US Language Attitudes

Discusses Dennis Preston's dialect attitude research (how do people feel about certain dialects). The Midland dialect is most commonly considered "standard" or "correct".

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For this leg of the journey we're joined by linguist Dennis Preston. Dennis studies the strong opinions we seem to hold about what we believe is right or wrong in the speech of our fellow Americans.

DP: There's a kind of American linguistic insecurity which is very, very old. After all, we didn't invent English. There were the English who had a hold of it before us. And so, there is a kind of lingering American insecurity that, well, maybe with English we don't do the very best thing. On the other hand, there's American populism and a desire not to be stuffy, not to be too correct. I've been walking around this train asking people to draw on blank maps of the United States the areas where they think people speak differently. They don't just do dialect areas. They identify those areas where they think the least correct or the most correct English is spoken and draw circles around that. Nine times out of ten when you ask people to do this they go for either the US south, which is almost universally believed to be a place where bad English is spoken, or New York City.

DP: But, New Yorkers, you're sure of. They don't sound like Pennsylvanians.

Woman: Yeah, no, they saw "wawder".

DP: They say what?

Woman: "Wawder".

DP: "Wooder".

Woman: "Wawder".

DP: Instead of. What do you say?

Woman: "Water".

DP: "Water". Well, that's what I say.

RM: Americans are ambivalent about language. They may think that New York and southern accents are bad English. But, they can also find them charming.

Man 1: I like hearing people from the south.

DP: Really? How come?

Man 1: I just like the way they talk like to hear the way they talk.

MAN 3: Let's take race out of the equation.

DP: All right okay.

MAN 3: Well, we take race out of the equation, if I go to a place in the South where at least they are not overtly racist or whatever, I would tend to feel comfortable around Southerners. "Come on in here honey". That kind of thing and yeah it makes me feel a little more. But, I mean there's some places in the south that me, as a black, I wouldn't be caught dead in.

DP: Oh no, no, that's another story yeah.

MAN 3: Yes.

DP: It would make no difference how they sound.

MAN 3: Absolutely.

RM: In a country full of linguistic variety, there is one variety that everyone sees as the norm.

DP: There's a great deal of agreement in the sort of Ohio Michigan, Northern Indiana, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania zone of normal English. Even Southerners for example will reach right up and draw that mid-western area and say it's normal.

DP: So, this is where you say the kind of correct American English is spoken?

MAN 4: That's what I would say that's all, without an accent or a twang.

MAN 5: But what's out here, what States are?

MAN 4: Kansas, Missouri...

DP: Kansas, Missouri, Iowa, Nebraska.

MAN 3: If you took a speech class, I think that they would want you to speak more like these people here.

DP: This Wisconsin, Michigan, Minnesota...

MAN 3: Wisconsin, Michigan, I should add Ohio in there

DP: Yeah, it's in there. There's Ohio.

MAN 3: Ok, Ohio is in there.

DP: So there, so if you were, were studying to be an announcer or something you think this is the.

MAN 3: This is what they would this.

DP: That's the target.

MAN 3: That's the target.

RM: Technically, the dialect area they're talking about is called Midland. Midland is spoken in much of the midwest. For most Americans, this is the yardstick. The most normal and correct of all dialects.
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From the "Do you speak American?" documentary.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• linguistics
• US
• American
• language
• dialect
• attitudes
• sociolinguistics
• midland

[pepjrp]

I totally 100% agree. And I have lived in both extensively. In fact, interesting that the Black man went right to his feeling of old South prejudice, but never a mention of the large, Northern cities that are easy prey on a White person. I am a European American and the Blacks that I encounter in the South have always been friendly and courtious, but in Chicago, St. Louis, I have been constantly been called racist names or had acts of aggression or even put as joking used against me quite often.

[tintintabulations]

Do any of the dialects make people sound like "fucking idiots"?  I wouldn't know, as I don't live in Norway...

By the way, the sound you're hearing in "water" is not a "d" or voiced alveolar plosive (in IPA /d/), but rather an alveolar tap (in IPA /ɾ/) which is a common intervolic allophone in virtually all American accents as well as Australian and New Zealand English. To actually pronounce a voiceless alveolar plosive "t" sound in "water" would sound affected and foreign to an American.

[SepherStar]

I disagree. "Normal" is what you hear on TV and is generally what you hear in California. In the mid-west you hear things like "warsh" for "wash", "crick" for "creek" "keyamp" for "camp".

[MultiMinnesotagirl]

@trilobright I am Minnesotan, and I say pen like pen, not pin. And how the heck are you supposed to sare Merry?

[cheeveka3]

Not southern Indiana they sound southern and I have to admit somewhat ignorant an dumb but that's just me Though no offense to anyone who's sounds southern

[kawaiimadness]

There is no such thing as the ''american'' language. Its just an adapted version of the traditional English language.

[cheeveka3]

My bad I meant to say Southern Midland should be considered southern or it own cause there is not common features between the Nothern Midland and Southern Midland even the development of the accents Have a different history most people would consider the Southern Midland accent up north a illiterate or sound unintelligent or might even call them Racist usually people that speak like that are usually viewed as Racist by some people

[cheeveka3]

I feel that the southern Midland sou be considered im from Wisconsin and when I came down Indiana I swear I feel like it's the South lol

[trilobright]

No no no, Midwesterners are not accent neutral. In the southern Midwest they sound more Appalachian or Southern, while in the Upper Midwest/Great Lakes it's the Scandinavian-influenced "doonchaknoow" accent that Sarah Palin has tried like hell to ruin. Even when Midwesterners (or many Californians) sound generally normal, they still mess up a lot of words, like pronouncing "pen" like "pin", "merry" like "Mary", and similar sorts of subtle malapropisms.

[darris321]

I AM KANSAS!

MY ENGLISH IS BETTER THAN YOURS!

fear me, mortals lol

[vTHExUNKNOWENv]

New York & the big D baby 4 life!!!!