<p>Babboo, I kind of figured the bathrooms were called basements because in old-time schools that’s where they were. But my high school was brand-spankin’ new in the 1970s, had no levels below the ground floor, and they STILL called them basements…even the ones on the second storey. My family moved there in the middle of my sophomore year. I kept hearing about people going to the basement, and kept looking for a stairway going to a level below the ground floor, and never saw one.</p>
<p>Dogwood and Babboo, maybe it had something to do with the scruffiness of my suburb, but we had plenty of things that were just pi$$ah, and not WICKED pi$$ah.</p>
<p>They also referred to getting drunk as getting “c*cked” (NOT “cRocked”).</p>
<p>Perhaps the most perplexing use of “wicked” I came across was when a guy who was supposed to show me around, on my first day of work at a new job, told me “Wait here. I have to take a wicked d*mp.” That from a guy I had known for about 20 seconds.</p>
<p>We went to the “basement” in school I attended in MA that was probably built in very late 1800s. Bathroom was in the basement. At home, we had a cellar, and we’d go “downcellar” (though not to go to the bathroom). I had “idear” stamped out of me when I left the state, and eventually learned that the coin wasn’t “quater” but “quarter.” We drank tonic, said “mum” instead of “mom” and had a “front room” in our house. </p>
<p>I give Julianne Moore points for effort, and enjoy her performance, but her accent doesn’t ring true for me. I enjoyed her accent in “The Shipping News” but now suspect she may not have sounded right to a Newfoundlander.</p>
<p>Sometimes I notice when Adam Sandler, in an off-guarded moment, speaks with an unadjusted New England accent from Manchester, NH where he was raised. It’s around 90 miles north of Boston central.</p>
<p>To me the main characteristic of Boston-speak is assuming that if you don’t know where you are, you shouldn’t be asking. The main streets have no street signs, only the smaller side-streets. You can go for miles not knowing which big street you’re on. </p>
<p>Also I love hearing directions such as these, “Turn left wheyah the tavern used to be.”</p>
<p>“Perhaps the most perplexing use of “wicked” I came across was when a guy who was supposed to show me around, on my first day of work at a new job, told me “Wait here. I have to take a wicked d*mp.” That from a guy I had known for about 20 seconds.” </p>
<p>Regarding people directions, I found that near Boston they would say “right” when midwesterners would say “OK.” Ask for directions in Boston, and somebody will likely say “Go up to the next light, right? Then turn left, right? Then go down the hill, right?” Also, in New England, they always give directions as left and right, because north, south, east, and west are worthless directions when every street snakes left, right, up, down, etc. Also in Boston, getting directions to “go up to the light, take an illegal left, and then…” is not uncommon.</p>
<p>Also regarding driving, I learned to drive near Boston, and even decades later in the Midwest, I get honked at daily for maneuvers that are standard in New England…most notably the four cars turning left as soon as a light turns green, and a yellow light means “speed up.”</p>
<p>Anybody remember “Candlepins for Cash” hosted by Bob Gemere? My brother and I (both transplanted Midwesterners) used to reach linguistic Nirvana when Bob would ask a contestant where he/she was from, and he/she would respond, “Dahchestahbowb.”</p>
<p>We also got a kick out of how the type of bowling that is standard in the rest of the effing civilized WORLD was called “ten pin” (when it was mentioned at all), even though the much-more-popular candlepin bowling ALSO had ten pins.</p>
<p>Do you remember the talent show called “Star of the Day”? You know, “Star of the day, who will it be. Your vote may hold the key. It’s up to you. Tell us who. Will be star of the day!” I think it was on channel 4. One of my most guarded secrets is that I performed on that show. Shhhh…Don’t tell anyone!</p>
<p>I basically learned to drive in Boston. I got my license in CT, but then lived in Boston for 6 years without a car. Talk about a wake up call. Going back into Boston across the Tobin Bridge (before the completion on the Big Dig) was definitely done with a prayer. My husband told me the rule for entering rotaries was “The right of way goes to the wreck”</p>
<p>Always been teased about sounding like I’m from the Midwest even though I come from NJ. “You don’t sound like you’re from Joisey!”…Newsflash!! People from NJ don’t say “Joisey!”…</p>
<p>oh, those shows - I remember them both and Santa Claus on Channel 9. The reception was a little snowy down in MA, but what would you expect from a guy broadcasting from the North Pole? You sent your letter in to the WMUR Santa and he would read them on the air - it was such a thrill to hear your letter being read. It was almost 48 years ago, but I still remember Santa reading “and a pair of mocassins for our mother.” (Mum’s slippers that had fur around the opening and some beadwork on the top of the foot.) </p>
<p>Having grown up being made fun of for the way I spoke no matter where I went, I’m very sensitive to mocking other people’s accents. I grew up in NJ, with parents from the south. I’ll never forget my southern cousin asking me to repeat the name of my hometown in NJ over and over in front of her friends when I was about 8 years old, because she thought my “accent” was so funny. But at home in NJ, I was “that girl who says y’all.” It wasn’t until I went to college in PA that I think I completely lost any accent. Now I sound like my surroundings. I pick up a Southern accent when we go to visit relatives, and it drops off when we get on the plane to come home. It’s not something I’m conscious of at all, but my family notices it. My kids can tell if I’m talking to my parents on the phone because my accent changes. </p>
<p>There is nothing - NOTHING - worse than people who think they can “do” a southern accent. It’s bad, it’s insulting, and 99% of the time they just sound like idiots. The second worst is people who think they can do a Boston accent. Ugh. My boss is from RI and sounds like it. She used to call me her Southern Belle in some godawful “southern” accent until one day I let her have it with both barrels. She hasn’t done it since.</p>
<p>OTOH…when we first moved to our small New England town it was growing fast and there was a LOT of resentment on the part of the “Townies” against all the newcomers. I’ve lived here 20+ years, and my children were born here, but none of us will ever be considered “local” by the old-timers. Since they were so eager to look down their noses at the newcomers, DH and I felt free to make fun of their accent (in private, of course). Now I think we newcomers have pretty much taken over - it was only a matter of time, haha - so I look at the accent as an endearing little trait, kind of like the way you chuckle at a toddler who can’t say R or S.</p>
<p>I’m from Ohio, on the very northern border of southern Ohio, and, on occasion, I can be heard to speak with an Appalachian accent. (For those of you from elsewhere, that would be “Appa-LATCH-un”, not “Appa-LAY-shun”.) I never knew I had an accent until I went to college in Boston.</p>
<p>I’ve lived here in Boston for almost eight years now, and I married a Boston native (one without much of an accent, but who can’t say “drawer” with the terminal r). My mother tells me I’m starting to sound like an east coaster, but I don’t know which of my vowels have changed!</p>
<p>Perhaps she’s jealous. Southern Rhode Island is about 45 minutes from Northern Rhode Island. And the ferries out to those islands don’t count for stretching the size, so let’s nawt get stahted.</p>
<p>lefthandofdog - No, I’m not a stah. I lost to some cute little 7 year old dancah.</p>
<p>mollie - I always put my clothes in a draw.</p>
<p>Lafalum - We have the same issue down here in NC, there were definitely people who were not happy about all us northerners moving down. When my husband first started at the local hospital 15 years ago, he heard an elderly patient whisper to her husband “He’s a yankee”. Also, I had never heard the civil war referred to as the “war of northern aggression” until I moved here. 15 years later, our area, and many other areas of North Carolina have become a big melting pot of people from all over the country. I think it’s great that we are getting to know each other and find most people, including natives, accepting of the changes. Gotta love that southern hospitality. I think it has made me a better person.</p>
<p>Yes, accents can vary widely within the same state. In NC, the folks in the eastern part of the state(coastal) speak far differently than those from the western part(mountains). </p>
<p>I am from northeastern NC and have a distinctly Tidewater VA accent.<br>
down sounds like doan
about sounds like aboat
round sounds like roan </p>
<p>I have taken a lot of flak since moving to a diff. part of the state. I’ve been here 28 years and have not lost my "down east h’oi toider accent.
It is hard for me to speak differently. I have to make a conscious effort.<br>
I usually don’t try.</p>
<p>I once worked in a fish factory on Fish Pier in Boston, and one of the workers there was a contestant on Candlepins for Cash. This was one of the most foul-mouthed people I’ve ever known, in a completely amiable way. She couldn’t ask you what you were having for lunch without using the F-word repeatedly, as in " Eh! What the F kind of F-ing sandwich are you having today?" We were all wondering how she would manage to talk at all on TV. I didn’t see it, but everyone said she looked scared and hardly said anything. I have the feeling the producers put the fear of god into her after exchanging a few sentences! :D</p>
<p>I’m sure Bowb Gameah would have been shocked–SHOCKED!–to hear the F word.</p>
<p>Another great thing was going to Celtics games at the Boston Garden…with Coach Tommy Heinsohn smoking on the bench while the game was in progress, just like about half the spectators. There were huge “NO SMOKING” signs hanging from the rafters, which were hard to see, clouded in smoke as they were.</p>
<p>To get back to the original intent of this thread, I’m still baffled by why the really hard-core Boston accent persists, given that even the LOCAL media personalities generally don’t have it. In other words, nearly everybody they hear on TV and in the movies has a fairly neutral accent, yet it seems to have zero impact on getting Bostonians to tone it down even a little. It’s like they are so confident that everybody else is wrong, it never occurs to them to change. Here in the Detroit area, the most prominent A.M. radio station has a weather man who’s been here for decades, but he sounds like he’s broadcasting from Southie. Even the many hockey players on the Red Wings who are from Sweden are able to speak in perfect Midwestern accents, but the weather man from Boston hasn’t let the locals impact him one ioter.</p>