Mister Micawber Posted 13 years ago
Linguistics Studies
From the Delancey Place newsletter
Contrary to both popular opinion and expectations, regional dialects and accents in America are growing further apart, not closer together. People tend to believe that dialect differences in American English are disappearing, especially given our exposure to a fairly uniform broadcast standard in the mass media. One can find this point of view in almost any discussion of American dialects.
This overwhelmingly common opinion is simply and jarringly wrong. The research reported here will demonstrate that the reverse is actually the case. New sound changes in progress are driving the regional dialects of English further and further apart, so that people from Los Angeles, Chicago, Toronto, Philadelphia, and New York speak more differently from each other now than they did in the middle of the 20th century. I would not expect most readers of this book to accept this statement lightly, and I will do my best to put enough evidence before you to make it believable. We will be dealing with sounds that are not easy to describe in print, but I will try to direct your hearing so that you can begin to observe some of these new sound changes around you in everyday life.
This book is a product of sociolinguistic research in which we interview people in communities across the country and record conversation that comes as close as possible to the speech of everyday life. This approach produces surprising results that often run counter to preconceived intuitions and opinions.
Author: William Labov
Title: Dialect Diversity in America
Publisher: University of Virginia Press
Date: Copyright 2012 by the Rector and Visitors of the University of Virginia
Pages: 1-2
This overwhelmingly common opinion is simply and jarringly wrong. The research reported here will demonstrate that the reverse is actually the case. New sound changes in progress are driving the regional dialects of English further and further apart, so that people from Los Angeles, Chicago, Toronto, Philadelphia, and New York speak more differently from each other now than they did in the middle of the 20th century. I would not expect most readers of this book to accept this statement lightly, and I will do my best to put enough evidence before you to make it believable. We will be dealing with sounds that are not easy to describe in print, but I will try to direct your hearing so that you can begin to observe some of these new sound changes around you in everyday life.
This book is a product of sociolinguistic research in which we interview people in communities across the country and record conversation that comes as close as possible to the speech of everyday life. This approach produces surprising results that often run counter to preconceived intuitions and opinions.
Author: William Labov
Title: Dialect Diversity in America
Publisher: University of Virginia Press
Date: Copyright 2012 by the Rector and Visitors of the University of Virginia
Pages: 1-2
Top answer
In John Steinbeck’s East of Eden, a guy persists to use his dialect although he’s born in America and learned and read much. If he don’t use it, his races - Chinese - would regard him as untrustworthy one, and the natives would think so, and so he chose to use his dialect. In my country, Korea, considerable numbers of guys from their own rural regions do not abandon their dialects, because of similar reasons above.
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In John Steinbeck’s East of Eden, a guy persists to use his dialect although he’s born in America and learned and read much. If he don’t use it, his races - Chinese - would regard him as untrustworthy one, and the natives would think so, and so he chose to use his dialect.
In my country, Korea, considerable numbers of guys from their own rural regions do not abandon their dialects, becaus
In my country, Korea, considerable numbers of guys from their own rural regions do not abandon their dialects, becaus
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