A Conversation for American Regional Dialects - New England's Wicked Good Accent

Horribly wrong about New England accents

Post 1

harrygams

I was raised in Connecticut & I pronounce all my rs, as a matter of fact most New Englanders pronounce all the letters in a word. This article only deals with a tiny portion of New England & that is the Boston area. Also I have never been passionate about the Boston Bruins, I used to be a fan of the Hartford Whalers. Where are the accents of Connecticut, Delaware, Rhode Island & Vermont? Why is only the Boston Accent featured in this article?


Horribly wrong about New England accents

Post 2

J

Hello there smiley - smiley
When I started writing these entries, I resolved to give more weight to the work of linguists than to anecdotes. It's pretty easy to find one person who's lived in Mobile, Alabama (for instance) all his life to have a completely different perception of local linguists from another person who's lived in Mobile, Alabama all his life. Anecdotes cancel each other out far too easily for a researcher to give them much weight. For this entry and others I relied heavily on the information I could find from the Atlas of North American English and the work of the sociolinguistics professor William Labov. Unfortunately, I couldn't buy a copy of the Atlas, because one copy costs $750, but it wasn't hard to access all the information I needed.

Your experience may be true for yourself, and I don't doubt your sincerity. For starters, I would agree based on what I've seen that Connecticut (while technically a part of New England) does not have as strong an accent as other places in New England.

Thanks for taking the time to read and comment, though. smiley - ok


Horribly wrong about New England accents

Post 3

vwood7300

you are not horribly wrong about New England accents and the accent you describe in not only found in Boston or the Boston/area. most of eastern and northern New Hampshire uses this accent as do many from Maine. i am from CT also and if you look through linguistics journals you will see that CT is usually divided in half. i also pronounce all my r's and i have some strange dialectical oddities about my speech that are not present in the rest of New England. But having lived in 10 different towns in NH, 2 in VT, 1 in ME and 3 in CT I can say that you have not got the NEw England accent wrong at all.


Horribly wrong about New England accents

Post 4

justquietman

As someone who grew up just north (no'th) of Boston, I find much of the discussion pretty close to my experience. When I was young it was quite easy to tell the differences in neighborhood accents, even in adjacent towns. Also the "Hahvahd" accent differs from that of the "townies" (Cambridge residents outside the college). (More due to class and associations than region.)

Having moved away from the area after college (the British would say university, I think), I found that my accent faded quite a bit, relative to family members who stayed in the area, but it is more pronounced when I return home for visits. Increased travel may be diluting these distinctive accents.

I envision these accents as moving out from "core areas", so Connecticut speakers can vary from nearly New York, to nearly Boston as you travel across the state. This is similar to the North Jersey/South Jersey changes that result from New Jersey being midway between NYC and Philly (Philadelphia).

I think some of this is due to how far TV signals reach. A similar response regarding sports teams that are favored is also seen, with Yankees/Rangers/Knicks/Giants/Jets. etc. fans in the west and Sox/Bruins/Celtics/Patriots fans more numerous as you move north and east in Connecticut. Similar divisions in team loyalties are also seen in New Jersey as you travel along the Turnpike.


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