Evening star., 1933-12-31
TYPICAL SOUTHERN
SPEECH IS DENIED
Linguist Finds Few Common
characteristics in Sur.
vey of Section.

There Is no distinctly Southern
speech 1t was reported to the Linguistic
Society of America meeting here yes
terday by DR.. Guy 8. Lowman of
Brown University.
Dr. LOwman has been investigating
speech differences in Virginia and
South Carolina in behalf of the lin
guistic atlas now being prepared for
the American Council of Learned So
cieties.
Communities few miles apart in
Virginia, he said, differ widely in the
| characteristic expression of their people
and there seems to be no trait common
to all by which the language can be
classified. There is. he said, enough COM
mon traits in New England communi-
ties to justify the term New England
speech"
In some Virginia communities, es-
pecially among the uneducated, he
found the term de" used commonly
in place of the" This Is commonly
believed TO be Negro corruption Of
English but. DR.. Lov,-, said it is
| just as common in the mountain COM
| munities which have hardly ever come
| in contact with colored persons as in
the lowlands. 1t is probably a direct
! inheritance. he believes, from a similar
language corruption found in the north
of England and Scotland, from which
the ancestors Of many of the Virginia
people came.
The same, he found holds for the
final "th" in words like with pro-
nounced "wid" in several communities
he visited. The term de" is found
| especially after a word ending with a
hard conSonant as in the sentence
, Put the dog out" The evidence seems
to indicate the Negro borrowed the cor
ruption from the uneducated whites in
stead of giving it to them.
Variation in Vowels.
The curious use Of w" for "v," he
said. is almost universal among the
older, uneducated people of Northeast
ern North Carolina, although the
younger generation manages 10 avoid
it. This also, he believes, is a direct
English inheritance which has been
preserved by generations of descendants
of the first settlers. The older people,
he found. are conscious that it is wrong
when they use such an expression as
very good vinegar" but can't help
slipping into it In their anxiety 10
speak correctly before a stranger they
go too far and substitute ''v' for "w''
where it doesn't belong, Thus he found
them speaking Of drawing water from
the veil"
A very wide variation was found in
the various vowel sounds, every COM
munity seeming to have its own inde-
pendent practice. Thus throughout
Maine, he said. it is customary to take
fresh impulse Of the breath over an
% maxine the world not" into moot" {"
This is characteristic of Maine
speech by which the "down-Easter
can be recognized. But in Virginia
there is a variation all the way between
this and the correct pronunciation
East of the Blue Ridge. he said, he
! found "sh' used IN place of It in the
middle OF word quite generally. as
"furnShure" instead Of furniture.
| West OF the Blue Ridge this corruption
| disappears.
Another far removed ancestral in
4uence in Northeastern North Carolina.
! he said. was in the method OF telling
time. person will never say Quarter
past TO- but As minutes to IL" Ap-
parently half past 10" would mean
something quite different, not related
to time telling at all. from 80 min
utes to IL" The same custom is gen.
| eral. he said, in parts of Scotland from
which the ancestors Of these people
| came two centuries ago
, In Rockbridge County. he said, he
| found general the couriouS expression
not a hate for mot at all" This.
he pointed out, is a clear Scotticism.
| II vas originally in the Scotch low
| oped into devil a bit" Eventually it
came to be merely strong negative.
But the Virginia folk have preserved
the original form.
| The denial of a distinctive dialect
| to Virginia provoked considerable dis
cusSion. 1t was pointed out that many
| EGzabethan expressions still survive. not
! only in the isolated mountain commu-
mites. but even in the most cultivated
section Of Tidewater Virginia, such as
| the region around williamsburg. Ex-
pressions are in common use such as
| bethan literature.
Dialect Atlas Studies.
Dr., l0Wman said he is making only
a preliminary exploration of the vari-
| Carolina, preparatory to a much more
intensive Investigation planned for the
Atlas Of American Dialects" He is
trying to isolate such matters as Negro
! and Hessian influence on the original
! Scotch Irish and London English
speech.
The findings IN q study OF PennSyl-
vania language, a curious sort of Eng
lish based on a German substrata. we're
! presented to the society by Dr. R.
| Whitney Tucker of Brooklyn The
study was confined to those who knew
! only English, in order to find what
changes the old German speech had
brought about. Dr. Tucker found lit
tie influence in vocabulary or pronun-
citation but considerable in sentence
structure and word usage.
Notable examples cited were the uses
of the words still and yet" both
used in a German sense. Thus the
Pennsylvania "Dutchman" would say
DO you want these things this morn
ing yet
The term 'for U.S." is frequently
used in the sense of "of." as in the
case, the baby died for u.s. The