#English dialects

[damnyoucully]

Friendly reminder that Steve and Bucky probably have absolutely wild Brooklyn accents. Maybe it’s mellowed out over the years but sometimes, woild, goil, woist, poifume. Cwafee. Wourder. Fugeddaboutit.

[datafags]

[tricornonthecob]

my favorite part of all this dialect research I did is watching Georgian period pieces with upperclass british gentry and knowing they wouldn't have spoken in RP and might have rather sounded a bit like pirates to my 21st century North American ear.

[muscari-melpomene]

Hi linguists of tumblr! I know there are some of you out there.

Can y'all explain the "I dunno" noise? idk if this is a southern thing specifically or if it's all over the place, but where I live people commonly just. Make A Noise, no vowel sounds, just a hum that (so far as I can tell) goes low pitch-high pitch-middle pitch (fooled around on a keyboard a bit to see if I could assign intervals. Kinda like anywhere from an augmented sixth to an octave up then maybe a third down, but that last note bounces a little?) that we all just acknowledge to mean "I don't know".

[mayday396]

Some Asians need to Understand that just like variants of speaking Chinese or Japanese.

ENGLISH HAS MANY VARIETIES, SCOTTISH ENGLISH, COCKNEY, TEXAN, ETC.

[acrowseye]

i'm conducting an experiment. everyone who's from an english speaking country state your country, regional area and what you call the following images. i need to see something

[tricornonthecob]

Dialect notes! Dialect notes! Dialect notes!

Because I missed my calling in academic research, I've spent a non-zero amount of time going down rabbit holes on early North American dialect for Along The Northern Heights. Is it worth doing all this research for a fanfiction of a PBS kids show from 20 years ago? Well it gives me considerable amounts of joy to write, so yes.

Anyway! I want to share a massive infodump, because writing gives me goodfeels and so does sharing! Please let me know if I am inaccurate or wrong about anything. I am not an academic and furthermore I do not want to spread misinformation.

MASSIVE WORD BLOCK UNDER THE CUT

A Pregame With Disclaimers About "Good" English

The history of Modern English is rife with Big Oof moments, and I'm not just talking about The Great Vowel Shift or Noah Webster deciding that the "u" in "colour" was silly. Especially in the late 18th century, there was a push to make accents more uniform and to establish a single "Good" English - and there is so much aggression towards what those scholars considered "Bad" English. And, in my extremely uneducated opinion, it seems like it's a conveniently moving target, just like "whiteness." In the context I'm in when writing, it positively reeks of shitting on any of the world's population groups that aren't Southeastern England. And, being from the United States, I know all too well the absolute shit that's been lobbed at AAVE for not being "Good" English.

This "Good" vs "Bad" way of looking at dialect is reductive, destructive, and boring, and I think it goes without saying I don't condone it in the slightest.

A Further Pregame With Received Pronunciation, or RP

the "generic" British dialect many of us outside the UK think of when we think of a British accent (a shame, I think, because the UK is so dialect-diverse and there are some absolute bangers on that damp island!) There are certainly a myriad of reasons for this, but probably the most common reasons/claims I've heard through my life are

A) 19th-century upper-class British folk wanting to have a more separate dialect from the other classes.

B) associations with the way the Royal Family has spoken English since at least Queen Victoria (a generic reasoning that we see happen along populations: imitating those in power)

C) 20th-century RP became "generic" in a similar way that the broad North American dialect* now associated with the United States and, to some degree, Canada, did - that is, it was further developed and use encouraged as the easiest to understand when recorded and played-back on period audio recording equipment (specifically radio and television.)

*a timeout is to be made here for the so-called Mid-Atlantic dialect at the dawn of "talkies" and early Hollywood. Its the delightful way of talking you'll hear in old black-and-white movies: slightly musical cadence, and combining the broad north american dialect with a bit of the non-rhoticity of RP. This dialect was mostly affectation and as anyone with living American relatives born before 1960 can tell you, mid-20th-century Americans largely did not speak it in normal settings.

Now, all of this is to say, RP as a dialect doesn't really appear until mid-19th century (although it would seem the loss of rhoticity we so associate with RP was a gradual shift starting in the very end of the 18th century.) Furthermore, the ways that we, 21st-century denizens, know RP don't come into their own until the 20th century and proliferation of audio-based mass media.

On to My Actual Point : 18th Century American Dialect (non-AAVE)*

*I make this distinction because the history of AAVE is a massive topic all on its own and I feel even less qualified to speak on it

It can't be ignored that the base strata making up Anglo-American speech patterns would have been as varied as where the original settlers/invaders came from, nor can it be ignored that the American Colonies were made up of more than just Anglo-Saxon descendants. Even back then, they were a mosaic of cultural interaction, which is why Thomas Paine declared America (at least the white part) a European, and not British, culture.

That being said, multiple primary sources indicate that the dialect of Anglo-Americans at the late 18th/very early 19th century was similar to "well-bred" Londoner dialect of the time (assuming there's enough of a distinction here from broad Southeastern UK,) and that this particular dialect was broadly spoken with less regional variance than the family of dialects in the UK.

This is made clear in vol 3 of Timothy Dwight's Travels in New-England and New-York, a collection of letters sent to colleagues in England:

"I shall not, I believe, offend against either truth or propriety if I say, that the English language is in this country pronounced more correctly than in England. I am not, indeed, sanguine enough to expect, that you will credit the assertion, nor that you will believe me to be a competent judge of the subject. Still I am satisfied that the assertion is true. That you may not mistake my meaning, I observe, that by a correct pronunciation I intend that of London; and, if you please, that of well-bred people in London."

(Dwight, Timothy. Travels in New-England and New-York vol 3 p 265)

Now in context he is only speaking of the New England region, and he does make a disclaimer here that he's not "a competent judge" of the subject, and we are certainly ignoring his hope that he won't be cited on the matter. But, his observation holds true from other primary accounts, especially William Eddis' Letters From America, which are composed of his observations (mostly of Maryland gentry) from 1769 to 1777. (His letters also happen to be an invaluable primary source for observations on culture and political commentary on the rising crisis between the colonies and Britain, from the perspective of a loyal well-to-do British subject.)

On the uniformity of language, Eddis has this to say:

"In England, almost every county is distinguished by a peculiar dialect; even different habits, and different modes of thinking, evidently discriminate inhabitants, whose local situation is not far remote; but in Maryland, and throughout the adjacent provinces, it is worthy of observation, that a striking similarity of speech universally prevails; and it is strictly true, that the pronounciation of the generality of the people has an accuracy and elegance, that cannot fail of gratifying the most judicious ear."

(Eddis, William. Letters from America, Historical and Descriptive. p 59)

if the odd comma placements are making it hard to read, you're not alone. 18th century writing is choc-full of what we might today consider run-on sentences, comma splices, or just generally cumbersome. Here's me paraphrasing as best I can:

"In England, almost every county has its own dialect, habits, and modes of thinking, noticeably different inhabitants that don't live very far from each other; but in Maryland and adjacent provinces, there is a notable similarity of speech, and its absolutely true that the generalized accent/pronunciation has an accuracy and elegance that won't fail to gratify a discerning ear."

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All this background I'm giving comes to this point: late 18th-century "well-bred" Londoner is the dialect I have chosen to loosely base what I write in Along The Northern Heights. I listen to alot of Simon Roper's work on youtube regarding the topic. I would say these two are probably the most valuable videos on the accent.

He makes disclaimers about not being formally qualified to speak on linguistics, and I would be remiss to not pass along those disclaimers.

That being said, what's in my mind is pastiche of that, the local "country" (read: appalachian) dialect in rural Virginia, the dialect work used in Turn:Washington's Spies and HBO John Adams, as well as some of the dialect you hear in PBS Masterpeice's Poldark, and various media I've watched/read from Living History re-enactors about reconstructing dialect.

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Since I've made it a headcanon feature that James Hiller has a bit of a brogue that he feels pressured to correct, but slips into when he is excited or upset, I'd like to dig more into less-"proper" dialects of the time, and, if possible, the less-proper Philly accent. For shits and giggles, here's what I suspect is a dramatization of a modern-day Philly accent:

And then a very similar, a very real Baltimore Baldmer accent:

Honestly? Hearing both of these warms the cockles of my heart, because my late grandparents (especially grandma. *Especially* grandma) spoke with a Baltimore accent, which has similarities with the Philly accent. My aunts and uncles all speak it; its been normalized and blended with a virginia rural accent in mine (I say wadder, my grandma said wooder. I say toosdaye, my grandma said toosdee. I say ahn, grandma said ooowan. I say y'all, grandma said all youse/all you. I say "d'jeet," she said d'jeet, and you can pull d'jeet from my cold dead hands.)

In addition, you have the modern-day "High Tide" dialect of Okracoke, the Carolina Brogue.

trouble with Carolina Brouge, which is disappearing, is that its got too much modern-day southeastern drawl to really use as a basis for an 18th century Philly boy. Though it does seem like drawing out the "A" in water into wooder/woader is a commonality.

Anyway. That's been my infodump. I spent too long on this!

[littlemizzlinguistics]

Studying linguistics is actually so wonderful because when you explain youth slang to older professors, instead of complaining about how "your generation can't speak right/ you're butchering the language" they light up and go “really? That’s so wonderful! What an innovative construction! Isn't language wonderful?"

[europaaesthetic]

Heute die englischen Dialekten

[cat-appreciator]

Do you ever became incredibly frustrated with your own language? No? Just me? Hwæt mickle mess!

From the US but i spell grey with an e because e just feels like a much greyer letter than a

[tricornonthecob]

Observation that nobody asked for time!

When doing all the soft research I've done for writing in 18th cent dialect, I've noticed a quirk in my own accent/dialect.

It's a broadly north american dialect, with a touch of southeastern and a helping of Maryland/tidewater. But when speaking fast or informally/relaxed, I sometimes pronounce "you" as "ye." As in "yeh" (or sometimes "ya") not "yeee." so then:

"you've got something on your face," (which I might pronounce fully if I'm actually trying to speak clearly/speaking with a stranger)

becomes "yehv got somethin' on yeh face," or, if I'm VERY chill, "y'got sum'in' on y'face."

I guess the problem I have is when transcribing that, and when I apply it to my fics when I think it might be appropriate, I really, REALLY want to use "ye" and not "yeh" because it looks/reads easier, (and in practice that "h" isn't actually there, which makes it so so so easy to cram it into other words like above,) but I'm assuming most people will read it as yeee and not yeh.

...I don't know where I was going with this but yeah. Actual linguists of tumblr, pipe in.

[drumlincountry]

For example, I acquired English in Ireland, where we speak a number of overlapping dialects that get grouped under the title "Hyberno English".

Depending where you are in the country, you may hear things like "Are yous coming with me to the shops later?" "Did yiz both study biology?" "I heard ye two were away on holiday!"

These forms are often criticised as not "proper" English because of classism and such. But they ARE proper English and I suspect most dialects have them.

Also! If you answered yes, I'd love to learn what your second person plural pronoun is! Especially if I didn't list it above :>

[korraisnottan]

#this is so cool!!!!!!

[amanufacturedheaven]

Rare Language Learning: Polari

If you have ever used the words:

- Naff

- Butch

- Camp

You have unknowingly been speaking the sociolect known as Polari, the language of queer people primarily used in the 30s to the 70s. Polari is now an endangered language, as labelled by the University of Cambridge

Something of note: Many resources out there imply (or state) that Polari was a language invented and used solely by white cis gay men, which is decidedly untrue. Many words of Polari come from drag culture, lesbians, and the Romani people and their language. The use of ‘the language of British gay men’ may be a more palatable title to the general public, but it is not to me. I did my best to curate a variety of resources, but unfortunately much of queer history has been lost many more decades than I’ve been alive, if you have any other resources for studying Polari I would love to read them, message me or leave a link in the replies.

Articles

Learn Polari, the Secret Language of the Gays ⚢ Out Magazine

Polari: The code language gay men used to survive ⚢ BBC

Polari and the Hidden History of Gay Seafarers ⚢ National Museums Liverpool

The Story of Polari, Britain’s Secret Gay Language ⚢ Fabulosa!

Polari People ⚢ Fabulosa!

Polari: a language born from prejudice ⚢ Englishpanish

The secretive gay language that gave LGBTQ people a voice ⚢ GAYTIMES

A brief history of Polari: the curious after-life of the dead language for gay men ⚢ The Conversation

Study Material

The Polari Bible ⚢ Internet Archive

Fantabulosa: A Dictionary of Polari and Gay Slang ⚢ Internet Archive

Sociolinguistics / Polari ⚢ StudySmarter

FlashCards ⚢ Quizlet

New Polari Translator ⚢ LingoJam

Polari: A sociohistorical study of the life and decline of a secret language. ⚢ Dissertation, University of Manchester

Polari: a language born from prejudice ⚢ Englishpanish

Simon Bowkett: a short blog in Polari for LGBT+ History Month ⚢ Civil Service LGBT+ Network