.

[Joe 6-pack]

A little off topic, but about 15 years ago, my work took me to some pretty remote parts of West Virginia. I went into a small country store and asked for a can of Copenhagen. The guy behind the counter was probably about 20-25 years old and blurted out a long, multi-syllabic noise that had the inflection of a question, but I could not, for the life of me make out what he was saying.

I probably made a fool of myself asking him to repeat himself several times, and eventually grasped that he was asking me, "Do you want snuff or long cut?" To my ear, it sounded like one single drawn out word, with some of the consonants ommitted lol.

[SunkenCiv]

Jake: Dad, this is the wrong book.

Alan: What are you talking about?

Jake: It's in some sort of foreign language.

Alan: It's Elizabethan.

Jake: Well, can we get one in English?

[Jamestown1630]

There are several good YouTube channels on Appalachian dialects:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZEjOW8Elfu8

[Buttons12]

Some of the Delmarva peninsula and Chesapeake Bay islands are like this.

And much of Appalachia. Search "Appalachian dialect" at youtube, there's a lot of results.

[Jamestown1630]

LOL!

[Albion Wilde]

I used to have family in SC and traveled there a lot but never ran into any Gullah speakers. I am a language nut and have always been interested in the varieties of English.

There is a Gullah translation of the Bible. Very sweet!

I enjoy reading Bibles in other languages to maintain my skills, because I'm familiar with the verses in English. So it helps to understand how such things are expressed in the other language.

[RatRipper]

My first paternal ancestor in America, Bartholomew Weathersbee, immigrated from England in 1616 landing at Elizabeth City, NC. I imagine that his English sounded much like the people of this island. The surname is now spelled Weathersby.

[sopo]

I’v e never ben to any of those, looks like by boat only; are there even towns there?

[Albion Wilde]

Snot dat differnt fum Merlin. Dey say dur ayohs th’same way we dew.

[Southside_Chicago_Republican]

Creative and optimistic!