Help identifying an accent?

[zmgmeister.livejournal.com]

Has anybody heard a particular accent where the speaker seems to go breathless and their voice cracks at the end of the word, especially certain consonants? It seems to be mainly women in their 20s and early 30s, and seems to be an affected, "trendy" accent. A few years back it seemed to be everywhere; every TV commercial trying to sell to this demographic was using it.

If you've seen the movie Fever Pitch, you know what i'm talking about. Drew Barrymore's character had this accent, and Jimmy Fallon commented that she was talking out the side of her mouth.

PS. Why ask this in Davis? There are people here who speak this way, and it tends to stick out like a sore thumb. Perhaps some resident linguist can explain. Why not ask this in B0st0n? Dont want to scroll through a snarkfest.

Comments

[krystynayt.livejournal.com]

I'm not a linguist (or at least, I've never taken classes in sociolinguistics), but if it's an affected accent, adopted consciously because it's trendy, then there's nothing to explain. It's simply that: people like the way it sounds so they try to speak like that.

Or maybe one person likes the way that sounds, speaks like that, and her friends pick up on it without realizing it... and then their friends pick up on it... and voila, a bunch of people in a demographic category speaking in a certain way.

Or maybe they all really like the movie Fever Pitch.

People adjust accents all the time, especially when they're young, and especially if they're transplants from elsewhere. And "young" and "transplant" are two very pertinent features of the Boston population.

...and I have actually no idea what what you describe sounds like. I haven't heard it, or if I have, I haven't noticed it. Can you describe a few words? (And yes, I'm waiting for a geek to put up something in IPA.)

[zmgmeister.livejournal.com]

Hmm well there's still something to explain. If it's a trendy accent, who started the trend?

It didn't come from Fever Pitch, it seemed to be everywhere about five years before that.

Now, how would i describe it by typing? I'd say the word "Year" is pronounced something like "Yiihr" with maybe an umlaut over one of those i's, and a purred r.

I don't know if IPA has symbols for this. Its been discussed online before, ive seen discussions about "throat creak" in the linguistics newsgroups. And in those discussions, it seemed to be that the phenomenon was either glaringly obvious or oblivious to the posters, with no in-between.

Most people who ive described this to think i'm talking about Valley Girl-isms, "like, kewl?" but its not the same. It could be a Northern CA thing though.

[hammercock.livejournal.com]

ITYM "enunciate". :)

[four-thorns.livejournal.com]

but if everybody annunciated, that would be pretty interesting too

[zmgmeister.livejournal.com]

Well the whole Valley Girl thing has been around for, what, 25 years now, so ive pretty much grown up with it and it doesnt sound weird to me.

But this other thing, it just seemed to pop up out of nowhere. Nobody who i know well speaks this way, but then i'll walk through Davis and hear an entire conversation conducted in the lingo.

[krystynayt.livejournal.com]

Or people should stop being judgmental and try to listen to what someone is saying, rather than how they're saying it. :D

Just sayin'. I've heard the truly stupid speak confidently and eloquently; I've heard the superior intellect speak with "likes", "ums" and regionalisms.

...I'll agree that it's easier to give up trying to get people to not judge others by their verbal cover and to simply adopt a certain manner of speaking, though.

By the way, you've got great vocabulary, and you bring up interesting points, but what you say could be undermined by the elementary spelling errors. I don't say this to be bitchy, really (mistakes happen and I make a ton of them regularly) -- but since you seem to care about verbal appearances, I thought I might point that out. ;)

...that came out a hell of a lot snarkier than I meant it to be. I tried to soften it with smileys. Really!

[four-thorns.livejournal.com]

for the record, the current usage of "like" was started by the beats, as a way of indicating that no object could ever encompass the totality of the concept that it was compared with-- for example, saying "she's like beautiful" rather than "she's beautiful", because no one person or thing can ever fully embody beauty, but only approach or approximate it.

that isn't to say that that's how people use it now, or that they're aware of the purpose of what they're saying-- just that the usage isn't necessarity indicative of insecurity or vapidity or bad speech habits.

[krystynayt.livejournal.com]

There are also studies that suggest that the usage of "like" is fairly complex. That doesn't mean the people who use it are complex, but it's not some stupid, simplistic linguistic glitch. :P

[ad-lib.livejournal.com]

ah! now i want to hear an example of this! i keep trying to create the sound in my head, but i don't quite get it.

[zmgmeister.livejournal.com]

Hell, yes. That article pins it down.

[krystynayt.livejournal.com]

Yikes, okay. I know why I don't hear it: I talk like that. It's not something I consciously picked up at all and I've done it for as long as I can remember being aware of how people speak.

Or at least, I say things like "and he's all like... and then she's like... and he's like..." and it's often spoken with a higher pitch.

I'm sorry if I've grated on your ears! :D

Thanks for posting the article, by the way, dan4th.

[zmgmeister.livejournal.com]

These are interesting too:

http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/002949.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creaky_voice
http://www.slate.com/id/2147008/?nav=navoa

But it seems to be the creak, as opposed to the use of "like" or the uptalk, that is striking me as odd.

Still wonder where it came from. Also wonder why i start speaking like an extra from the Sopranos whenever i hear it, like im trying to correct them or show that i'm not one of them.

[zmgmeister.livejournal.com]

Oh, and this one practically read my mind:

http://devoidofsubstance.blogspot.com/2006/08/city-girl-squawk.html

"Almost every girl I went to high school with talked in this way, and seeing as I go to NYU, largely populated by girls from the Northeast, I haven't escaped it. This accent has bothered me for a long time."

[krystynayt.livejournal.com]

Oh, come now; this is funny to discuss but it can't be so bad. And I'm not just saying this because this is how I talk. An accent is an accent; a mannerism is a mannerism. People use their mouths, tongues, throats and breath differently, despite what we see on American TV, where people are split up into "non-descript, non-twangy midwestern", "twangy southern" and "British".

I dunno. I love the variation. Everyone's got something weird and potentially irritating in their speech. "Proper" speech is a futile concept, which linguists from the Observer article noted. Pinker goes into this in The Language Instinct, too.

...this is what happens when you study linguistics. :)

[sarah-raz.livejournal.com]

I agree with you. It's fascinating.


I suspect that I may talk like this too. I go back and forth between Boston and Minneapolis and people out there are always baffled by my accent. People often ask me if I'm from California!

[ravenword.livejournal.com]

I love the way people talk in Minnesota. It's sooo cute. My best friend from high school (we're from FL) went to college out there and she picked up some of the accent on certain words. :D Meanwhile, people in Boston think I have a Southern accent. Which I... kind of have...? But only in comparison to people who've never lived down south and thus sound horrible when they try to imitate the accent for comedic effect or something (read: almost everyone on TV or in the movies). Even my FL-born boyfriend, who normally talks like an NPR personality or something (he pronounces all wh- words with an inital H sound, like "white" = "hhwhite") can do the accent right when he wants to. It's in our blood or something.

Meanwhile, words I've learned since moving to Boston (mostly names of towns and T stops) I kind of pronounce with Boston vowel sounds. It started out as making fun of the T conductors, but now nothing else sounds right.

...Obviously I've had a little too much coffee before writing this post.

[awkwardduckling.livejournal.com]

that's really pretty interesting. at least now i know i'm not the only one that makes every sentence a question. (god damn that period wanted to be a question mark sooo bad, too)

[sarah-raz.livejournal.com]

Ah, yes, The NY Observer - always good for some lazy misogyny masquerading as clever snark!

[krystynayt.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I was trying hard not to react to the sexism and the not-so-subtle mockery of stereotypically "feminine" speech, but the language change aspect is interesting nonetheless. If you take out the part where they concentrate on females, it is really quite vindicating for people who don't talk in a stereotypical, "ideal", "masculine" speech.

[sarah-raz.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that's the thing. There's actually a really interesting sociological story in there about gendered speech. You could even make an argument about how, as women become more and more successful, society expects women to act more and more like girls.

But instead the punk with the byline furthered this trivialization of successful women.

[enochs-fable.livejournal.com]

It's interesting. I find that it tends to trail off in women passing their late twenties, and a lot of young guys have similar habits (at least as far as the ums, likes, and certain sounds). I find it makes it harder to concentrate on the substance of what they're saying, and makes them sound less intelligent. FWIW, I had to train myself out of a few of these habits, because I was undermining myself in social and professional situations where clear direct speech was important.

[abilouise.livejournal.com]

Yeah. Seriously. I loooove the part where they describe what the girls are WEARING, because it is so relevant!

[sarah-raz.livejournal.com]

Right. And how the tone of voice is particulary useful for getting stuff out of daddy!

[iamcoreyd.livejournal.com]

This girl at my job does this same thing, and, coincidentally, she's dumb as a stick.

[sarah-raz.livejournal.com]

Anyone who watches Project Runway: I think Alison seems to be a poster child for this way of speaking.

[ravenword.livejournal.com]

She's still my favorite female designer from season, despite hair-bow. (Michael is obviously the best male designer, and also hot. Even the three lesbians I watched with last night can agree.)

RUNWAY 4 LIFE

[dougo.livejournal.com]

Is this the accent portrayed by Kristen Wiig on Saturday Night Live in the "2 A-holes" sketches?