So trivial, yet it really ticks you off.

[GHT]

In Texas "damn" is two syllables: "day-um."

Wine might be a four letter, single syllable word, but someone from Alabama can make it a whole sentence, I love it though. And in those Southern States, if you speak with an original cockney accent, you get asked to repeat it over and over again. It's not that they didn't hear, it's just the novelty of realising that Londoners really do speak cockney. Furthermore, I like to throw in the occasional rhyming slang, but abbreviated, the way cockneys do. For example, pork pies means to tell lies, easy enough, but if I said: "What a load of porkies," that might have the listener scratching their head.

 

[LizzieMaine]

So a Maine drawl. Nice

I'm vacationing in Florida right now. My Uber driver the other night was from Maine. She had that thick Maine accent. It wasn't without its charm.

The real accent is disappearing fast. The generaton born after about 1970 is generally rhotic, those born between 1950 and 1970 may be rhotic or non-rhotic depending on social class, and those born before 1950 are almost universally non-rhotic regardless of social class. I recently preserved a number recordings of broadcasts from the 1930s by native Maine speakers. One series featured the then-president of the National Education Association -- a very well-educated, sophisticated woman from Augusta, Maine who had one of the thickest traditional Maine accents I've ever heard on radio. Another broadcast featured a salty old Maine seaman who had saved the lives of his crew during a maritime disaster in 1937. He had exactly the same accent as the president of the NEA. You would never hear that homogenity of speech across class boundaries today, not with the hardening of class lines and the increasing presence of non-Maine-speakers in positions of authority over the last fifty years. The last nationally-prominent Mainer I can think of who had a traditional accent was Sen. George Mitchell. There will not be another.

The Maine Drawl is interesting. It usually only occurs in words ending in a post-vowel R -- "bee-ah," "bay-ah," "hee-ah," "they-ah," "whe-ah," etc. But some speakers will apply it elsewhere -- my mother pronounces "fluid" as a drawn-out "floo-eed," a pronunciation which tends to mystify anyone who comes from south of Penobscot Bay. It's one of the quirks of the local accent that comes to us via Francophone Canada.

 

[Hercule]

In much of New England, "beer" is a two syllable word -- "bee-ah." "Hey Sully, you goin' downa packie? Gimme some bee-ah!"

Ha!! "Packie" - Now there's a word I haven't heard in a loooong time. Thanks for the blast from the past!

 

[ChrisB]

I knew two men, both lifelong residents of the same town in western Maine. One had a strong accent, while the other could have been a TV news anchor. They were about ten years apart in age.

 

[Fading Fast]

The real accent is disappearing fast. The generaton born after about 1970 is generally rhotic, those born between 1950 and 1970 may be rhotic or non-rhotic depending on social class, and those born before 1950 are almost universally non-rhotic regardless of social class. I recently preserved a number recordings of broadcasts from the 1930s by native Maine speakers. One series featured the then-president of the National Education Association -- a very well-educated, sophisticated woman from Augusta, Maine who had one of the thickest traditional Maine accents I've ever heard on radio. Another broadcast featured a salty old Maine seaman who had saved the lives of his crew during a maritime disaster in 1937. He had exactly the same accent as the president of the NEA. You would never hear that homogenity of speech across class boundaries today, not with the hardening of class lines and the increasing presence of non-Maine-speakers in positions of authority over the last fifty years. The last nationally-prominent Mainer I can think of who had a traditional accent was Sen. George Mitchell. There will not be another.

The Maine Drawl is interesting. It usually only occurs in words ending in a post-vowel R -- "bee-ah," "bay-ah," "hee-ah," "they-ah," "whe-ah," etc. But some speakers will apply it elsewhere -- my mother pronounces "fluid" as a drawn-out "floo-eed," a pronunciation which tends to mystify anyone who comes from south of Penobscot Bay. It's one of the quirks of the local accent that comes to us via Francophone Canada.

From Google Words
rho·tic
ˈrōdik/
adjective
PHONETICS
relating to or denoting a dialect or variety of English, e.g., Midwestern American English, in which r is pronounced before a consonant (as in hard ) and at the ends of words (as in far ).

And once again, my vocabulary expands thanks to Lizzie. Hey, but just from context, I knew my first thought, that rhotic was a misspelling of an adjectival form of rotten, was wrong .

 

[HudsonHawk]

The real accent is disappearing fast. The generaton born after about 1970 is generally rhotic, those born between 1950 and 1970 may be rhotic or non-rhotic depending on social class, and those born before 1950 are almost universally non-rhotic regardless of social class. I recently preserved a number recordings of broadcasts from the 1930s by native Maine speakers. One series featured the then-president of the National Education Association -- a very well-educated, sophisticated woman from Augusta, Maine who had one of the thickest traditional Maine accents I've ever heard on radio. Another broadcast featured a salty old Maine seaman who had saved the lives of his crew during a maritime disaster in 1937. He had exactly the same accent as the president of the NEA. You would never hear that homogenity of speech across class boundaries today, not with the hardening of class lines and the increasing presence of non-Maine-speakers in positions of authority over the last fifty years. The last nationally-prominent Mainer I can think of who had a traditional accent was Sen. George Mitchell. There will not be another.

The Maine Drawl is interesting. It usually only occurs in words ending in a post-vowel R -- "bee-ah," "bay-ah," "hee-ah," "they-ah," "whe-ah," etc. But some speakers will apply it elsewhere -- my mother pronounces "fluid" as a drawn-out "floo-eed," a pronunciation which tends to mystify anyone who comes from south of Penobscot Bay. It's one of the quirks of the local accent that comes to us via Francophone Canada.

The Cracker accent of my native Florida is also disappearing. It's down to geography now, where you'll hear it in the north part and in the south central part. It's pretty much gone from the coastal areas and in the larger cities. I went to a family reunion last weekend, and it was good to hear it again. I'm sure I've picked back up some of it. Heck, my wife says she can tell when I've been talking to my mother on the phone.

 

[HudsonHawk]

From Google Words
rho·tic
ˈrōdik/
adjective
PHONETICS
relating to or denoting a dialect or variety of English, e.g., Midwestern American English, in which r is pronounced before a consonant (as in hard ) and at the ends of words (as in far ).

And once again, my vocabulary expands thanks to Lizzie. Hey, but just from context, I knew my first thought, that rhotic was a misspelling of an adjectival form of rotten, was wrong .

Most Southern accents south of Virginia are very hard rhotic. That's the Scots and Scots-Irish influence. However, the "Hollywood Southern" accent, the stereotypical one you hear very poorly faked in the movies, is the non-Rhotic, Colonial-English derived kind. It's very limited and it's very class-linked. But for whatever reason, it's the one that Hollywood has seen fit to misapply at every turn.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Ha!! "Packie" - Now there's a word I haven't heard in a loooong time. Thanks for the blast from the past!

You have to be careful where you use it. It's phonetically identical to a very crude racial slur in some parts of the English-speaking world. But in much of New England, especially the Boston area, it's where you go to get your poundahs.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Most Southern accents south of Virginia are very hard rhotic. That's the Scots and Scots-Irish influence. However, the "Hollywood Southern" accent, the stereotypical one you hear very poorly faked in the movies, is the non-Rhotic, Colonial-English derived kind. It's very limited and it's very class-linked. But for whatever reason, it's the one that Hollywood has seen fit to misapply at every turn.

I think Hollywood, and specifically "Gone With The Wind" is pretty much singlehandedly responsible for promoting that particular stereotype dialect. There's a reason why pretty much every woman who tries to "do a Southern accent" sounds like Vivien Leigh as Scarlett O'Hara.

I did a detailed study in my book on "Amos 'n' Andy" of the dialect used in the early radio version of that program, and found that dialect was very different from Hollywood Southern, Hollywood Plantation, Blackface Minstrel, or modern African-American Vernacular English. The creator of the program came from Richmond, Virginia, and the dialect was very heavily influenced by the non-rhotic Tidewater accent spoken by both blacks and whites in that area in the late 19th and early 20th Century, to the point where hypercorrected rhoticity was used for characters higher on the social-class scale, or hoping to be so.

 

[GHT]

You have to be careful where you use it. It's phonetically identical to a very crude racial slur in some parts of the English-speaking world.

Lizzie is right, You should never even think the word on our side of the pond, it's a derogatory remark aimed deliberately at anyone of Pakistan origin.

 

[tonyb]

You have to be careful where you use it. It's phonetically identical to a very crude racial slur in some parts of the English-speaking world. But in much of New England, especially the Boston area, it's where you go to get your poundahs.

I know of some Wisconsinites who use it. It was suggested to me that it was an abbreviation of "package store," the place where you bought "packaged" alcoholic beverages. I have no idea if that etymology is accurate or not.

 

[LizzieMaine]

That's the generally-accepted source here. "Package store" was the common term for a liquor store for a long time after the repeal of Prohibition. The king of all packies is Kappy's Discount Liquors in Boston, well known for its gaudy, overstuffed ads in the Boston daily papers.

 

[sheeplady]

Wine might be a four letter, single syllable word, but someone from Alabama can make it a whole sentence, I love it though. And in those Southern States, if you speak with an original cockney accent, you get asked to repeat it over and over again. It's not that they didn't hear, it's just the novelty of realising that Londoners really do speak cockney. Furthermore, I like to throw in the occasional rhyming slang, but abbreviated, the way cockneys do. For example, pork pies means to tell lies, easy enough, but if I said: "What a load of porkies," that might have the listener scratching their head.

I've been reading Harry Potter (I never read it when it first came out, but I like to read potential books in advance for the kids, and well, know what all the fuss is about). I have to look up some of the slang, about 3 words so far (I am in book.. 5?). They say Americans use more slang than anyone else... I really don't think so.

 

[Stearmen]

Let me settle this once and for all, you all have accents that are unintelligible to me! Now if you will excuse me, there is a grizzly bar up near Cripple Crick that is just hankering for a tussle!

 

[GHT]

Look out, Stearmen's about, giving it large.

 

[MisterCairo]

Lizzie is right, You should never even think the word on our side of the pond, it's a derogatory remark aimed deliberately at anyone of Pakistan origin.

As in Canada - I did a double take when I saw that post!

 

[MisterCairo]

I was the only non-American on the Joint Pacific Operational Law Excersise (PACJOLE) in Hawaii, eleven years ago, and I buddied up with a Texan JAG officer with whom I'm still in touch.

He told us all in the shacks an anecdote, the details of which I forget, but the central theme was how some guy pronounced the word "whore".

The subject of the tale said, and I can't do the pronunciation justice in type, but something like this:

"And, then he went and called that poor woman a 'hoe-wuh'". "He called her a what?" asked the listener in the tale.

"I said, he called her a (even more emphasis and drawl that further confuses the listener) HOEWHHHHHHH!"

 

[LizzieMaine]

I was the only non-American on the Joint Pacific Operational Law Excersise (PACJOLE) in Hawaii, eleven years ago, and I buddied up with a Texan JAG officer with whom I'm still in touch.

He told us all in the shacks an anecdote, the details of which I forget, but the central theme was how some guy pronounced the word "whore".

The subject of the tale said, and I can't do the pronunciation justice in type, but something like this:

"And, then he went and called that poor woman a 'hoe-wuh'". "He called her a what?" asked the listener in the tale.

"I said, he called her a (even more emphasis and drawl that further confuses the listener) HOEWHHHHHHH!"

That's another word my mother drawls. She'll yell it out the window at people who cut her off in traffic: YOU SON OF A HOE-WAH!"

 

[Inkstainedwretch]

Now there's a term that has disappeared: "whoreson." It was thought so vulgar that it was euphemised to the much less offensive "son of a bitch." Of course that in turn became a vulgar expression. Sometimes you just can't win.

 

[ChiTownScion]

That's another word my mother drawls. She'll yell it out the window at people who cut her off in traffic: YOU SON OF A HOE-WAH!"

Shades of Ralph Cifaretto (as played by Joe Pantoliano on HBO's "The Sopranos)! Doubt that you're a fan, but that is exactly how the character pronounced it ("She was a HOE-WAH !!") before he met his well deserved end.