Dialects & Accents (Was Re: Subject-Verb agreement with compound subjects)

[potioncat]

--- In HPFGU-OTChatter at yahoogroups.com, "Tiffany B. Clark" 
<minnesotatiffany at ...> wrote:
>
> > Mike:
> >
> > It seems that accents in the US are slowly fading away. 
> > Sure, regional accents still exist, but not to the degree 
> > they used to. I often notice a large difference in accents 
> > between generations even when both generational individuals 
> > have remained within the same region. They may retain those 
> > peculiarities like you point out PC, but the overall accent 
> > keeps getting less pronounced. 


Potioncat:
I've noticed that too, especially when I go back home. Now it's more 
a surprise when I do hear the old sounds than when I don't.

The other change is food. Restaurants are generally national chains 
and regional differences are fading away. No longer do you walk into 
a mom-and-pop restaurant. I don't I'll ever forget how surprised my 
northern cousins were to dicover mayonaise on hamburgers, or how 
surprised I was to discover northern iced tea was made without sugar.


> 
> Tiffany:
> 
> The slang is what really I think is tough to pick up on, esp. if 
not 
> used to the local dialects & ways of saying words.  I was in 
> Philadelphia last year & some of the slang there was almost hearing 
a 
> foreign language.  Wooder is water, Fluffia is Philadelphia, just 
to 
> name a few of them there.  I know of a lot of foregin students in 
> classes that say learning the different forms of slang here in the 
US 
> was tough for them.

Potioncat:
Wooder! That's it! My husband grew up in the NJ suburbs of Philly. To 
this day he always pauses and says "water" very slowly and distinctly 
because so many people have not understood him.

Southerners use (or used to use) the word 'carry' to mean to give a 
ride to someone who wants to go somewhere. "I'll carry you to the 
doctor." while 'take' means to force someone to go, "I'll take you to 
the doctor."