Word usage by geography

[Svrtnsse]

I bumped into this article and found it quite interesting: The dude map: How Americans refer to their bros ? Quartz

The main thing to take away here is that even though people in a country speak the same language, they may have a preference for which words to use. I guess that probably doesn't come as a surprise to anyone, but it's still nice to see a bit of research on it.

Further, it's a good argument for avoiding writing "in dialect" to show that someone's from a different part of the world/country. Instead, pick some word that your local characters don't use at all, and have the "outsider" use that word a lot.

 

[CupofJoe]

I love that map... But what happened to "dude" in the middle of Texas?
A little difference can go a long way.
I'm co-authoring a paper with an American and [spelling aside] even their written [American] English is strange to my [English - Home Counties] English.

 

[Svrtnsse]

I'm co-authoring a paper with an American and [spelling aside] even their written [American] English is strange to my [English - Home Counties] English.

I'm having issues with this in my writing. Some of the spell checkers I use go with British English, and some with American English. In the name of consistency I should probably sort it out and settle for one of the two, but so far it's always felt like something I can neglect to do later.

 

[DragonOfTheAerie]

So true.

There was a thread on here a while ago asking how to denote a character's from "the South" (U.S.A) using dialect. Mine, and many others' , response was that there is no one "southern" dialect. Kentucky sounds different from Georgia sounds different from Louisiana sounds different from North Carolina and so forth. Even then, people in the Appalachian Mountains sound very different than those elsewhere, even within the same state, and there are small regional differences within states, etc...Even the staple "y'all" isn't reliable. My grandmother, who is a North Carolina native, says "yins."

So basically, if you try to write that dialect without knowing it, you're going to sound like a disrespectful caricature. Which is not good, since the "southern" accent is so stigmatized and associated with being uneducated.

Dialects generally are hard to pin down. I'd say if you haven't grown up around a dialect, hearing it spoken every day of your life, don't attempt it.

 

[CupofJoe]

So true.

There was a thread on here a while ago asking how to denote a character's from "the South" (U.S.A) using dialect. Mine, and many others' , response was that there is no one "southern" dialect. Kentucky sounds different from Georgia sounds different from Louisiana sounds different from North Carolina and so forth. Even then, people in the Appalachian Mountains sound very different than those elsewhere, even within the same state, and there are small regional differences within states, etc...Even the staple "y'all" isn't reliable. My grandmother, who is a North Carolina native, says "yins."

So basically, if you try to write that dialect without knowing it, you're going to sound like a disrespectful caricature. Which is not good, since the "southern" accent is so stigmatized and associated with being uneducated.

Dialects generally are hard to pin down. I'd say if you haven't grown up around a dialect, hearing it spoken every day of your life, don't attempt it.

A couple of years ago I was in Paris on holiday when I met a young couple talking in broad Northern Irish accents. My family is from there so I carefully introduced myself and we got to chatting. About half way through our chat I realised they were from Tennessee and I was hearing their Appalachian/Great Smoky's accent.

 

[DragonOfTheAerie]

A couple of years ago I was in Paris on holiday when I met a young couple talking in broad Northern Irish accents. My family is from there so I carefully introduced myself and we got to chatting. About half way through our chat I realised they were from Tennessee and I was hearing their Appalachian/Great Smoky's accent.

This is really interesting. Many people in the mountains were originally descended from Scottish/Irish immigrants, so the accents probably have a common origin.

 

[Chessie]

So true.

There was a thread on here a while ago asking how to denote a character's from "the South" (U.S.A) using dialect. Mine, and many others' , response was that there is no one "southern" dialect. Kentucky sounds different from Georgia sounds different from Louisiana sounds different from North Carolina and so forth. Even then, people in the Appalachian Mountains sound very different than those elsewhere, even within the same state, and there are small regional differences within states, etc...Even the staple "y'all" isn't reliable. My grandmother, who is a North Carolina native, says "yins."

So basically, if you try to write that dialect without knowing it, you're going to sound like a disrespectful caricature. Which is not good, since the "southern" accent is so stigmatized and associated with being uneducated.

Dialects generally are hard to pin down. I'd say if you haven't grown up around a dialect, hearing it spoken every day of your life, don't attempt it.

All I know is that when visiting the South, I often have to ask people to repeat themselves and feel stupid for doing so. I'm sorry, but it's hard to understand some Southerners! :/ I think Tennessee and Georgia probably have some of the strongest twangs I've heard. It's funny because up here, no one thinks we have accents. But when we travel out of state, we're told we sound "funny", or so I've heard from folks in the Midwest and the South.

@Svrt, use the American version. It has less letters in the spelling and is therefore faster to type. I kid, I kid.

 

[Tom]

Dude...why isn't New York deep purple? I have never once in my life heard pal, fella, or buddy. Bro is a little more common, but dude is by far the most common term.

What's interesting about where I live is that the Buffalo area is generally considered the meeting point of New England/the Northeast and the Great Lakes/Midwest, in both dialect and culture. Our accent is an unholy amalgam of the two, with some Ontario Canadian thrown in. When I travel to the South, people regularly ask if I'm from Canada. The second most frequent guess is Chicago.

 

[Svrtnsse]

I've heard some of the English people at work use the term fella when referring to someone's boyfriend, but that's the only time.

As for accents/dialects... old Cork people have an almost completely incomprehensible accent. Imagine someone with a fake Jamaican accent trying to speak Dutch very quickly. They're usually happy though, which kind of makes up for not understanding a word of what they say.

 

[Peat]

My grandmother, who is a North Carolina native, says "yins."

Sort of like the Pittsburgh yinz?

My future mother-in-law says that. As far as I can tell, no one under the age of 35 uses it without a fair degree of irony.