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November 21, 2007
Fully speauken hur
That's my best phonetic attempt to write the phrase "Philly spoken here" in the regional dialect that used to be much more common in this area than it is now. The local football team is fondly referred to as the "Iggles" and there's a blog called "attytood," but fewer and fewer people actually speak that way. As more and more local television reporters started speaking in Californian, the accent faded away. Although I did grow up here, I don't have much of a Philadelphia accent, and thus I was surprised by the results of an online test I found quite accidentally when I clicked on Glenn's link to David Freddoso's discussion of Northern prejudice against Southern accents. Actually, a reverse prejudice also exists, and who could blame Southerners for being annoyed by people who say "attytood" for attitude, "humitt" for humid, "wooder" for water, and even more incomprehensible things? As someone who lived in California for three decades, I naturally assume that I am as accent-free as the Cleaver family. So imagine my surprise and shock over the results of the What American accent do you have? test!
I don't know how much stock I should place in these online tests. I suspect that the first warning sign of spending too much time online is when you start to take online tests. The second sign is when you let others know about them so they can take them too. But the final alarm should be sounded when you take the time to link the tests in a blog post, while analyzing the results! This is an addiction, and I really should be more ashamed of myself. Fortunately, Ann Althouse made me realize that things are not as bad as I thought. She linked a net addiction test which indicates that I really don't have a problem. I scored only a 34 -- not as high a score as Ann Althouse but in the same general grouping : You are an average on-line user. You may surf the Web a bit too long at times, but you have control over your usage. The important thing to remember is like Ann Althouse, "I can quit whenever I want!" I'm not addicted. (Or, as they used to say in Fully, "not addictit.") It could never happen to me. Yo! No deenial hur! MORE: Sean Kinsell's comment made me work harder. It occurred to me that "attytood" really doesn't convey the traditional "Fully" dialect, and that it should have been spelled "addytood," as only the second "t" is pronounced with the t sound. On top of that, Glenn Reynolds' link to the the video that Andrew Sullivan neglectit served as a reminder that I can improve on the phonetic Fully spelling of "addicted." It ought to be "adicktit." Hmm... Even there, some people might still get it wrong, because they might mispronunce the "a." So it's not "adicktit" but "uhdicktit." posted by Eric on 11.21.07 at 04:14 PM
Comments
I got Philly, too, Eric, and I don't get it, either. All those words really are pronounced differently! BTW, I like your attempt to transcribe the Philadelphia long o. Sean Kinsell · November 21, 2007 10:39 PM Thanks Sean, and I wish you could come "eauver" for Thanksgiving turkey. However, you made me realize that "attytood" isn't quite accurate; it really is pronounced "addytood." Eric Scheie · November 22, 2007 12:20 PM Good site. Thank you. decorated christmas trees · December 9, 2007 09:54 PM Post a comment
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I stopped taking that net addiction quiz about a third of the way in, when I realized approximately how much I wouldn't like the result. Bad, bad.
On the accent quiz I answered honestly, so I don't really know what I said, but apparently I have the sought-after non-accent.
"You have a Midland accent" is just another way of saying "you don't have an accent." You probably are from the Midland (Pennsylvania, southern Ohio, southern Indiana, southern Illinois, and Missouri) but then for all we know you could be from Florida or Charleston or one of those big southern cities like Atlanta or Dallas. You have a good voice for TV and radio.
All wrong! But I have had two people think I'm from Ohio for no reason I could discern.
This must be a non-comedic variant of the "gay accent," too, because pretty much everyone I talk to presumes I'm gay until some nasty bit of hetero vulgarity shows through. Got to be real.