Posted on 05/22/2005 1:14:31 PM PDT by quidnunc
Could America's mouth be heading south?
Depends on who's talking.
About 40 percent of the nation's population will be living in 16 Southern states by 2030, many of them Northern transplants, the U.S. Census Bureau predicts.
Those in-migrants are unlikely to eradicate Southern speech, according to Dennis Preston, professor of linguistics at Michigan State University.
It's more likely that arrivals will end up speaking Southern, he says, especially after a few generations. "If anything, those newcomers would strengthen Southern norms rather than weaken them."
This raises the tantalizing possibility that the drawl will finally get some love.
The Southern accent has long been stigmatized as a badge of backwardness. But what happens if a plurality of Americans are saying y'all?
The negative attitude toward the sound of the South won't disappear anytime soon, says Bill Kretzschmar, University of Georgia linguistics professor.
"People from New York still think those old stereotypes about the South are true: that Southerners are slow," says Kretzschmar. And this conviction isn't likely to change, at least not fast enough to keep up with other changes.
Harry Watson, director of the Center for the Study of the American South at the University of North Carolina, knows about the anti-y'all prejudice from personal experience.
-snip-
(Excerpt) Read more at orlandosentinel.com ...
I don't need people moving in from other parts of the country and adapting to the ways of speaking to validate my speech.
I believe it. I used to live in the South as a (military brat) child. Whenever I hear people with certain Southern accents speak, I start picking it up again really fast.
Let's hope they will end up voting Southern.
That's good to hear!
Well...the least we can do is teach them how to do it right!
The only thing that bothers me about New York liberals moving to the South is their annoying habit of trying to change the place they moved to into the place they left.
Does the South really need a southern edition of the New York Times, and a Starbucks in every pasture?
My wife's voice will shift with who she's talking to. Her ex-long-term SO was from Brooklyn and she'll tend to towards the accent of anyone she's speaking to. She'll almost out-Brooklyn my parents (who were both born and raised in Brooklyn, though don't have too much of the accent anymore), unless she's annoyed with them, at which time she'll get really Southern. Her default seems to be slightly Dixie.
The funny thing is my nine-year-old son, who speaks mainly with a northern/standard American accent -- until he drops a "y'all" in there, which almost sounds like it's another voice.
Too late! They've already invaded us down here!
As a matter of fact, the Starbucks opened up before our first Walgreen's did! That's just sad.
Some how, "Bless your heart, go F yer sef" just doesn't sound right.
Yes, it's not "directly," per the title, but "dreckly." Gracious sakes, if they're going to talk Southern, at least they can get it right.
Redneck Jihad!!
It's all a part of our evil plan to dominate the world.
Boy have they EVER invaded. A goof ball of a stand up comedian announced that he had found the 'end of the earth' and that it was in Houston. His reasoning was that in Houston there is a Starbucks across the street from a Starbucks, and to him that meant it was the 'end of the earth'. That location for any of you who have been searching for the 'end of the earth' is the corner of Shepherd and West Gray. ;9)
But only in season, I'm sure.
; )
It isn't all bad. I was once in a restaurant in Missouri when I heard a New York voice asking what "chit-ter-lings" were. Shoulda seen the look on the waitress's face...
Actually, I believe it was the late, great historian Daniel Boorstin described the speech in Colonial America (including Boston) as more like what you would hear in the deep South with English overlay - not the nasal horror that exists today.
I speak South. Being raised in Southern Baptist churches, I learned it. Until I was 35, I thought it was the No'th Phoenix Baptist Chu'ch.
Still sounds good to me.
"Does the South really need a southern edition of the New York Times, and a Starbucks in every pasture?"
AAARRGGGHHHH!!! That's what I ran away from, and am living here in halcyon bliss in GA (How 'bout a big shout out, Y'ALL!!!!)!!!! (well, ok, we do have lots of Starbuck's here, but good coffee I can live with - so long as I also get the pleasure of grits, BBQ, "sweet tea", and The Varsity!!!)
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