Newsgroup: it.cultura.linguistica.inglese
Titolo: southern accent?

Are the students interviewed here: 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JdMBhNmnuI8
 clearly from Southern US? 
They don't sound all that southern to me.
:-/
Here are more similar videos:
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=theu.com+chapel+hill&search_type=&aq=-1&oq=
Ciao,
Enrico il Pentolaio.
-- 
There are two kinds of Italians, those who work for Berlusconi and those 
who are about to.

 don't sound all that southern to me.
The students don't have a southern accent although there are places in North 
Carolina where the accent is still very strong. I think the reason for this 
may be that education and mass media has influenced the accents of young 
adults ( I found that I lost my regional accent when I went to university in 
the US). In addition, North Carolina has experienced an increase of 
emigration of Northeasterners in recent decades. It's interesting that the 
male narrator in the video still has a distinct African-American accent.
One sure test for a southern accent is to mumble something incoherent to a 
suspected southerner and wait for the "Do what?" response. 

 suspected southerner and wait for the "Do what?" response. 
LOL!


 accent. Big mess!
When attending university, I was exposed to a variety of dialects and 
foreign languages. It was part of my academic qualification :))
So I have forgotten my scholastic English, but nevertheless I know some 
Spanish (Argentinian and south american) and Greek, and a lot of 
vernacular words.
-- 
Allà kaì eàn hemeîs è ággelos ex ouranoû euaggelízetai [humîn] par'hò
eueggelisámetha humîn, anáthema esto. Hos proeirékamen, kaì árti pálin
légo, eí tis humâs euaggelízetai par'hò parelábete, anáthema esto. 
(Gal.1,8-9)

 Indeed. Could you tell where he is from?
I haven't made a study of regional accents, but I didn't detect any
particular regionalism in his speech. I would say that he spoke a standard
American dialect (telegiornale) with an African-American cadence. If this 
topic interests you, you might find the following article interesting: 
http://www.linguistlist.org/issues/7/7-1104.html

 
http://www.linguistlist.org/issues/7/7-1104.html
Thanks!


 not the phrase "do what". Is "do what" an element of southern accent?
It is a southern regionalism, typically said with a strong southern accent.
I've heard it said by residents of the south from North Carolina to
Louisiana. I've never heard it in the northeast or the west.
A proposito, si dice "while/when watching tv, I saw/heard" e "doesn't."


Most Southerners (and other Americans) who go to college try to lose their
accents. There are students at UNC from just about every State, and from
many foreign countries, but since the law requires that 82% of each Freshman
class must be residents of North Carolina, the odds are that any chance
interview would be with someone from North Carolina. The only really obvious
accents belong to two men who speak with Black American accents - the
narrator and one of the men interviewed.
Joe from Massachusetts

 narrator and one of the men interviewed.
Ok. Una che il prossimo anno va là mi diceva che in quei video di 
theU.com su youtube si sente chiaramente che gli studenti (o alcuni 
studenti) sono originari degli stati meridionali, e mi ero un po' 
preoccupato proprio perché non mi sembrava affatto che fosse così.
Thanks!
Ciao,
Enrico il Pentolaio.
P.S. Ma anche un accento americano "nero" puo' essere caratteristico del 
sud, vero? O almeno, in "True Blood", che è ambientato in Louisiana, mi 
pareva che certe vocali dei personaggi neri non fossero così diverse da 
quelle dei bianchi.
