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A few weeks ago, I'd been in an online writer's group, and shared a chapter of one of my stories. One of the people in the group asked me why my character was talking with a Southern accent. Does anyone else who's read my stories see any accent like that? The only places I've lived have been New Jersey and California, so I'm really not sure where I might have picked up a Southern accent.
Comments
Were the characters in your story talkin' like a kid?
I'm thinkin' maybe they saw them 'postrophies and dropped consternants you sometime use to denote kidspeak in your writin'; and started hearin' a southern drawl as they read. So instead of the Little Rascals they was hearin' Foghorn Leghorn or Jubilation T. Cornpone- which I can't decide if it's funny or scary that they'd do that; 'cause it's as commonly used to denote a kid's imprecise diction (see any voice balloon in old Dennis the Menace comics) as it is an American southern accent. I can't think of any other reason why they'd think that; I don't hear nothin' particularly regional in yer dialogue.
There's a inherent risk in spellin' dialogue phonetically 'cuz there's rilly no guarantee the reader's gonna hear it like you did when you wrote it. After tryin' to wade thru n' decipher some of Mark Twain's characters' speech I made it a rule o' thumb that less is more when it comes t' this stuff; and if I do it I do it way more toward the beginning of a character's part in a story, with just the occasional booster after that; figurin' the reader will get that this character didn't suddenly start talkin' like some don at Oxford if I tone it way down.
~hugs, Ronni
What borders on stupidity?
Canada and Mexico.
.
Hrmm...
I think what I'd shared was the first chapter of Janegirl Camp, so at lease one of the characters was talkin' like a kid. Kids in my stories do tend to talk different from adults. I guess I could try toning things down a bit. It might feel a bit weird though, like the kid was trying to act grownup. Still, it may be worth a try. :)
Arabic Accent.
Several times people have asked me if I am Arab. I was active Muslim for over 7 years but did not know an accent could be in the printed word.
Gwen
As far as I can tell ...
... I haven't noticed any Arabic accent in anything you've written. That may just be because I haven't had a lot of interactions with people who have that sort of accent.
Just tell 'em, "My characters
Just tell 'em, "My characters were most definitely speaking North Carolinan, not South Carolinan!". And be very incensed about it for good measure.
Hugs!
Rosemary
*grinning*
Talking about being from North Carolina or South Carolina reminded me of some of the times I'd mention to someone about being from New Jersey, and cringing when they'd say, "Oh, you're from Joizey?" Nobody I knew pronounced Jersey that way, but that's because I was from South Jersey, and they only talk like that up in North Jersey. I know it's a pretty tiny state, but there really is a difference in dialect from where I grew up, and where people had a "Joizey" accent. I think that may be part of the reason why North Jersey and South Jersey are seperate states in my South-Jersey-Verse. :)
My mom and I
were both born in Washington state. Partway through school, I started trying to pronounce words as they were meant to be pronounced. One of the words I was careful to change my pronunciation of was Washington. Most people who live in the state tend to say, Warshington. My mom is one. We were joking about the pronunciation of words one time, and I commented that Mom says the name of the state that way. "I do NOT!" she exclaimed.
Hugs!
Rosemary
That reminds me ...
... of how I used to pronounce "creek" as "krik". I dunno where that pronunciation came from, but everybody in my family used it. The last time I used that pronunciation was when a kid in school asked me to pronounce c-r-e-e-k. I knew he'd laugh at me if I didn't pronounce it the way he expected. After thinking a bit, I took a guess, and managed to avoid being laughed at. After that I was more careful about how I pronounced things.
Family memes
In my family, we pronounced Warshington State and Washington D.C. differently.
Also, a crick is NOT the same thing as a creek. At least in Arkansas, a crick can be stepped or at least jumped across but a creek will have to be waded, bridged or gone around. And a bayou is a creek deep enough for a boat but not as wide as a river. :)
Hugs,
Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
Interesting!
Your description for a crick would have been called a stream in my family. Not sure if that fits in the the generally accepted definition of a stream, but my family is a bit funky, and we have our own way of doing a few things. ;)
Not specifically Southern
I grew up in the South, and when I read your stories, I don't hear a Southern accent.
Many of the things you write out -- like "aughta," or "-in' " instead of "ing," or "ya" for "you" -- are how most people actually pronounce the words in casual speech, though they might not realize it. And some of the "non-standard" uses, like "ain't" or "she don't" are features of many English dialects. FWIW, I don't recall educated Southerners using words like "ain't" -- it's considered lower class.
The impression I get from your stories is that the younger children pick up a local dialect where these things are common, and shift to a more standard (or hypercorrect) version as they grow older, I would guess because their families are in a social class which doesn't use the local dialect.
I didn't really think ...
... any of my characters had a Southern accent, but it's nice to hear from someone else they didn't hear that sort of accent either. I guess maybe the person from the writer's group had a different idea of how a Southern accent would be portrayed in writing.
Which southern dialect?
Yeah, I get it, y'all people think all us southerners talk alike. Texans don't sound or use the same words that someone from Georgia would. Two distinct and different accents that are widely known, (Texas Drawl and Georgia Bell accents)
The Appalachia area my family is from was heavily settled by immigrants from the Scottish highlands and the dialect tends to sound something like a cross between a Scottish brogue and a southern bell, with the voice always pitched into a higher than normal register, and can really difficult to understand someone that is excited and talking fast if you're not from the area, even if you are from the same state.
We the willing, led by the unsure. Have been doing so much with so little for so long,
We are now qualified to do anything with nothing.
To be honest ...
... I have no idea which Southern dialect the person from the writing group was hearing. I think I was too surprised to even think of asking which dialect he was talking about. The closest I came to anyone with a Southern accent, was the time when a few relatives had moved to Texas for a few years, and had a slight accent when they moved back to New Jersey. I'm not sure if I picked up an accent from them, but I suppose it's possible.