Southern American English

"Southern Drawl" redirects here. For the album by Alabama, see Southern Drawl (album).
This article is about English as spoken in the Southern United States. For older English dialects spoken in this same region, see Older Southern American English. For English as spoken in South America, see South American English.

Southern American English or Southern U.S. English is a collection of related American English dialects spoken throughout the Southern United States, though increasingly in more rural areas and primarily by white Americans.[1] Commonly in the United States, the dialects are referred together simply as Southern.[2][3][4] Other, much more recent ethno-linguistic terms include Southern White Vernacular English and Rural White Southern English.[5][6]

The Southern U.S. dialects, which have largely superseded an older set of dialects originating in the same area, make up the largest accent group in the United States,[7] from the southern extremities of Ohio, Indiana, Maryland, and Delaware, as well as most of West Virginia and Kentucky to the Gulf Coast, and from the southern Atlantic coast extending to most of Texas and much of Oklahoma. Southern U.S. English can be divided into several regional dialects and sub-dialects. African American Vernacular English (AAVE) has common points with the Southern dialects due to the strong historical ties of African Americans to the region.
Speech example
An example of a Texas-raised male with a rhotic accent (George W. Bush).
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Speech example
An example of a Plains, Georgia male with a non-rhotic accent (Jimmy Carter).
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An example of a southwestern Arkansas male with a rhotic accent (Bill Clinton).
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Geography

The dialects collectively known as Southern American English stretch across the south-eastern and south-central United States, but exclude the southernmost areas of Florida and the extreme western and south-western parts of Texas as well as the Rio Grande Valley (Laredo to Brownsville). This linguistic region includes Alabama, Georgia, Tennessee, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Louisiana, and Arkansas, as well as most of Texas, Virginia, Kentucky, Oklahoma, West Virginia, and northern and central Florida. Southern American English dialects can also be found in extreme southern parts of Missouri, Maryland, Delaware, and Illinois.[8][9]

Southern dialects originated in large part from a mix of immigrants from the British Isles, who moved to the South in the 17th and 18th centuries, and the creole or post-creole speech of African slaves. Upheavals such as the Great Depression, the Dust Bowl and World War II caused mass migrations of those and other settlers throughout the United States.

Phonology of the Southeastern super-region

Approximate extent of Southern American English (in green), based upon multiple dialect studies.[10][11][12] A "broader range of Southern characteristics" may also be heard in a larger Southeastern super-region (in pink).[13]

Headed by William Labov, the 2006 Atlas of North American English (ANAE) identifies the South itself, as well a large area of states bordering all along the South, as constituting a "Southeastern super-region,"[14] with even remote (including arguably Northern) areas that phonologically exhibit some noticeable "Southern character."[14] Essentially all of the modern-day Southern dialects, plus dialects marginal to the South, are thus considered a subset of this super-region.[note 1] Thus, a modern Southeastern dialectal super-region is defined by essentially the whole American South, including all of the Gulf region (even Florida), the Mid- and South Atlantic regions, and a transitional Midland dialect area between the South and the North, lying above the strict Southern region and comprising most of Oklahoma, Kansas, Missouri, southeastern Nebraska, Southern Illinois, Southern Indiana, and Southern Ohio.[15] Put perhaps in clearer terms, the Southeastern super-dialect region encompasses all of these most general regional American dialects:

These are the minimal necessary features that identify a speaker from the Southeastern super-region:

The merger of pin and pen in Southern American English. In the purple areas, the merger is complete for most speakers. Note the exclusion of the New Orleans area, Southern Florida, and of the Lowcountry of South Carolina and Georgia. The purple area in California consists of the Bakersfield and Kern County area, where migrants from the south-central states settled during the Dust Bowl. There is also debate whether or not Austin, Texas is an exclusion. Based on Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006:68).

Phonology of the South

Mean formant values for the ANAE subjects (Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006:?)) from the Southern U.S. (excluding Florida and Charleston, SC). The red symbol marks the position of monophthongized /aɪ/ before voiced consonants. The distinction between /ɑ/ and /ɔ/ is preserved mainly because /ɔ/ has an upglide. /eɪ/ is backer and lower than /ɛ/.

The South proper as a modern-day dialect region generally includes all of the pronunciation features of the Southeastern super-region, plus additional features listed below, which are together popularly recognized in the United States as a Southern accent. However, there is still actually wide variation in Southern speech regarding potential differences based on factors like a speaker's exact region or sub-region (see the different Southern U.S. English dialects section below for more information), age, ethnicity, etc. The following phonological phenomena focus on the developing sound system of the more recent Southern dialects of the United States that altogether largely (though certainly not entirely) superseded the older Southern patterns throughout the region:

Inland South and Texas

ANAE identifies the "Inland South" as a large linguistic area of the South located mostly in southern Appalachia, inland from the Gulf and Atlantic Coasts, and the originating region of the Southern Vowel Shift. The Inland South, along with the "Texas South" (the geographic majority of the state of Texas), are considered the two major places in which the newer Southern sound system is the most evolved, and therefore the core pronunciation areas of the modern-day South.[35]

The accents of Texas are actually diverse, for example with important Spanish influences on its vocabulary;[36] however, it is still primarily an unambiguous region of Southern speech, with the current-day west and central Texan dialect, notably including the cities of Dallas, Abilene, Lubbock, Odessa, and, marginally, Amarillo,[37] being rhotic and fully realizing all threes stages of the Southern Shift.[38] In western Texas, the phoneme /ɔː/ may remain a pure vowel.[39]

Phonology of Atlanta and Charleston

ANAE identifies Atlanta, Georgia as a dialectal "island of non-Southern speech,"[40] and Charleston, South Carolina likewise as "not markedly Southern in character," despite these being two prominent Southern cities. The modern dialect of Atlanta is extremely young, influenced by a huge movement of non-Southerners into the area during the 1990s,[41] while the modern dialect of Charleston has evolved as a Midland-influenced update of the traditional Lowcountry dialect, whose speech patterns were "diametrically opposed to the Southern Shift... and differ in many other respects from the main body of Southern dialects."[42] For this reason, the following vowel sounds of Atlanta and Charleston have been unaffected by typical Southern phenomena like the Southern drawl and Southern Vowel Shift:[41]

However, the modern dialects of Atlanta and Charleston do, in fact, incorporate the general Southeastern super-regional features listed above and can be mostly regarded as varieties of Midland English.[41][43]

Phonology of Southern Louisiana

Acadiana

Main article: Cajun English

Since the early 1900s, Cajuns of southern Louisiana, though historically monolingual French speakers, began to develop their own vernacular dialect of English, which retains some influences and words from Acadian/Cajun French, such as "cher" (dear) or "nonc" (uncle). This dialect fell out of fashion after World War II, but experienced a renewal in primarily male speakers born since the 1970s, who have been the most appealed by, and the biggest appealers for, a successful Cajun cultural renaissance.[44] Speakers of Cajun Vernacular English demonstrate these major features, among many others:[45]

New Orleans

Main article: New Orleans English

Southern Louisiana, as well as some of southeast Texas (Houston to Beaumont), and coastal Mississippi, feature a number of dialects influenced by other languages beyond English. Most of southern Louisiana constitutes Acadiana, dominated for hundreds of years by monolingual speakers of Cajun French,[44] which combines elements of Acadian French with other French and Spanish words. This French dialect is spoken by many of the older members of the Cajun ethnic group and is said to be dying out. A related language called Louisiana Creole also exists.

One historical English dialect spoken only by those raised in the Greater New Orleans area is non-rhotic and remarkably shares more pronunciation commonalities with the New York City dialect than with other Southern dialects. Since at least the 1980s, this dialect has popularly been called "Yat," from the common local greeting "Where you at?". The New York City English features shared with this dialect include:[41]

Yat also lacks the typical vowel changes of the Southern Shift and the pin–pen merger that are commonly heard elsewhere throughout the South. Yat is associated with the working and lower middle classes, though a spectrum with fewer notable Yat features is often heard the higher one's socioeconomic status; such New Orleans affluence is associated with the New Orleans Uptown and the Garden District, and its speech patterns are sometimes considered a separate variety altogether from the Yat dialect.[46]

Additionally, many unique terms such as "neutral ground"[47] for the median of a divided street (Louisiana/Southern Mississippi) or "banquette"[48] for a sidewalk (southern Louisiana/eastern Texas) are found in New Orleans and elsewhere in coastal Louisiana.

Grammar and vocabulary

Newer features

Frequency of either "Y'all" or "You all" to address multiple people, according to an Internet survey of American dialect variation.[49]
Frequency of just "Y'all" to address multiple people, according to an Internet survey of American dialect variation.[49]

Shared newer and older features

These grammatical features are characteristic of both older Southern American English and newer Southern American English.

African American Vernacular English

"Southern U.S. English" popularly refers to those dialects spoken by White Southerners;[6] however, as a geographic term, it may also encompass the dialects developed among other social or ethnic groups in the South, most prominently including African Americans. African American Vernacular English is spoken primarily by African Americans throughout the United States, deriving from varieties that developed out of the South.

This variety originated in the Southern States where Africans and African Americans were held as slaves until the American Civil War. These slaves originally spoke indigenous African languages but eventually picked up English to communicate with their masters and one another. Since the slave masters spoke Southern American English, that is the dialect of English the slaves learned. Over time, the form of Southern spoken by these slaves developed into what is now African American Vernacular English, which retains many Southern features. Like Virginia Piedmont, Coastal Southern, and Florida Cracker dialects, AAVE is largely non-rhotic. While the African slaves and their descendants lost most of their language and culture, some vocabulary and grammatical features from indigenous West African languages remain in AAVE. While AAVE may also be spoken by members of other racial groups, it is largely spoken by and associated with blacks in many parts of the U.S. AAVE is considered by a number of English speakers to be a substandard dialect. As a result, AAVE speakers who seek social mobility typically learn to code-switch between AAVE and a more standardized English dialect. Liberian English is said to be at least partially based on AAVE, since that dialect of English was modeled after American English and not British English.

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ Thomas (2006:4, 11)
  2. ↑ Stephen J. Nagle & Sara L. Sanders (2003). English in the Southern United States. Cambridge University Press. p. 35[This page differentiates between "Traditional Southern" and "New Southern"]
  3. ↑ "Southern". Dictionary.com. Dictionary.com, based on Random House, Inc. 2014[See definition 7.]
  4. ↑ "Southern". Merriam-Webster. Merriam-Webster, Inc. 2014[See under the "noun" heading.]
  5. ↑ Thomas, Erik R. (2007) "Phonological and phonetic characteristics of African American Vernacular English," Language and Linguistics Compass, 1, 450–75. p. 453
  6. 1 2 (Thomas (2006)
  7. ↑ "Do You Speak American: What Lies Ahead". pbs.org. Retrieved 2007-08-15. External link in |publisher= (help)
  8. ↑ Map from the Telsur Project. Retrieved 2009-08-03.
  9. ↑ Map from Craig M. Carver (1987), American Regional Dialects: A Word Geography, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Retrieved 2009-08-03
  10. ↑ "ASA 147th Meeting Lay Language Papers - The Nationwide Speech Project". Acoustics.org. 2004-05-27. Archived from the original on January 8, 2014. Retrieved 2012-11-08.
  11. ↑ http://www.ling.upenn.edu/phono_atlas/NationalMap/NatMap1.html
  12. ↑ "American English Dialects". Aschmann.net. Retrieved 2012-11-08.
  13. ↑ Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006:139)
  14. 1 2 3 4 Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006:137)
  15. ↑ Southard, Bruce. "Speech Patterns". Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture. Oklahoma Historical Society. Retrieved October 29, 2015.
  16. ↑ Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006:141)
  17. ↑ Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006:263)
  18. ↑ Thomas (2006:14)
  19. ↑ Thomas (2006:9)
  20. ↑ Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006:261)
  21. ↑ Thomas (2006:16)
  22. ↑ Thomas (2006:15)
  23. ↑ Thomas (2006:1–2)
  24. ↑ Heggarty, Paul et al, eds. (2013). "Accents of English from Around the World". University of Edinburgh.
  25. ↑ Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006:244)
  26. ↑ A Handbook of Varieties of English: Volume 1, p. 301, 311-312
  27. ↑ Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006:245)
  28. 1 2 Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006:248)
  29. 1 2 Thomas (2006:5)
  30. ↑ Stephen J. Nagle & Sara L. Sanders (2003). English in the Southern United States. Cambridge University Press. p. 151.
  31. ↑ Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006:69–73)
  32. ↑ Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006:254)
  33. ↑ Thomas (2006:7)
  34. ↑ Wolfram (2004:55)
  35. ↑ Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006:148, 150)
  36. ↑ American Varieties: Texan English. Public Broadcasting Service. MacNeil/Lehrer Productions. 2005.
  37. ↑ Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006:131, 164, 254)
  38. ↑ Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006:69)
  39. ↑ Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006:254)
  40. ↑ Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006:181)
  41. 1 2 3 4 Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006:260–1)
  42. 1 2 Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006:259–260)
  43. ↑ Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006:68)
  44. 1 2 Dubois, Sylvia and Barbara Horvath (2004). "Cajun Vernacular English: phonology." In Bernd Kortmann and Edgar W. Schneider (Ed). A Handbook of Varieties of English: A Multimedia Reference Tool. New York: Mouton de Gruyter. p. 412-4.
  45. 1 2 3 4 Dubois, Sylvia and Barbara Horvath (2004). "Cajun Vernacular English: phonology." In Bernd Kortmann and Edgar W. Schneider (Ed). A Handbook of Varieties of English: A Multimedia Reference Tool. New York: Mouton de Gruyter. p. 409-10.
  46. ↑ Alvarez, Louis (director) (1985). Yeah You Rite! (Short documentary film). USA: Center for New American Media.
  47. ↑ "neutral ground". The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000. Retrieved 2008-09-08.
  48. ↑ "banquette". The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000. Retrieved 2008-09-15.
  49. 1 2 http://www4.uwm.edu/FLL/linguistics/dialect/staticmaps/states.html
  50. ↑ Harvard Dialect Survey - word use: a group of two or more people.
  51. ↑ Hazen, Kirk and Fluharty, Ellen. "Linguistic Diversity in the South: changing Codes, Practices and Ideology". Page 59. Georgia University Press; 1st Edition: 2004. ISBN .0-8203-2586-4
  52. ↑ Regional Note from The Free Dictionary

References

  1. ↑ The only notable exceptions of the South being a subset of the "Southeastern super-region" are two Southern metropolitan areas, described as such because they participate in Stage 1 of the Southern Vowel Shift, but lack the other defining Southeastern features: Savannah, Georgia and Amarillo, Texas.

External links

  1. ↑ http://factfinder.census.gov/faces/tableservices/jsf/pages/productview.xhtml?pid=ACS_10_1YR_B16001&prodType=table
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