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American Regional Dialects - an Overview

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American Regional Dialects - an Overview View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by OTHES 'Y'ALL COME BACK NOW, Y'HEAR!?' LANGUAGE ATTITUDES IN THE UNITED STATES TOWARDS SOUTHERN AMERICAN ENGLISH DIPLOMARBEIT ZUR ERLANGUNG DES MAGISTERTITELS DER PHILOSOPHIE EINGEREICHT AN DER GEISTESWISSENSCHAFTLICHEN FAKULTÄT DER UNIVERSITÄT WIEN VON BARBARA SOUKUP BETREUER: PROF. HERBERT SCHENDL WIEN, IM MAI 2000 2 TABLE OF CONTENTS PREFACE ............................................................................................................................. 4 INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................... 6 PART I: FRAMEWORKS ........................................................................................................ 7 1. CONTEXTUAL FRAMEWORK: LANGUAGE VARIATION IN THE USA ................................. 8 1.1. American Regional Dialects - an Overview ........................................................... 8 1.2. Southern American English ................................................................................. 20 1.2.1. General Features ............................................................................................ 20 1.2.2. 'East Tennessee Talk' ..................................................................................... 27 1.3. 'Standard American English' ................................................................................ 32 2. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK: LANGUAGE ATTITUDES ................................................... 40 2.1. Language Attitudes: an Overview ........................................................................ 40 2.2. Methods of Language Attitude Surveys ............................................................... 49 2.3. Selected Previous Studies .................................................................................... 52 PART II: THE FIELD STUDY............................................................................................... 58 1. INTRODUCTION: AIMS AND SCOPE ................................................................................ 59 2. ASPECTS OF A CONTENT ANALYSIS OF SOCIETAL TREATMENT: SOUTHERN STEREOTYPES ................................................................................................................... 60 3. GENERAL SET-UP OF THE FIELD STUDY ........................................................................ 68 3.1. The Situational Setting ......................................................................................... 68 3.2. Language Varieties Tested ................................................................................... 70 3.3. The Informants ..................................................................................................... 71 3.4. Design of the Questionnaire ................................................................................. 73 3.4.1. The Rating Scales .......................................................................................... 74 3.4.2. The Text ........................................................................................................ 76 3.4.3. The Speakers ................................................................................................. 77 3.4.4. The 'Ideal Salesperson' .................................................................................. 79 3.5. Administering the Test ......................................................................................... 80 4. WORKING HYPOTHESES ............................................................................................... 81 5. PRESENTATION AND ANALYSIS OF RESULTS ................................................................. 85 5.1. Part I of the Questionnaire ................................................................................... 85 5.1.1. Overall Ratings .............................................................................................. 86 5.1.1.1. Competence ............................................................................................ 88 5.1.1.2. Personal Integrity................................................................................... 89 5.1.1.3. Social Attractiveness .............................................................................. 91 5.1.1.4. The Summarizing Statements ................................................................ 92 5.1.1.5. Correlations between Speakers .............................................................. 93 3 5.1.1.6. Ratings of the 'Ideal Salesperson' ........................................................... 94 5.1.2. Speaker Evaluation according to Group Variables ....................................... 96 5.1.2.1. Informants' Region of Origin ................................................................. 97 5.1.2.2. Informants' Sex ..................................................................................... 100 5.1.2.3. Informants' Region of Origin and Informants' Sex Combined ............. 103 5.1.2.4. Origin of Informants' Parents ............................................................... 105 5.1.2.5. Travel Experience ................................................................................ 106 5.1.2.6. Time Spent with Friends/Relatives from the Respective Other Region108 5.2. Part II of the Questionnaire ................................................................................ 109 5.2.1. The Origin of the Speakers.......................................................................... 110 5.2.2. Question 1 ................................................................................................... 111 5.2.3. Question 2 ................................................................................................... 112 5.2.4. Question 3 ................................................................................................... 113 5.2.5. Question 4 ................................................................................................... 114 5.2.6. Question 5 ................................................................................................... 115 5.2.7. Question 6 ................................................................................................... 117 5.2.8. Question 7 ................................................................................................... 118 5.2.9. The Meta-Categories ................................................................................... 120 SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION(S) .................................................................................... 123 BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................................................................................................... 130 4 PREFACE Little did I know, when I first set foot on the American continent back in 1993, that the experiences I was going to make over the period of the following six months or so would once determine my choice of topic for my M.A. thesis. Thoughts about going to university were for the future; for the moment, I was spending a semester at a high school in Kingston, Roane County, Tennessee. Yet, after six months of total immersion in Southern culture, I had become 'the Austrian with the funny Southern accent' (as attested by a lady from New Jersey), doing all kinds of weird things to my vowels (as attested in a speech lab course later at the University of Vienna English department). Realization that a Southern accent carried all sorts of 'baggage' with it first dawned on me during a screening of an old Cary Grant screwball comedy, the 1940 My Favorite Wife. The plot is rather intricate, but early in the film Grant's movie-wife, played by Irene Dunne, comes back after long years spent on a desert island after a shipwreck; wishing to stay incognito at first, and still to be able to check out her surroundings, she assumes the role of a country-bumpkin cousin. She wants to appear naive, simple-minded, funny, and to offend a little all snobs present, in short, she assumes a Southern accent. This little incident put me on the scent of all kinds of stereotyping phenomena related to Southerners and Southern accents. In the end, the result is this present paper. Working on the field study for this paper was a very rich, interactive experience for me. The main purpose of this preface, then, is to thank all the people who helped make the experience, and the time spent on it, absolutely worth-while. The list is long, but noone should be left out, for everybody's help was immensely valuable. First of all, kudos go to my speakers, Chris, Erica, Scott, and Suzanne, for lending their voices to the project. Thanks also to all my student subjects, who were willing to put up with my field study. At St. Michael's College in Vermont, I would like to thank Vincent Bolduc (Sociology), John Caravelles (Economics), Elizabeth O'Dowd (International School), Rick Marcotte (Education), Pam Marek (Psychology), Jennifer Vincent (Economics), Joan Wry (English), and Carole Parker (Business) for giving up class time for the project. Thanks also to the Psychology volunteers who signed up for it. Jonathan Silverman (Education) set up many contacts and sustained my morale. Many thanks also to the St. Michael's School of International Studies - Christine Bauer-Ramazani, Bonnie Tangalos, and Mahmoud Arani, as well as the staff - Erin and Lisa. At UVM, my thanks go above all to Maggie Hayes (School of Dance), who helped in organizing many sessions.
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