Talk:Boston accent

Karmafist 22:09, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Update

Ok, i've improved it a bit, now you can just put in {{chowdah}} to get the template, which you can see at {{chowdah}}

[edit] Milkshake and Frappe

Note: I've put this here since I had this exchange on an anon IP's talk page, and it could be of interest here, since the changes were to this article. BCorr|Брайен

Why are you deleting the references to a milkshake without ice cream? Are you thinking about McDonald's milkshakes or something? BCorr|Брайен 22:25, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

I grew up in Boston, and have never heard of or seen anything without ice cream called a milkshake. Nor has anyone else from the area that I asked. The information was inaccurate, so I removed it.

I've lived in Boston since 1987, this was one of the first things I learned here -- after being teased mercilessly for saying "pop" for a soft drink -- and it's not terribly common anymore, but it is real, and not just at one or two places. It's more common south of Boston (Quincy, Brockton, etc.) as it's the standard in Rhose Island, but can be found up in New Hampshire too. A more complete explanation is in the milkshake article here, but there are plenty of non-Wikipedia references to it:

• Answers.com
• SurveyCentral message board with people having the same argument
• Sherwood Hotels brochure about their Boston facilities (pdf format)

Thanks, BCorr|Брайен 15:15, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Without cited sources to back it up, no claim as to the meanings of "frappe" and "milkshake" in Boston is verifiable, and so should not be included in Wikipedia in the first place. --Angr (t·c) 15:43, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Found one: http://www.bartleby.com/61/66/M0296600.html --Angr (t·c) 15:56, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

is there actually an arguement over what a milkshake is, it is milk mixed with vanilla sryup, no ice cream. I didnt think there was anything to dabate or argue over. Anyone from the regions knows this.--Kev62nesl 05:09, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

No question. I'm just a teenager, so my dialect isn't probably traditional, but a milkshake is not a common drink. A frappe with ice cream is. I don't live near Boston though. I live near the cape. This is a huge distinction to make when addressing this dialect. Another biggie is "grinder".

In my mind, a milkshake does not guarantee ice cream. It should be clearly a beverage (thin straw) as opposed to a frappe (thick straw or spoon). Ladlergo 05:16, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

Okay, I grew up on the South Shore, and my family goes back a few generations here. Milkshake, ice cream soda, and frappe are three things that mean different things here than elsewhere, but all I know is that the one I want is a frappe. It's thick and ice-creamy and delicious, where a milkshake is more watered-down (due to the milk), and an ice cream soda is wicked watered-down (due to the soda water). Elsewhere in the country (and even here in Boston sometimes) a milkshake is more like the aforementioned McDonald's milkshake, meaning it's more like a frappe.

"I grew up in Boston, and have never heard of or seen anything without ice cream called a milkshake. Nor has anyone else from the area that I asked. The information was inaccurate, so I removed it." <- You are quite wrong. Before national chains moved into the area a milkshake did not have ice cream but a frappe did.

[edit] T for two

As a native of Massachusetts who has lived in both the Western and Eastern parts of the state (and it really does make a difference), I've noticed that us Massholes tend to drop the letter "t" if it occurs in the middle of a word along with other consonants or at the end of a word. Instead, we use a glottal stop ('). In the case of double "t's", the "t" sound is closer to a "d". Examples: -Moun'ain (for "mountain") -Restraun' (for "restaurant") (However, "Worcester" is pronounced "Woosta.") -Boa' (for "boat") -Bai' (for "bait") -Beddah (for "better") -Mea' cuddah (for "meat cutter")

Frankly, I don't know enough about phonetics and the IPA to write about this. Nor have I done any real research into the topic, aside from observing my own pronunciation and that of those around me. However, if anyone else has noted this habit of pronunciation and knows more about it then I do, I would appreciate the addition of the information to this article. Grammar nazi 05:27, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

This is true of American English in general, and some other dialects of English as well. It's not specific to Massachusetts by a long shot. --Angr (t·c) 05:56, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

-I think this is stronger near Connecticut. I hear this a lot, even in refined speech, in Connecticut, which is as close to newscaster as you can find usually.

[edit] Truly "non-rhotic?"

I know nothing of linguistics and phonology... I may be deceiving myself but after some years of living in the Boston area I am convinced that the "r" is not truly missing in the Boston accent, it is just different. (And, yes, subtle). A good example is the pronunciation of the town name "Arlington." I am not sure exactly what I am hearing, but something is going on. There is some kind of consonant-like-thing happening before the L. It is not pronounced "Ollington." Similarly, on close listening, I am convinced that "Harvard," while certainly not pronounced the way I would pronounce it, is not pronounced "Hahvahd." There are seven phonemes pronounced, not five.

The best way I can describe it is that when the syllable "ar" is pronounced, there is no real consonant, but the vowel is pronounced as a diphthong. The problem for me is that I can simultaneously perceive that there are two different sounds, and yet both of these sounds to me are perceived as the same "ah" phoneme.

I'll bet that native Boston-accent speakers perceive themselves to be enunciating an "r" and I'll bet they hear an "r." This is certainly true of the few that I've asked.

Lady Mondegreene department: a friend of mine mentioned misperceiving something said by a native Boston-accent speaker. The speaker was a Dr. Armington, who I met on a couple of occasions, and he pronounced his own name much the same way as the Ar- in the name of the town of Arlington. My friend said that Dr. Armington had, on a couple of occasions, used the phrase "a nominal egg" to mean "the price of something expensive." He finally asked about the meaning of this quaint New England expression, since an egg didn't seem like a good exemplar of luxury. It turned out that Armington had been saying that something cost "an arm and a leg." Dpbsmith (talk) 13:20, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

Could be a glotal stop, but I'm from Kansas, so I don't hear many people speaking with a Boston accent around here. Don't know man.Cameron Nedland 03:57, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] geographic area

I found this page very interesting! I might also add that this accent can also be found in (or is very similar to) much of Rhode Island, and eastern Connecticut (in addition to the already mentioned eastern Massachussetts, New Hampshire, and Maine). Since I'm not a linguist, I dare not attempt to change the page on my own. But basically anyone from east of the Connecticut River shares some traits of the Boston accent. It's just food for thought. Any suggestions? --VingenzoTM 15:56, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Nobody talks like the Kennedys

I take issue with the note at the end of the first paragraph stating that the best-known user of the Boston accent was JFK. NOBODY in Boston has that accent except his brother Teddy. Nobody. Come to Boston and you'll never hear this peculiar accent.

I'd also like to note that, although to the outside world all the accents from Maine to Connecticut form the larger Boston-y accent, there is a gigantic difference in accent in different areas. For example, I grew up on the South Shore, where most people speak very low in their vocal range (think words like "cahnt" for can't) and with more of a Brooklyn-like punchiness than on the North Shore, where the voice is much breathier and words are spoken much more quickly (Think PEE-biddy for Peabody). Despite the Big Dig's connecting us all together like never before, these differences seem to persist.

Hailing from North-Eastern Connecticut and having very heavy experience in Mass, Rhode Island, and Southern CT, I can say for a fact that Connecticut is for the most part "Standard American" in its accent, with a few MA and RI influenced folks here and there. Maine and Vermont, however, have quite a large "accented" population. That said, you're completely right, no one has an accent like the Kennedys. --Shaikoten 16:13, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

Joe Quimby (the mayor of Springfield, from The Simpsons) has the distinctive "Kennedy accent."

Joe Quimby you've got to be kidding--Kev62nesl 06:24, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, with Quimby. The Simpsons writers were not from New England. They, like Trey Parker and Matt Stone on South Park during Cartoon Wars, confuse the dialect with New York. Kennedy's dialect is bizzare. And its his whole family. Its more reminiscent of the accents in rural areas, where words like there and four are two syllables, than Boston sub-urbs.

Quimby is modeled after the Kennedys Joe Quimby --Kev62nesl 08:31, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

I'm from the Metro West area and few of the neighbors have anything like a Boston accent. Maybe the range of the accent should be defined a bit more clearly. Ladlergo 05:11, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

It's true that no one speaks like the Kennedys. I'm from Cambridge (a city across the charles river from Boston, for those of you who don't know) and I know this to be a fact. It is just a bureaucratic thing they have to make them seem closer to the people. This may become controversial, but I doubt it's real. J-stan 19:55, 2 August, 2006.

[edit] Time factor in debate over whether anyone talks like the Kennedys

I moved as an early teen to the Boston are(r) in the early 1970s. It was like moving to a different country. There were all these new words, like wicked, pissah. Many people talked like the Kennedys. That was nahmal. (The accents of Matt Damon and Ben Affleck in Good Will Hunting give you a sense of this. Softening of Boston accent With time, the Boston accent has softened. This has happened with the influence of television. Television provides a national standard. Children spend many hours listening to it. Aside from their parents, television is an important factor in shaping children's speech. Cumulatively, more generations have become influenced by standard American speech, and less influenced by Boston speech. Furthermore, local television stations have influenced this by employing newscasters with Standard American accents, rather than with Bostonian speech. Actually, Senators John F. Kerry and Edward M. Kennedy had stronger accents in the 1970s. When one hears recordings of their speeches from that period their accents are more pronounced.

For many people there was the notion that having the Boston accent was low class. These speakers have shed or never adopted the accent. Additionally, the colleges of Boston and Cambridge have attracted migrants from other pahts of the U.S. Many of these migrants have stayed and have influenced the mannah of speech in the Boston area(r).

So, we now have the softened Boston accent. It is too bad that aside from the Kennedys we have few easily accessible recohdings of standid Bahston speech in the 1960s. Dogru144 14:39, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Ben Affleck & Matt Damon

If those two have Boston accents, then Moxie is a delicious soda. -- Toscaesque 16:49, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

-You honestly don't know what they have. They're actors who have experianced many dialects and accents. In Good Will Hunting, Damon's accent was pretty convincing. If he spoke like that in person, I would not be able to tell if he was affecting it or not.

Many native New Englanders have learned to slip in and out of the accent at will. Early interviews with these two have shown that they have this accent. -- Malber (talk • contribs) 16:27, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

But Moxie is a delicious soda!--Mayor Beauregard 19:27, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Slang section

This section says the word 'jimmies' means only chocolate sprinkles. I have heard and used the term 'rainbow jimmies,' for meither of them would anyone around here use the word 'sprinkles,' it sound so weird. Rmpfu89 14:14, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

-Hate to say this, but "jimmies" originally referred only to chocolate sprinkles: and the reference was to "jimmy," a offensive slang term for a dark-skinned man. A number of black candies had similar names - for instance, there used to be a candy called "n***** babies" (obfuscation was my own).

—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 71.233.33.198 (talk) 13:16, 17 February 2007 (UTC).

Oh, and to the comment above.... Moxie is a delicious soda.

I'm familiar with the word "sprinkles" in reference to both kinds. However, both of my parents are from NY (Brooklyn and Niagara Falls), so maybe my vocabulary is a bit skewed. Ladlergo 05:13, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

Some of this "Boston Slang" happens to be pretty popular out in NW Kansas, so I think some of it is GA slang. Just food for thought.Cameron Nedland 04:01, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Suggested move with redirect

I suggest that this article be moved to the more accurate title "Eastern New England accent" as other states throughout New England are mentioned. The accent is more widespread than just Boston (with minor variations which are discussed in the article). A redirect will insure that anyone searching for "Boston accent" will come here. -- Malber (talk • contribs) 16:30, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] British Heritage

It is interesting how you can actually hear the transition from British English to American English within the Boston accent - like in certain features throughout the East Coast. Think about how an Englishman says 'got' and how an average American says it. The former pronounces it almost like 'goat', while with the latter it is more like 'gat'. Both of these sounds are contained in the word when a Bostonian says it.

Also, Bostonians often pronounce the H in words like "herb" while the rest of the US does not.

[edit] Mayor Quimby or Moe Szyslak?

If anyone from "The Simpsons" series talks with genuine Boston accent, it is bartender Moe Szyslak. I wouldn't say that Quimby is necessarily a good example.

Moe Szyslak is a "bad imitation of Al Pacino", in Hank Azaria's words. That is exactly Al Pacino's accent, who grew up in the Bronx. 71.195.31.76 05:43, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Bang a Uey

This article claims (without reference, shocking) that this phrase for "make a u-turn" is exclusive to New England. I can report, however, that it is used regularly in the Midwest, and certainly in Indianapolis, where I live.

[edit] Non-rhoticity elsewhere in New England

The recent edit says:

Traditional maps have marked most of the territory east of the Connecticut river as non-rhotic, but this is highly innacurate of contemporary speakers. The University of Pennsylvania's Telsur map shows non-rhoticity as only occuring with any significant frequency in Eastern Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Southeastern New Hampshire, Southeastern Connecticut, and Coastal Maine.

However, Penn's Telsur project only interviewed speakers from major cities. In other words, Eastern Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Southeastern New Hampshire, Southeastern Connecticut, and Coastal Maine are all the areas east of the Connecticut River for which Telsur has any data at all. Thus this is in no wise inconsistent with "most of the territory east of the Connecticut River" being non-rhotic—in fact, it supports it. AJD 21:57, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] boston brahmin

i added a clarification at the top of the page to distinguish from the Boston Brahmin accent. i don't know if this is the conventional way of such notation, so if anyone else wants to bring that into line with other wikipedia conventions, please do so.

As far as I know, your link was stylistically all right; however, I removed it because I have yet to see a reputable source which states that the accent of Boston Brahmins differs from the characteristics of the Boston accent described in this article. The Boston Brahmin accent article itself is linguistically confused, hopelessly vague, and totally unsourced, and it only refers to the speech of individuals who are not Boston Brahmins; see my comments in Talk:Boston Brahmin accent. AJD 05:55, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Southeastern New England

Boston is not considered "Southeastern New England" which is usually used to describe areas south of Boston. The Boston accent is common to areas to the North and South of Boston and in Boston itself. The accent is very similar in areas of southern Maine, New Hampshire and Rhode Island. A very different accent is heard in central and western Massachusetts. I don't really know how to define the area perfectly, because there is a gradual shift in the accent. In Portland, Maine, one can hear something very similar to a Boston accent, with differences such as "ayup" instead of "yup," for example. It is hard to tell where the Boston accent ends and the Maine accent begins. Alcinoe 11:57, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Vocabulary Section

I live in Northern Ireland and I just wanted to point out that I recognise some of the words and phrases which are listed under Boston slang. For example: "blinker" to mean a car indicator light, "mint" for good, and "says" in place of said. I also notice a parallel between the stated use of the word "wicked", as in very, and what some rural dwellers in Ulster say - wild, ie "That car was going wild fast!" Less common in these parts is the use of "hey" to end a question or statement - "What time are you going home, hey?". In this case, it is peculiar to Ballymena and "hey" is pronounced "hi." I wonder then if the Boston dialect is just a descendent of the language used by the many Irish settlers who left these shores to make their home in New England. I'm not a linguist by any means, but has anyone else got any ideas? Paddyman1989 00:33, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Carol Danvers (Ms. Marvel)

Can anybody tell me if this is the accent Ms. Marvel talks in? I'm from Holland, and I love to hear the voices of the characters in my comic books in their genuine accents; I hear Rogue (from X-Men) in a Mississippi drawl, I would love to know if this is what Carol sounds like. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 81.69.56.237 (talk) 17:50, 3 April 2007 (UTC).