Southern American English

Southern American English is a dialect of the English language spoken throughout the Southern region of the United States, from central Kentucky and northern Virginia to the Gulf Coast and from the Atlantic coast to eastern Texas. Southern American English can be divided into different sub-dialects (see American English), with speech differing between, for example, the Appalachian region and the coastal area around Charleston, South Carolina. The South Midlands dialect was influenced by the migration of Southern dialect speakers into the American West. The dialect spoken to various degrees by many African Americans, African American Vernacular English (AAVE), shares many similarities with Southern dialect, unsurprising given that group's strong historical ties to the region.

Overview of the Southern dialect

The overall Southern dialect dialect generally follows the borders of the Confederate states that seceded from the United States during the American Civil War. The general southern dialect has its origins in the English immigrants who moved to the South in the 17th and 18th centuries, of whom most were of European Celtic origins (according to an 1860 census, "three-quarters of white Southerners had surnames that were Scottish, Irish or Welsh in origin." http://www.americasvoices.org/archives2003/AdamsJ/AdamsJ_061403.htm). These immigrants brought with them a very distinct style of English speaking, which was then combined with the African languages spoken by the African Americans who were at this time enslaved in the South. Over time this cultural and linguistic diversity combined with the South's rural isolation to produce a unique American dialect.

Related Topics:
Confederate - American Civil War - European Celtic - 1860 - Census - White - Scottish - Irish - Welsh - African languages

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Pronunciation

Few generalizations can be made about Southern pronunciation as a whole, as there is great variation between regions in the south (see the different southern American English dialects section below for more information). One phenomenon that is probably found throughout the region is the merger of {{IPA|}} and {{IPA|}} before nasal consonants, so that pen and pin are pronounced the same, but the pin-pen merger is not found in New Orleans and Savannah. This sound change has spread beyond the south in recent decades and is now quite widespread in the Midwest and West as well.

Related Topics:
Different southern American English dialects - Merger - Nasal consonant - ''pen'' and ''pin'' - New Orleans - Savannah

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Other typical (sometimes stereotypical) aspects of the Southern accent:

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• {{IPA|/z/}} becomes {{IPA|}} before {{IPA|/n/}}, for example {{IPA|}} wasn't, {{IPA|}} business, but hasn't is sometimes still pronounced {{IPA|}} because there already exists a word hadn't pronounced {{IPA|}}.

:{{IPA|/z/ ? }} before {{IPA|/n/}}

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• The diphthong {{IPA|/a?/}} becomes monophthongized to {{IPA|}}. Some speakers have this feature before voiced consonants but Canadian-style raising before voiceless consonants, so that ride is {{IPA|}} and wide is {{IPA|}}, but right is {{IPA|}} and white is {{IPA|}}; others monophthongize {{IPA|/a?/}} in all contexts.

:{{IPA|/a?/ ? }}

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• The diphthongization or triphthongization of the traditional short front vowels as in the words pat, pet, and pit: these develop a glide up from their original starting position to {{IPA|}}, and then back down to schwa. This is the feature often called the "Southern drawl".

:{{IPA|/æ/ ? }}

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:{{IPA|/?/ ? }}

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:{{IPA|/?/ ? }}

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• Like Australian English and English English, the English of the coastal Deep South is historically non-rhotic: it drops the sound of final /r/ before a consonant or a word boundary, so that guard sounds similar to god (but the former has a longer vowel than the latter) and sore like saw. Intrusive /r/, where an /r/ sound is inserted between two vowel sounds ("lawr and order") is not a feature of coastal SAE, as it is in many other non-rhotic accents. The more western (including Appalachian) varieties of SAE are rhotic. Non-rhoticity is rapidly disappearing from almost all Southern accents, to a greater degree than it has been lost in the other traditionally non-rhotic dialects of the East Coast such as New York and Boston. The remaining non-rhotic SAE speakers also uses intrusive r, like New England and New York City.

:{{IPA|/?/ ? 0}} | before /+con/

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:{{IPA|/?/ ? 0}} | before #

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• The distinction between the vowels sounds of words like caught and cot or talk and tock is mainly preserved. In much of the Deep South, the vowel found in words like talk and caught has developed into a diphthong, so that it sounds like the diphthong used in the word loud in the Northern United States.
• For many Southern speakers, some nouns are stressed on the first syllable that would be stressed on the second syllable in other accents. These include police, cement, and behind.
• The distinction between {{IPA|/?r/}} and {{IPA|/or/}}, as in horse and hoarse, for and four etc., is occasionally preserved, especially in non-rhotic varieties.
• Lax and tense vowels often merge before 'l', making pairs like feel/fill, fail/fell, and fool/full homophones.
• The distinction between w and wh, as in wine and whine is preserved for some speakers.
• The distinction between {{IPA|/ær/}}, {{IPA|/?r/}}, and {{IPA|/er/}} in marry, merry, and Mary is preserved.
• Yod-dropping is not found among many speakers, thus {{IPA|/dj/}}, {{IPA|/nj/}}, {{IPA|/tj/}}, in due, new, tune is preserved.
• The distinction between {{IPA|/?r/}} and {{IPA|/?r/}} in furry and hurry is preserved.
• In some regions of the south, there is a merger of {{IPA|}} and {{IPA|}}, making cord and card, for and far, form and farm etc. homonyms.
• The distinction between {{IPA|/?r/}} and {{IPA|/i?r/}} in mirror and nearer, Sirius and serious etc. is preserved.
• The distinction between pour and poor, more and moor etc. is lost in many regions.
• The l's in the words walk and talk are often pronounced, causing the words talk and walk to be commonly pronounced /wAlk/ and /tAlk/ by southerners. A sample of that pronunciation can be found at http://www.utexas.edu/courses/linguistics/resources/socioling/talkmap/talk-nc.html .

Word use

• Use of double modals ("might could", "might should", "might would", etc.)
• "You" may be "ye" ("Did ye get yer car?")
• Use of drowneded as the past tense of drown.
• Use of hot water heater for the tank that heats the water in a house, apartment, business etc.
• Occasional preservation of the aspirative "h" for the third person singular neuter ("hit").
• Use of "y'all" as the second person plural pronoun (less commonly "you-all," "all-y'all")
• Some Appalacian and Ozark dialects prefer "you'uns", and by extension "we'uns" and "they'uns" or even "'uns" used as a pronominal suffix to certain verbs.
• Use of a- prefix on -ing verbs, such as "He was a-hootin' and a-hollerin,'" or "the wind was a-howlin'"
• Use of "fixin' to" or "a-fixin' to" as an indicator of immediate future action. For example: "He's fixin' to eat," or "We're a-fixin' to go."
• Use of the word "done" in place of "have" in present perfect constructions, such as in "We 'done' gone to town" (We have gone to town).
• Partial or total replacement of "have" (to possess) with "got," as in "I got one of them" (I have one of those).
• Use of the word "ain't" in place of "have not" in past perfect constructions, as in "I ain't done nothin'" (I have not done anything).
• Replacement of "doesn't" with "don't" (he don't, she don't, it don't, John don't)
• Use of past participle forms in place of simple past tense forms, as in "I seen that" (I saw that) or "He come up here" (He came up here).
• Replacement of "those" with "them."
• Use of "over yonder" in place of "over there" or "in or at that indicated place," especially when being used to refer to a particularly different spot, such as in "the house over yonder"
• Partial or total replacement of reflexive pronouns, "myself" becoming "me," "himself becoming "him," etc. For example, "I'm fixin' to paint me a picture," or "He's gonna catch him a big one."
• Use of "to love on someone or something" in place of "to show affection to" or "be affectionate with someone or something." For example: "He was lovin' on his new kitten."
• Use of the term 'mosquito hawk' for a dragonfly or a crane fly (Diptera Tipulidae).
• Use of the term 'Frigidaire' or 'ice box' for a refrigerator.
• A distinction between the words 'barbecue' and 'grill'. Barbecued chicken is different from grilled chicken, and so on.
• Word use tendencies from the Harvard Dialect Survey:
• A carbonated beverage in general as "coke" or "cocola," likely influenced by the dominance of Coca-Cola in the region
• The small land crustaceans that roll when you touch them as "roley-poleys" rather than "pill bugs" or "woodlouse"
• The push-cart at the grocery store as a "buggy"
• The small freshwater crustacean in lakes and streams as a "crawdad," "crawfish," or "crayfish" depending on the location (note: the pronunciations of crawfish and crayfish can be inverse to the spelling; i.e. crawfish pronounced as though it was spelled crayfish and vice versa)