Posted on 02/10/2016 1:48:23 PM PST by SkyPilot
'People speak to machines differently than how they speak to people,' says language technology expert Alan Black.
It was a simple enough question, at least in this part of the world.
"How can we mosey on down to the rodeo?" my friend Ben Crook drawled, sat in a rocking chair on his front porch, a can of Lone Star beer in his left hand on a humid night in Houston.
Only one thing jarred with this otherwise stereotypical Texas scene: Crook was asking Siri, the voice-activated digital personal assistant on his iPhone, rather than, say, a passing sheriff on horseback with a cowboy hat wider than the Buffalo Bayou.
Siri understood the individual words but didn't know how to respond. But Crook had other questions. He was hungry; heck, so hungry he coulda eaten the north end of a southbound billy goat.
"We're fixin' to eat brisket, where should we go?" he asked Siri. She offered a list of 15 restaurants - though not all appeared to serve Texas barbecue. Siri was also helpful when asked where to find crawfish, but baffled about kolaches, the pastries of central European origin that are hugely popular in Texas, calling them "Colotchies".
Meanwhile, though the free Dragon dictation app performed admirably when fed lines from the 2004 movie The Alamo, it did turn "Davy Crockett feller" into "David Rockefeller", and evoking a family of Yankee industrialists is no way to describe a hero of the battle for Texas independence.
The upshot of this brief and decidedly unscientific experiment is that Siri is at her best when addressed in standard English, with accents toned down and slang avoided where possible.
(Excerpt) Read more at theguardian.com ...
I suppose. But the first thing I thought about when reading this article was: "How does Siri deal with Ebonics and Ghetto English?"
I guess first I would have to use siri. It is the first thing I turn off on my apple stuff.
Accents have been on the way out since long before Siri. When TV decided the “normal” American accent was midwestern all other accents were on a ticking clock. Every generation is exposed less and less to their regional accent and more and more to the midwestern. Mass media does that.
Texans don’t have accents, lot’s of folks outside the state kind’a sound funny but not Texans.
The article conflates accent with jargon.
“Mama don’t raise no chumps!”
When he returned he spoke in a faux upper class British accent. It was very, very awkward.
Some celebrities have done the same thing.
Madonna was one of the most famous phonies, but there are others.
Man doan wan no hep, man doan git no hep.
I’m sorry, Dave. I’m afraid I can’t do that. HAL
I used to find accents very contagious, I’d start picking them up in just a couple of hours. Then I worked for a company where the CEO was from Mexico, took about 3 months of fighting the urge to make it go away.
True.
They’ll have to pry my Texas drawl from my cold dead vocal chords.
In an article in a British newspaper. Using poor language is not the same as having an accent.
I grew up in the country in Northern Arkansas. I have a very thick accent. There is absolutely no chance of me ever loosing my accent. I don’t like Siri or any other dictation program, I can type faster than I can talk.
No, Midwestern accents sound “hick”. Californian non-accent is the media default.
Second Jive Dude: Hey... knock a self a pro, Slick! That gray matter backlot perform us DOWN, I take TCB-in', man!
[Subtitle: DON'T BE NAIVE ARTHUR. EACH OF US FACES A CLEAR MORAL CHOICE]
Lol. I had an Air Force flight instructor who was from Texas. He was fantastic. What I really like were his Texas colloquialisms of wisdom:
- You land like a cow pissin' on a flat rock
- Remember, wherever you go in life.....there you are
Nope. The general American accent used by the media is midwestern:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_American#General_American_in_the_media
Don’t want to sound like what ‘others’ want. When I lived abroad, I still said “no ma’am”, etc. even tho I was ridiculed. Instilled in me since birth. Will never deny my heritage or upbringing.
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