h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

"Anyway, worth mentioning that the Boston Celtics pronounce it 'selltics', not 'keltics'?"

That's really interesting. Glasgow has a football (soccer to you ) team called Celtic, which is pronounced 'selltic', whereas if you were talking about celtic as in 'related to the people called the Celts', you would pronounce it 'kelltic'.

Yes, that's actually pretty interesting. I guess Celtic is just more easily pronounced with the 's' sound. It's not really that difficult to say 'Kell-tick' or 'Kell-ticks' though. I wonder if there's a good reason for this change.

By the way, if my American friends are wondering (and I doubt that they are), I pick Ohio State to win in the BCS championship tonight, 17-14. I'm afraid if we lose, Ohio will start to be known as the second place state, after a championship loss to Florida (which we shan't discuss), then another championship loss to Florida in basketball... Go Bucks

Damn, halftime and already my prediction is shot all to hell

My (pesky weak dollar) regarding AViation:

One summary clip for the entire project?
Featuring:
Part 2. test words: all accents saying the same words at some point, for direct comparison.
Part 1. each regional accent describing places to see in the region: hear the accent in context.

We wouldn't want go into explaining everything like the entries do, just give some examples so readers can hear whats going on.

Part1: (apologies to Jodan and all other americans reading for dialogue errors below)


Shot: flash map of the USA, begins to zoom in on southern region.
VO(Southern Drawler): The American south is culturally independent from the rest of the United States, in particular the Deep South, which includes the states of South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas. ...[more text here]
Shot: Zoom into Southern Region, now highlighted somehow, as each state is mentioned,they pop out of the map and are highlighted, possibly including flag/symbol of each state.

VO(Texas Twang): Now don't y'all-get-kawt-out lumpin' all-these-states together [etc etc (apologies again)]...
Shot: Zoomed in map of texas fades into photo-montage of any pictures of texas that researchers might have lying around.

etc. etc. etc.



I probably made it sound really complicated, but I don't think it needs to be - every state mentioned would need its own ***simple*** animated map - that just means the outline of the state glowing some colour, sorry, color, to highlight it, and all or some of the following objects fading in and out: some sort of state symbol, the state capital maybe, the most famous landmark, oh, and the name of the state I guess.

Then we would need some actual photos of the state in question, which shouldn't be too hard, and a wee voice over to go with them, which would ideally incorporate some of the words highlighted in the entries...

Now if we had enough US Researchers I guess we could have regional music in the background as well, but I have a feeling that might be a bit ambitious...

vp

*wanders off to see whats going on in New Hampshire*

I don't think we have regional music up here.

That's interesting stuff.

As for "regional music", we do and we don't. I believe each state has a state song, but those usually aren't recognizable. Some songs have strong historical ties to particular parts of the country. I imagine songs like "Dixie", "Yankee Doodle" and others which I can't think of right now, would be suitable.

I dunno much about animation, but I'm of course willing to help the AViators in whatever way I can.

That's incredible, vp. You've got a whole storyboard in your head, haven't you? And it sounds fantastic.

The New York State Song:
>>I LOVE NEW YORK
(repeat 3 times)
There isn't another like it.
No matter where you go.
And nobody can compare it.
It's win and place and show.
New York is special.
New York is diff'rent' cause there's no place else
on earth quite like New York and that's why
I LOVE NEW YORK.
(repeat 3 times)<<

Pardon me while I finish sniggering.

Yankee Doodle might do for the New England area.

I can probably dig up a friend with a New Yawk accent, if necessary. Count me in.

Bear in mind with music that h2g2 only has a license to use 25 seconds of pop music, or 45 seconds of classical. So we'd have to use just a brief snippet, perhaps when zooming to the countries?

The other limitation that we have is that the whole clip needs to be ten minutes or less in length. With seven entries in the project, that gives you about 80 seconds per Entry if you allow two minutes for the intro, credits and 'Introduction' section. It might be worth roughly storyboarding out one of the accent Entries, just to make sure you can do everything you want to in that time.

vp, do you need any help with this, or would I be treading on your toes? I'm quite happy to assist in any way I can, but this definitely looks like it's shaping up to be your baby.

Skankyrich dropped me a message, and apparently we Chicagoans have accents? If I can help, let me know.

More specifically (I don't think I was clear), I'd be happy to record some test words in this alleged accent of mine, if someone decides to go with this. Just let me know!

Chicagoans, that's the word. You'll notice on the posting to your PS that I carefully avoided mentioning 'Chicagan' or anything of that ilk!

Yeah, I think Chicagoans have a very similar accent to most of the rest of the Midwest, actually from my experience in Chicago (which is a great city by the way - I love visiting Chicago). The Chicago accent which I allude to in the final entry of the series is typified by the Northern Cities Vowel Shift, which is occurring in Chicago as well as a lot of upper midwestern large cities - the fact that Chicago is really the only city in that area with any cultural output means that this shift in dialect is sometimes called a Chicago accent. That's kind of a hard point to make clearly, and I'm sure I've lost a good part of whoever is reading this, but it's true

If I was AViating the final entry, I would record some examples of NCVS talk. However, it needs to be clear that the Northern Cities Vowel Shift is not something that everyone in the area of the 'Northern Cities' is affected by. Some people retain simple, midwestern accents. Some are heavily hit. Some are in the process of making the shift, so that their vowel sounds are only slightly shifted. So if we present a voice making the sound 'blaaack' to pronounce 'block' it's a heavily affected/shifted accent. And we should make that clear.

As for songs, an introductory song doesn't really have to typify the accent or culture of the region. If I could find a funny little ditty about corn, it would fit perfectly for the Midwest

This is all very exciting, by the way.

I haven't noticed any of the vowel shift thing, locally, at least not if I read the entry correctly, but I'll be keeping my ears open now, listening, for sure!

I've been told I have a flat, somewhat nasal, "accent". You'll all have to let me know after I've recorded my bit.

May I just butt in and say that this is an absolutely amazing project. I've read the Introduction and the Southern Drawl so far, and I'm hooked. Can't wait for the AV clip for this.

"I haven't noticed any of the vowel shift thing, locally, at least not if I read the entry correctly, but I'll be keeping my ears open now, listening, for sure!"

Y'know, I've been much more attentive lately to American accents. On a couple of occasions, I've been watching a television show when I hear a peculiar accent from a character, I'll look up the actor's name and I'll have guessed it correctly based on where they were born and raised. Some accents are very subtle, and you sort of have to know what you're looking for. There's nothing subtle about the Boston accent, on the other hand.

The problem with an entry like this is that it's extremely difficult to balance anecdotal information with information from scholarly sources. I'm sure if these entries make their way to the FP, there will be a slew of comments saying "I've lived in [x] my whole life and I've never pronounced [y] like [z]!" Exceptions abound

Thanks B'Elana, I do appreciate that.

Don't worry about comments like that, Icy got a few in that vein on his 'Pronouncing British Place Names' entry, but at least you'll know that people have read your entries.

Are you close to submitting it to PR?

I'd imagine he would. If someone did an entry like that for America, it wouldn't ever end... In Ohio, we pronounce "Versailles" like "Ver" followed by the plural of the things that make boats go (old boats). I recently found out that Iowa has a city named Nevada, which has a long first 'a', while the state of Nevada has a short first 'a'.

I dunno. We're going through the University system, and I honestly don't know how that works anymore. 'rich is the subbie and has editing rights, so I suppose he'll submit them when ready?

Yes, he will. I'll ask him to tell me once he does, because I'm currently not subscribed to PR and don't want to miss them.
It's a good job that I'm alone in the room, because I'm pronouncing the words according to your instructions as I read, and am pulling faces, like trying to look like a horse in a feed bag (OK, maybe some would say I look lkie that anyway).

It's a shame I never get to listen to films in their original - but then again, I'm not sure I'd understand all that much if I did.

The horse in feed bag line was perhaps a bit cruel. But the Lawn Guyland accent really does make you drop your lower jaw, until it is positively equine. I think so, at least.