<p>^^^^</p>
<p>lololololol</p>
<p>
I didn’t grow up in the Boston area (and very few people can place my accent). Shortly I moved here, I identified a woman to an native Bostonian who was taking attendance at a meeting. I said, “There’s Bonnie.” He was perplexed and said, “Who?” I said, “Bonnie.” He shrugged his shoulders and began writing, “B a r n e . . .” I said, “No, her, the tall woman over there.” “Oh!” he said. “You mean Bawnie!”</p>
<p>^^^ That’s the little secret that non-New Englander’s don’t get about the Boston accent. It’s not just about dropping R’s (and adding them to words that are supposed to end in a). It’s also about turning "ah"s into “aws”. For instance: the baseball team is the Sawx. </p>
<p>I saw a posting on FB today, a guy was writing to a local (Boston area) friend that he couldn’t wait to come back and visit. He joked that he wanted to have a wicked time. Someone local jumped in and commented, “Dude, you can have a wicked good time, or a wicked bad time, but you can’t have a wicked time. Get the lingo straight before you come back! haha”</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>The type that doesn’t distinguish between too, to and two?</p>
<p>I want to thank all of you for making me laugh so much. Maybe someone can answer a question for me. </p>
<p>Where do the people who say “warsher” for “washer” come from?</p>
<p>I watched a 6-y.o. boy through a one-way mirror as a psychologist from Chicago administered an IQ subtest verbally, individually. THe boy had just moved to the region. </p>
<p>Question (my best recollection): " Are these made from metal?" “a pole, a pan, a pin.” The boy kept saying, “what? what?!” to the word “pan.” The psychologist re-pronounced it “paaaaan” to skirt his flat Midwestern accent, and the boy got it immediately.</p>
<p>Gloworm, sorry we crossposted. You asked:
</p>
<p>Warsaw? Or maybe Pennsylvania and Maryland. I grew up in Baltimore and seem to recall that. People warshed those marble steps on the row houses.</p>
<p>I’m a little more than 100 miles from Chicago, so according to this thread I qualify for no accent. People from Chicago, NW Indiana, and Michigan do have an accent! Chicago and Michigan are identifiably different though.</p>
<p>Lots of people here warsh their clothes.</p>
<p>I’m still trying to figure out how to say “college” if it’s not “caw ledge”. Also the difference between Dawn/Don and Kerry/Carrie.</p>
<p>Someone asked for a state that has a huge difference in dialects within the state. Indiana definitely does. NW Indiana for all purposes is Chicago. The southern 1/3 is southern, and the closer to the Ohio river, the heavier the drawl.</p>
<p>sryrstress, I pronounce it “cah-ledge.” Don is pronounced “Dahn.” And Dawn is pronounced like it’s spelled.</p>
<p>I’m from Utah and while we don’t have much of an accent, we do have lots of Utah specific vocab-most of it related to Mormonism but used and understood by non-Mormons (“Gentiles”–even people who are Jewish), like my family</p>
<p>Temple–the Mormon Temple (usually the main temple)</p>
<p>RM–returned missionary</p>
<p>Family Home Evening–a Mormon evening for family activities; never try to schedule anything on a Monday unless everyone you’re inviting is a Gentile/jack Mormon</p>
<p>Ward–Mormon church/meeting house</p>
<p>Temple Recommend–proof that one is a Mormon in good standing</p>
<p>“Oh my heck”</p>
<p>Convention–annual(?) gathering of Mormons</p>
<p>Jack Mormon–someone raised Mormon who has left the LDS church</p>
<p>Most of these may be religious phrases, but they are very common in Utah culture, and you would likely be lost if you lived here (regardless of religion) and didn’t pack them up.</p>
<p>On another note, my mom’s best friend is from Boston–my mom is a military brat who lived all over the country–and when they first met, my mom still couldn’t understand what she was saying!</p>
<p>Also, what accent is “warsh” from? I’ve heard it from both Bostonians and Southerners.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>What about places like Moab, Juab and Tooele? I actually went to a Catholic Church service in Central Utah once and everyone there sounded like they were from the South (or at least very rurl). Northern Utah is pretty plain though, by SoCal standards.</p>
<p>I seriously always thought that Don and Dawn had identical pronunciations. No?
I remember having a little doll named Dawn when I about 10. She was like a mini Barbie and had a friend (Angie, I think, who had a really groovy Afro) and a plastic runway, etc. She was all the rage. I remember, though, feeling a little sorry that her name sounded like a boy name.
An aside to that story. One of Dawn’s little outfits disappeared when my cousin was visiting from California. She was my number one suspect because I thought it was very strange that she would say “Oh, Guy!” instead of “Oh, God” or “Oh, Gosh!”. She may as well have been from another planet.</p>
<p>I mean, really, who is Guy?</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>They do for your dialect, but not for some other American dialects. Wikipedia reveals it’s technically known as the Cot-caught merger or the low-back merger. Here’s a US map showing where the merger has taken place. It started in western Pennsylvania and eastern New England, then moved to Southern California. Now it has taken hold almost everywhere west of the Mississippi.
[File:Cot-caught</a> merger.png - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Cot-caught_merger.png]File:Cot-caught”>File:Cot-caught merger.png - Wikipedia)</p>
![http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Cot-caught_merger.png]File:Cot-caught](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Cot-caught_merger.png%5DFile:Cot-caught){kind=link}
<p>Here’s some discussion:
[Phonological</a> history of English low back vowels - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“Phonological history of English open back vowels - Wikipedia”>Phonological history of English open back vowels - Wikipedia)<br>
[Do</a> You Speak American . What Lies Ahead? . Change . Changin | PBS](<a href=“http://www.pbs.org/speak/ahead/change/changin/]Do”>Do You Speak American . What Lies Ahead? . Change . Changin | PBS)</p>
<p>Then there’s another strange vowel change, the Northern Cities Vowel Shift. In the Rust Belt cities of the Northeast, the vowel sounds are cycling: stuck -> stalk-> stock -> stack. That is, people affected by that vowel shift say “stuck” the way I’d say “stalk,” “stalk” the way I’d say “stock” and so forth. And there’s a California Vowel Shift that’s shifting the vowels in the other direction! People imagine that with TV and radio, we’d all start talking the same way but that’s far from the truth.</p>
<p>The NYC accent is changing from an Italian/Jewish/Irish accent to one that is more Latino/Black influenced. You can really hear it from the younger ones – my D says “diDUNT”, instead of “DIDn’t”. Also, you never hear anyone under 40 say RAD-i-A-tuh, or gazz (for gass). I wonder if other city accents are changing too because of population changes?</p>
<p>I’ve never distinguished between “Dawn” and “Don.” I even had a Long Islander offer to teach me how to pronounce “Dawn” - it was neither a pretty sight nor a pretty sound. If someone can’t hear the difference between “rosey fingered dawn” and “Don Knotts,” they’re not paying attention.</p>
<p>I’ve heard “warsh” in South Dakota - used by people with what I’d call country accents. First time I ever heard a “wash cloth” called a “warsh rag.” I was reluctant to touch the thing after that.</p>
<p>Maybe Southern Utahan’s have an accent, though I never noticed it and I spent a lot of time in So. Utah growing up.</p>
<p>However, thank you for bringing up “Tooele” (pronounced Too-will-uh)–that, along with Hurricane (pronounced Hurr-uh-ken) are my two favorite ways to find out if someone is REALLY from Utah! ;)</p>
<p>Whenever I visit London, I am appalled by their local accent! Why can’t the Brits speak standard English as it is spoken in California? Who do they think they are that they can alter the pronunciation of our language? :-)</p>
<p>The “warsh” thing can be heard all the time in the Baltimore area. The Baltimore accent is one that’s really hard to pin down, because a lot of people in the area don’t have a true Baltimore accent, but have the Baltimore accent for certain words. For example, wash is pronounced as “warsh”, water is “wooder”, and fire can sometimes sound like “far”. If you ask someone from Baltimore where they live, they’ll likely respond with “Balmer, Merlin” for “Baltimore, Maryland”. It’s just an odd accent in general.</p>
<p>Woah… There’s a whole wikipedia article on the Baltimore accent.</p>
<p>^^^^^^^^^^^^^^</p>
<p>Hey, it ain’t an accent if people around you talk like that.</p>
<p>Although it is funny to hear my wife’s East Boston accent re-emerge after only a few minutes back at her folks’ place.</p>
<p>Besides, there is no “right” way to pronounce the name of that sliding cube unit with pull handles in which you place your clothes, right?</p>
<p>“draw-er” ???</p>
<p>“draw” ???</p>
<p>“droar” ???</p>
<p>None of the above.</p>
<p>Dwore</p>