The morning call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1878-1895, 1893-04-02
PROVINCIALISMS.
Dialects of All Parts of the Country
Heard in New York.


New York is perhaps the only place in the
United States where all the provincialisms
of American speech may be studied. The
permanent population Of the city includes
natives of every State in the Union, scarce
any having less than one hundred repre-
sentatives here, and many having thou
sands. The floating population includes
men fresh from every State and Territory,
aud bearing upon their tongues their pro-
vincialisms of speech as yet unmodfied by
contact with the outside world.
The SoutheTner's peculiaTiIies of speech
are perhaps more stubborn than those of
any other American. Traces of them re-
main after the man has lived twenty years
IL New York, accepted its social conditions,
renounced inherited politics and prejudices.
and half forgotten the home of his child
hood The slight Southern tinge OF the
Marylander seems as tenacious as the broad
provincialisms of the far Southerner. Be-
fore the Southern Society had home of its
own, the New York Hotel was the best
place in the city to note the varieties of
Southern speech. One heard from the
guests of that hotel all the gradations Of
dialect that mark the South, from the soft
ness Of the Delawarean to the LouIsianan's
air-cnshioned vowels and almost silent
rs"
from the region above the North Carolina
line, after long residence in the North,
loses almost every trace of the peculiarly
Southern sreech, save a leisurely prOnun-
citation, and habit of giving full value to
certain auXiliarieS that Northerners conn
monty slur Some Southerners cling to GER
tain words as II in evidence of old-time al
legiance. The pronunciation of the prepo-
sition ito" as toe" is one OF the cOmOn-
est marks of the man from Southern Mary.
lanh 10 nd rt,o
Southerners and some New Englanders
have in common the verb ito reckon with
q meaning widely different from that
attached to it in its best usage. But the
Southerner's ri reckon" or more broadly,
Jaw reckon" means something distinctly
different from the New Englander's phrase
With the New Highlander IL implies a shade
of doubt; with the Southerner il indicates
conviction. The Southerner apparently
has more confidence in his own mental pro-
cesses than the New Highlander, OF perhaps
he lacks the latteT's caution.
Not few Snutherners have, in common
with many New Englanders, nasal tone
of voice, and this remains in the case of
each long after provincialisms of dicton
and pronunciation have disappeared. Per-
haps the educated SOutherner is more apt to
retain his prOyincialSms of speech than the
educated New Englander. There are
Southerners in this town who read Homer
with a Virgnian accent. and Southern
eth them, not as 0xonians, but as South
eTners.
Southern Pennsylvania, Southern Ohio.
Southern Indiana and Illinois have n OF alto
gether escaped the linguistic influence of
their neighbOrs to the south, and when one
meets persons from those regions it is not
always easy TO guess from which side of
Mason and Dixon's line they come.
The West is pretty free from the nasal
tone not unusual South and East, and it fs
easier TO detect in New York the South
erner or the New Highlander than the man
from the region between the Aleghanies
and the Rockies.
A curious proyincialism common inlCen-
| trail aud Western Pennsylvania often clings
| to persons from those regions long after
they have become New Workers. 1t con-
sists In giving rising infection to cues
| ton where one would naturally expect the
falling infection. 1t is a popularity of
which those whom it marks are unconscious.
but it usually attracts the attention of the
| least observant stranger.
The proyincialisms of the middle west lie
rather in notifications of vowel sounds
than in pecullarities of diction, and in these
they often do not greatly differ from other
| Americans, save far Southerners and car e.
| full speakers in New England. The niceties
of vowel sounds are observed by Compare
lively few New Workers, save those of New
England BIRTH