How did regional accents form in the US?

Question

I am very interested in social linguistics, and was curious as to how accents formed.. specifically... in the US... such as... what culture communities formed each accent.??

Answer 1

I took a class in American Linguistics in college--Fascinating! I remember a story my professor told about a girl who they found in a truck stop outside our town--she had amnesia and they eventually called him in because she had a distinct accent and word usage. He asked her his usual questions and came up with a tri-county point of origin for her. They put it on the local news in these three counties (of course, contacted the police) and within a few days, she was back at home and eventually recovered.

Check out this interactive link: (sorry I can't actually add a link--my computer won't let me do it on YA so you'll have to cut and paste into browser)

accent.gmu.edu/browse_maps/namerica.php

You can find tons of cool stuff about regional speakers!

Answer 2

it quite is tough to understand some people from the two US or uk, while you're no longer from that area. That is going for many international locations..there are quite 'impartial' (for loss of a greater advantageous be conscious) accents that are genuinely understood after which you have some thing like the Cajun accessory in Louisiana this is extremely hard to stick to. of direction as quickly as you get used to listening to it i.e. you progression to that area or have a chum from the section, then finally you finally end up no longer likely noticing the accessory anymore. What an uneventful worldwide it may be if all of us sounded precisely the comparable!

Answer 3

I'm interested in that stuff also. From books i've read I think it's because of the different types of cultures and how in the old days they couldn't comunicate very well because of no phones. And i didnt think of it but like what the dude over me said. The immagrants coming to different parts and the region's history. Like in New England people used to talk more like they had almost English accents, just watch some old time movies.

Answer 4

hard to know for sure, but there are some threads that can be followed.

the scotch irish who settled in the south had a lilting english accent when they first came to america - exactly how that developed into one of many examples of the southern drawl - of which there are several - i don't know.

but there are more accents than you realize - in the south alone there seem to be distinct accents for north carolina, south carolina, texas, alabama and georgia - i might be able to identify more but haven't been in other areas.

how the boston accent developed i also don't know, but can't help but wonder if the two distinct boston area accents are outgrowths of the class distinctions and accents from england or perhaps london specifically is curious.

the cockney accent could be viewed as a possible origin for the harsh boston accent 'pahk my cah in hahvahd yahd (park my car in harvard yard) but honestly i don't know.

fox butterfield (ny times reporter) wrote a book about southern violence and where it can trace it's origins to and where that can to this day be traced - and in it he spoke extensively about south carolina and where the people came from. i'm not sure of the name of it, but i bet if you googled him you could find it pretty easily.

Answer 5

The influx of different immigrant groups to varying parts of the country had a great deal of influence. As one example, the Scandanavian influence on the speech of Minnesota comes to mind.

Answer 6

english speakers emigrated to america

then the accents and spelling all went tiits up

Answer 7

isolated groups of people talking like their neighbors?......if fred and jim live next door with their families and no neighbors for 100 miles,they arent going to sound like Teddy kennedy

Answer 8

Google "William Labov." Then go for his books.