New England Accents (or lack thereof)

Because western Massachusetts is pretty much just like upstate New York, which is (unfortunately) pretty much the mid-west. You do have an accent. You draw out your A sound. I do, a little, too, because I'm originally from upstate New York. Accents don't have to do with geography, they have to do with what you hear when you grow up. So, more than likely, you talk like your parents, friends and teachers.

Everyone not from your part of the country thinks you have an accent. People from Delaware think they don't have an accent, but their accent makes me want to jam their tax-free shopping up their asses.

A necessary evil when it comes to buying cigars and scotch, though...

In the paragraph above, the speaker is making the following error(s) (more than one may apply):

A. He/she believes in the dubious concept of a "region-free" accent.
B. He/she believes that childhood holds some of our fondest memories.
C. He/she thinks that the people with whom he/she grew up are in an advantageous position to recognize their own accents.
D. Television is a fine method of communication.

Dave, she's the female version of duke fleed. It's really not worth the bother.

Almost everyone in the region where I grew up understands that Jesus is the son of the one true God. But, when you travel to other regions of the world, you should hear the crazy shit they believe in. Eightfold path my DICK.

Even in places where there is little accent, there are often phrases you say that tie you to a region. Like wicked, or you'se. Or whatever phrase you use to classify soft drinks (they're all coke to me).

Duchess Fleed?

This one's always fascinated me. So if you want a Sprite, you ask for a...?

Do you want a coke? Sure. What flavor? Sprite.

ALL sodas are coke.

What if you're not asked?

"Can I help you?"

"May I please have a Coke?"

"What flavor?"

You guys have to add an extra question every time?

I've asked this before, but doesn't that get confusing when you actually want a Coca Cola? Doesn't it become a "who's on first" thing?

Person No. 1: Boy, I could go for a coke.
Person No. 2: Sure, what flavor?
Person No. 1: Coke.
Person No. 2: Right, I heard you. What kind?
Person No. 1: COKE, DAMN IT!
Person No. 2: WHAT. FLAVOR???
Person No. 1: Sigh, just give me a Pepsi.

And... scene.

When in a restaurant, we know to specify what kind of coke we want to drink (and do so accordingly). Honestly, it's not that complicated.

And what if you want a Cherry or Vanilla Coke? It defies all rules of logic and comprehension!

It's 'pop', anyways. Get it right.

Soda!

The things I have to forgive for my northern brothers. *sigh*

It's really just a ploy to divert everyone to the true elixir of the gods: sweet tea.

lolmultiplechoice

While some critics proclaim the use of standardized tests to be problematic due to their privileging of certain groups over others and the failure of such tests to measure important skills such as conceptual thinking, it is still generally assumed that reading comprehension and the ability to follow simple instructions are key to attaining a high score.

A. True.
B. False.

Yinz got nothing on Pittsburghese. Now I gotta go red up the haus. Go Stillers.

C. None of the above.

Dave's question is culturally biased. Thus, I am rewriting it so that someone with Princess Kate's accent can understand it.*

"While some critics proclaim the use of st[ɛə]ndardized tests to be problem[eə]tic due to their privileging of certain groups over others and the failure of such tests to measure important skills such as conceptual thinking, it is still generally assumed that reading comprehension and the ability to follow simple instructions are key to attaining a high score.

A. True.
B. False."

* Also applies to Princess Kate's friends, smart and dumb alike.

You make me want to move.

Soda pop!

Actually, I use "soda", but many of my friends from upstate NY say the above.

Fuck sweet tea. Adding sugar* to iced tea is a vile practice which must be resisted at every turn. Gimme that shit unsweetened, with a withered lemon wedge of unkown age, the way it's meant to be. I can drink unsweetened iced tea by the goddamn gallon. It's a DELIGHT.

*if you use a sugar substitute in your putrid, vomitous sweet tea, you aren't even human. You consume an abomination that SHOULD NOT BE.

I...I think I need to go to bed...

I grew up in Oregon (where I developed a very neutral accent from what I can tell, especially compared to some where I live now, fwiw), and we called it Pop. Now, in Maryland, everyone calls it Soda (to which I've long since adapted, because I always thought Pop sounded silly anyway). I'm convinced the midwest all calls it Soda Pop to join the two.

Also, I don't understand the whole "calling everything coke in the south" confusion? If you guys want a Mountain Dew, wouldn't you order a Mountain Dew? If I'm at a restaurant, and I want a Root Beer, I don't ask for a soda and wait for them to ask for clarification.

I'm from upstate. We do stretch out or short As. Friends in college would ask me to say "ham," I'd ask them to say "mall." Guess where they were from.

Actually, if the inflection on the word Coke is used properly your waitstaff should be able to understand what flavor you want.

And we say pop in the south. We say "I'll pop you upside the head with this co-cola bottle."

For those who aren't familiar with the "Bawlmer Accent", a lot of it hinges on the the letter O. The word "boom" sounds like "Beeyoom" in Bawlmerese, and "Hon" (a common affectionate in the stereotypical Baltimore lexicon) is pronounced "Hawwun" (spoken very quickly). Sink is "Zink", Water is "Wudder", and Wash is "Warsh".

I've noticed most of the people with these accents come from some pretty specific areas, mostly Dunkdalk Md, (aka Dundoowallk) and Perry Hall (aka Perry Huwall).

Even if Princess Kate is mildly retarded she's not entirely wrong. There's a correlation between level of education and thickness of accent. I'm not making this up, it's a fact. I would also contend that I know plenty of people who have no discernible accent.

Total bullshit; there's a correlation between education and entitlement and the entitled person assumes his/her accent and his/her accent alone is the most "neutral" and therefore "correct" one. Which is ridiculous and smacks of self-obsession (another trait closely tied to education and wealth), as does the original post, which is just flat-out ridiculous and clearly written by someone with no concern or regard for other people and how they perceive things, no grasp of intersubjectivity whatsoever (sorry).

I grew up in a purportedly "accentless" part of America and always assumed my accent was fairly neutral. I lived for half a year in England (the country of many accents, each of which has significant class-based connotations; class in England is somewhat analogous to race in America--something most educated people try to ignore but are nonetheless subtly aware of, as are Americans inevitably aware of both historical and contemporary racial biases and Britons aware of class-related ones). There, I was told I had a strong American accent. And apparently an "American accent" isn't what we're accustomed to hearing in the movies; instead, it's just "American." I thought I sounded like people in (American) movies; so do the British, apparently.

Like it or not, a New England accent (or a California accent) is every bit the accent you'd find in the deep south or abroad; it's only what you consider "standard" that defines your (wholly relative) perception of it.

Regarding accents, I think part of the problem is that the generalized American accent (basically the mid-western "non-accent" many are referring to) IS an accent, but because it is used so prominently in tv and movies, used on sites like dictionary.com for pronunciation, and seems to be the accent taught in many English classes for foreigners, people feel like it is the standard (i.e., no accent).

Regarding "coke" as as the general term for pop (yeah, I'm a mid-westerner), I don't know how I've managed to not ever hear that (I've visited North Carolina, South Carolina, Kentucky, Indiana, and Florida enough that I feel like I should have heard that at some point). It seems odd, but I guess it isn't that much odder than someone saying Vaseline instead of petroleum jelly or Kleenex instead of tissue.

I'm pretty sure the key phrase when it comes to the having or not having of accents is "egocentrism." Princess Kate seems to have her egocentrism backed up by the fact that she thinks people on TV sound like her. But what she doesn't understand is that the accent heard by Americans on television is as much an accent as a drawl or whatever they call New England accents. It just happens to be an accent that is reasonably intelligible by the vast majority of Americans and so is used in popular media, dubbed in some parts "American Standard."

That said, while JuddL is wrong (for the above reasons), you are equally wrong, policar. The lessening of strong accents amongst those with higher education has diddly shit to do with entitlement. It has to do with getting out of your comfort zone, exposing yourself to other accents, and wanting to make yourself understood to a more diverse population. When I went to school and the Longuylanders noted my stressed As, I shortened it. A Southerner who moves up North for a good deal of time tends to have their accent fade.

But what it changes to is another accent... one close to the accent we dubbed "American Standard."

ETA: OK, KungfumonkeyMike beat me to it but I used more words!

I hope you had fun with your Fortune 500 friends at Princeton or whatever. The poor thank you for your condescension and for correcting our mistakes!

Otherwise, I actually agree with about 90% of what you wrote, especially since I have close friends from the south whose specifically southern accents completely disappeared while they were at college. And don't take the entitlement thing personally; I was just offended by those two posters' obvious education and entitlement.

Where did you go to school?

State University of New York at Binghamton. I am an elitist prick.

Re: Coke/soda/pop

In Texas, the most frequent usage of "coke" as a generic usually goes something like this:

Guy A: I'm going to the (store/cooler/fridge) to grab some cokes, what do you want?
Guy B: Dr. Pepper

If you're ordering at a resaurant or a drive through, then naturally you'll just say what you want. We're not *completely* retarded down here.

Next everyone is gonna say the call the remote control a "clicker" and a video game controller a "paddle" and I'm gonna go apeshit.

For the record I like to imagine all "American" accents like when Apu pretends to be from Wisconsin on the Simpsons "The Nye Mets are my fav-o-rite baseball squadron"

Just join me in wishing all of MA west of 495 would fall into the ocean. I realize it has to leap over eastern MA to do it, but I can't be bothered by details.

Yes. I have friends from here who spent about ten years in New Jersey. This means they know what a toque is but drink a lot of soda. And y'all talk funny.

And eat this stuff called 'red sauce', but don't put gravy on your freedom fries. Philistines.