Posted on 03/12/2010 6:19:58 AM PST by jay1949
The unenlightened assume that Appalachian accents and usages are a “hillbilly” corruption of the flatlands Southern drawl. This is not so; the accents and usages of the Backcountry developed contemporaneously with the versions of English spoken in the other areas of European settlement. The society and culture of the Backcountry were dominated by the large numbers of Scotch-Irish immigrants, blended with the influence of German, Dutch, Welsh, Scottish, and yeoman English settlers. Appalachian speech developed from the versions of English introduced by these settlers, independently of the development of the Southern drawl and the Yankee accent of New England. The traditional speech and vocabulary of the Backcountry is not a "corrupt" dialect. It is in certain respects more true to its roots than other versions of American English.
(Excerpt) Read more at backcountrynotes.com ...
Did you know that “porch” is a word derived from African slaves? At least, this is what I’ve been told...
This book is worth reading — even if it did come from PBS...:^)
http://us.penguingroup.com/nf/Book/BookDisplay/0,,0_9780142002315,00.html
It nicely describes the “flow” of English and it’s regional variations around the world.
Your blog is very nicely done. I’ve been researching my “lines” off and on over the past ten years and have found a great number of cousins living in Giles and Augusta counties. Been up there a few times and if I could afford it myself, would probably move there. Beautiful place.
amen...being a cotton state raised lad from Dixie now living in middle Tennessee and who works with folks from up the Cumberland plateau and so forth daily....I already knew this.
hillbilly and southern drawls as very different
true southern drawl runs from east Texas up to Dallas and across Louisiana and southern Arkansas into only west-middle Tennessee and western Kentucky and then all of Mississippi and Alabama south of Huntsville into southern Gerorgia and parts of Atlanta even and most of South Carolina , middle and eastern North Carolina, to tidewater Virginia and a hint even into Maryland coastal...and a spine down through Florida panhandle over to Jacksonville and meanders down through Florida in places all the way to Clewiston to Everglades City
Appalachin accents though varied between say Blue Ridge Georgia to Wheeling West Virginia run primarily in all the hill/mountain country from the southeast up deep into the North
I think it meant racial and Blacks specifically because it mentioned the lack of farms and the need for Blacks slaves to man them.
you built it on the rock, right?
“Manteo-Elizabeth City, NC”
The residents of Harkers Island, east of Morehead City and Atlantic Beach NC, has a very distinct “hoy toid” (high tide) cockneyed dialect.
A shrimp boat captain from Harkers Island and his then fiancee, a nurse, introduced me to my wife twenty-six years ago in Atlantic Beach. We have fond memories of Cherry Point, Morehead City, Beaufort and Atlantic Beach and the good folks “Down East.”
Ok...I see...thanks, blam...
The horses on Carrot Island and Horse Island at Beaufort are a sight to see....Beaufort is my favorite place on the NC coast...
bookmark
oh mine do that too!
Absolutely beautiful place.
*ping of interest*
Used to live near Salter Path, NC. Always got a laugh when it was said “it’s a hoy toyd, the crahbs er in tha collahds.”
(it’s a high tide, the crabs are in the collards)
Anyone who spends a lot of time cruising around the South eventually comes to realize that there are scores and scores of sub-dialects — maybe hundreds. Or at least, “were.” People in Tidewater Virginia had the general Southern drawl dialect — but not as slow a drawl as those from Charleston, SC, say. Then inside Tidewater there are (or at least were) different usages in Norfolk and in Portsmouth, on opposite sides of the Elizabeth River. Then there were Eastern Shore dialects, as someone pointed out above. In Appalachia, the cadence tends to be more clipped and faster as you move up country from Tennessee to Pennsylvania — but there are exceptions along the way.
And its not just Southern. I inherited a good “ear” from both parents, for which I am grateful. When mingling with New Yorkers, I can usually pick out a native of the Bronx, which imbues a different accent than Brooklyn. In New England, you hear different dialects in Vermont, and New Hampshire, and Massachusetts, of course (Bah-stonian, wheah they pahk tha cahs, for example). And Maine is great — Down East is my favorite, but then there’s upcountry Aroostook, where you run into the northern edge of redneck USA, mingling with speakers of Canadian French. And in the Western Maine mountains, a whole new vocabulary and inflection. Wonderful place for a language maven.
Many, many moons ago, I was visiting the Outer Banks with a bunch of other teenage ne-er-do-wells, and was riding with one — Wayne — when he decided it was the right time to crank his 1955 Ford coupe up to 85. He was pulled over by a native cop who fussed and fumed at him for several minutes in an incomprehensible language. Wayne apologized profusely and begged forgiveness so convincingly that he got off with a warning. Another passenger, Dwight, asked Wayne if he had understood anything the cop said. “Yeah,” said Wayne. “I got the part where he said, ‘Oi oat tuh toike yuh tu th’ joil in Mante-oh.’” (’I ought to take you to the jail in Manteo.’)
I think we are losing so much of our dialects and I am amazed how newscasters manage to sound southern to me.
I envy you. I love to hear proper speaking.
My southern country dialect sticks out like a sore thumb and I feel people may think I am dumb when they hear me speak
melissa
The way Beaufort is pronounced in NC contrasted with the way it is pronounced in SC is a stark example of regional differences.
Thanks for posting this. Very cool!
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