Midwestern English Is Also Diverse Enough To Have Sub-Varieties

“Authority and American Usage,” an interesting essay written by the brilliant and quick-witted David Foster Wallace, presents an argument on different ways of understanding the ever-changing American usage in the English language. Keeping up with the English language in America is like chasing your new, untrained puppy down the street. Tiring and basically impossible to get a hold of. Over the past centuries, the English language has evolved so much, that if you took a person from the 13th century and threw them in the middle of New York City in 2013, it would be as if two different languages were being spoken.

American English has changed the culture of Americans depending on where you live. People in the south have deeply reflected their culture on the English they speak. As you move north on the map northerners call soda pop while southerners call soda what it is actually called. Southerners have been making a big impact on American English by adding y’all into the dictionary.

Every part of the country has their own stereotype the west coast has people in bikini and partying non-stop, east coast is where all the famous movie stars hang out and Arizona is where “cowboys” are. The middle states, on the other hand, get look down because they aren’t as incredible and exciting as the east or west coast. The Midwest really doesn't get mentioned during besides begin tornado territory. In “The Horizontal World” by Marquart she explains how the Midwest gets looked down for its dull appearances while using visuals, allusion, and anecdote to give the reader the sense of the Midwest.

The dialect known as Brooklynese is what New York speakers identify as, even if the individual person is not from Brooklyn specifically. There are three major features to this dialect. The most common characteristic that people think of when they hear a New York accent is the dropped “r” sound at the end of words. For instance, the word “father” would sound like “fatha.” The second is the “aw” sound that does not really fit the American English sound like in the word “coffee” which sounds like “cawfee” when a Brooklynese speaker says it. Finally, one sound that might not stick out as much as the others do, is the raised “a” which changes the word “last” to “leahst.” The Concise Oxford Companion to the English Language says this: New York pronunciation has a long, tense, very round vowel in words like caught and a long, tense, relatively high vowel in words such as cab.” In addition to these, there used to be a more prominent “oi” sound, making the word “girl” change to “goil.” Even though this last characteristic has disappeared lately, the rest of the Brooklynese

Accent reduction schemes work on the basis that regional dialect will be viewed negatively in workplace and attempt to change or completely change the way in which someone speaks. Evidence contradicts this as some regional accents can evoke a positive response and can be an asset in some

United States of America, small in history but large in diversity continues to face new challenges with language as time continues to turn. In the documentary “Do You Speak American?” Robert MacNeil analyzes the English language and reveals many dialects that culturally defines us. Regional dialect is one of the many strongholds of all cultures and now it has reached its’ zenith and today it is slowly declining because it does not possess the human nature of advancement. Optimistically, it allows people to learn how to cooperate with each other. In order to advance and adopt a person has to change; I believe that the acceptance of cultural adaptations, diversity, and industrialization can prove that the decline of speech does not cause a

In the second episode of “Do You Speak American,” the major dialects that were discussed were: Eastern New England, Pennsylvania, Midland, Southern and Western. During the time they spent in the South, we learned that there are a few different misconceptions about the Southern dialect. One of those misconceptions are that southern people are stupid because of the way they talk. Jeff Foxworthy points out some words that southerners tend to say that make people think they are “stupid.” For example, the word mayonnaise is used like “Mayonnaise a lot of people here tonight.” He also uses the word “innuendo,” and some Southerners may say “Hey dude. I saw a bird fly innurendo.” Since these are not correct statements, this is probably why people think

Speaking American: A History of English in the United States tells the story of the evolution of English and how it has been effected(affected?) by different regions of the continental United States. The author, Richard W. Bailey, passed away before the book’s publication. I believe that this is one of the reasons for the book’s rambling and inefficient writing style as the editors, because of their inability to contact the deceased, “left potential ambiguity unresolved” (Bailey xi).

What were the dominant concerns of the founders of the United States with regard to language? Several of the founders deemed standardization of language usage to be a grave concern because the US does not have a designated language.

The Standard American English dialect (SAE) is, in many ways, similar to the Pacific Northwest dialect as well as different in other ways. The following essay will go into detail of the unique linguistic features that the Pacific Northwest dialect comprises of. Phonology In Foster and Hoffman’s journal article, they state many phonological differences in the Pacific Northwest dialect compared to the SAE.

Nisen also list several different examples of dialect, one is the Pennsylvania German- English; which is a dialect influenced by Pennsylvania Dutch. Their grammar allows sentence such as “ Smear your sister with jam on a slice of bread" and "Throw your father out the window his hat." another example is the Virginia Piedmont dialect the article says, “When an R comes after a vowel, it becomes UH, and AW becomes the slided sound, AH-AW. Thus, four dogs becomes fo-uh dahawgs. Some local words are: hoppergrass (grasshopper), old-field colt (illegitimate child), school breaks up (school lets out), weskit (vest)”

Although the current study examines language use in HHNL, it is first necessary to go further back in time to the origins of AAVE and look at specific features AAVE has in contrast with standard English and also examine further developments of AAVE through cultural movements such as Hip Hop. In one of the earlier studies done on language use in AAVE, John R Rickford, Arnetha Ball, Raina Jackson Blake, and Naomi Martin (1991), stated that AAVE is the only American dialect where is deletion is found. He had found occasional instances of are deletion in some European American dialects. Rickford also discussed copula variation playing a large role in the origin debate of AAVE. He presents all previously stated methodologies of the origin debate including the Dialectologist and also the Creolist Approach, in order to compare all theories of copula variation in AAVE. There are two specific views on the origin of AAVE. Labov’s Dialectologist approach (1969) assumes that AAVE was created into a dialect of American English. This means that all of the distinguishing features of AAVE were created out

Growing up in State College were the English appears to be rather nominal it has always been very easy for me to understand most people. Traveling a lot around the Mid-East of the United States, most of the time the dialect of English is the same. Though I do have friends who have slightly different dialects that are easy to understand, or if there is a misunderstanding they have been very easy to correct. One of those said friends was from the United Kingdom, more specifically Britain.

There are hundreds of dialects in America and they are continuing to grow, in regions such as the north, the south, and the west. Dialects in these regions have been around for years and are relentlessly flourishing. For example, many residents in Ohio speak the Appalachia dialect. (Do You Speak American? Down south, 2005). In this region the Appalachian dialect is becoming a trend and is spreading rapidly. (Do You Speak American? Down south, 2005). In other regions like the west, there are dialects that have had a major influence. For example, Spanglish is a combination of both Spanish and English. (Do You Speak American? Out west, 2005). Due to the growing population of the Latinos in America, they intertwine their native language,

Language variation, whether across different regions or different social groups, is a complex topic with a plethora of factors worthy of investigation. As Figure A and Figure B show, there are some interesting patterns that develop as a result of such factors. The following analysis will consider ways in which a variety of issues can begin to explain the reasons for such correlation in the data. Specifically, ways in which methodological factors, linguistic prestige, and the notion of speech communities and ‘class’, all play a contributory role, will be considered.