inverness

[georgeetta]

I was at the watering hole asking about a departed waitress how she was doing ..her chum said she was living in ..Inverness, Fla.

but it came out like : in'foorniss ..sounded like "in furnace"

I got a kick out of that ..

other day I called about a 4x4 ATV somebody was peddlin' ..I said I knew the area she was up north of Sacandaga (in the 70's my granda 'right, fae Aberdeen min ! used to blow gaskets trying to pronounce local Dutch /n Indian name villages ..lakes) 'SCHAGTICOKE' WAS A DEAL BREAKER schnectady was not far behind ..Kayaderosseras Creek put him on the floor !!

she lady asked how I knew area ..so I told her ..well Dad's ma'd a camp up over at Edinburgh [correct Edin-bur'rah] and we'd to drive up each 3 wks to take her grocery shopping 'as she lived spring till fall ..

YEP she murdered it .. y'mean Ed 'n berg ..

just funny I guess .

th
d

[KentuckyCeltophile]

There is a Scottish guy here locally, who delivers from my favorite Chinese restaurant. He was greatly impressed that I pronounced Edinburgh and Glasgow properly.

In southern Ohio, where I am from, there are towns like Patriot (pronounced like the British version PAT-ree-ut, not PAY-tree-it) and Pedro (PEE-dro as opposed to PAY-dro). I don't know why they are like that, but everyone gets it wrong, and no one will correct you.

[Tarheel]

I still have fun listening to the folks pronounce names here in the "Magnolia State." The surname Ingram (at home in NC) is Ing-grram with two gs and a short rolling r. Here it is "ING-ram". I smile a lot and nod.

The county I live in is Lafayette. It is not pronounced anything near French sounding here. It is "La-FAY-et"
Larger more difficult names are referred to other people for interpretation.

[unixken]

As a teen, and in my early twenties, I marveled at pronunciations I'd heard all around the country, when I was in the Coast Guard.

As a native New Englander, I'd theorized that the disappearance of the letter "R" was because New England had had 350 years of maritime history. You can not yell the sound of the letter "R" from weatherdeck to crow's nest, or from one ship to another (try yelling "lob-sterrrrr." It comes out "lob-stahhhh.") I assumed that whalers and fisherman developed this tendency to replace "R" with "AH", and then upon returning to shore would propagate this to their families.

Next, I discovered in the mid-west, some folks had a tendency to add the letter "R" where none was required. People would "warsh" their clothes in "warter."

And then there were the folks I met, in the south. When stationed in North Carolina, I was apartment hunting. While speaking with the woman who would later be my land lady, I had been asking questions such as how much to expect an average utility bill to cost each month, and so on. We were talking about the expenses, and as we'd been talking about money, she asked if I had any pay-ettes. I thought to myself "Is she asking about payroll receipts or other proof of income?" I was silent. She re-phrased the question... "You got any cats or dawgs?"

So...
In New England, letters and sounds disappear... and are replaced.

In the Midwest, letters, displaced from elsewhere, are inserted where they don't belong.

In the South, not to be out done, single-syllable words gain a syllable, are hyphenated, the short "e" sound is replaced with the sound of a long "a", and the whole thing then gets appended with a final "e".

Oh... and I grew up in Quincy, Massachusetts, pronounced "Quin-Zee", though I've known people from Quincy, Illinois, pronounced "Quin-See."

[KentuckyCeltophile]

Next, I discovered in the mid-west, some folks had a tendency to add the letter "R" where none was required. People would "warsh" their clothes in "warter."

And then there were the folks I met, in the south. When stationed in North Carolina, I was apartment hunting. While speaking with the woman who would later be my land lady, I had been asking questions such as how much to expect an average utility bill to cost each month, and so on. We were talking about the expenses, and as we'd been talking about money, she asked if I had any pay-ettes. I thought to myself "Is she asking about payroll receipts or other proof of income?" I was silent. She re-phrased the question... "You got any cats or dawgs?"

I can totally relate to this as I am from the Mid-West (Ohio). I had a primary school teacher and family members who added "R" to oil (sounded like "oral"). But your "pay-ettes" story had me rolling on the floor.

[Celtic Mom]

I love this thread because I am a Navy Brat, and lived in eight states before my dad retired. I love accents, and I am sad that it seems that regional accents seem to be declining. I lived in Upstate New York, not far from Schenectady, I remember trying to fathom out the names in eighth grade when we moved there. Oregon also has some place names that are quite tricky like Willamatte, and Yachats. I now live in Utah, and here there is a tendency to drop the letter t drives me crazy. They typically say "mountain" as "mou-an," my maiden name of Barton became "Bar-un." They also pronounce "our" the same way as "are."

[Father Bill]

When Ronald Reagan was first elected president, a Canadian reporter called up the party's press secretary and asked if the president's name was pronounced "Reegan" or "Raygan". The reply was that it was definitely "Raygan".

The reporter then asked several innocuous background questions for future reference - his favourite colour, birthday, favourite movie, etc., ending with his favourite dog...
...to which the answer was that it was definitely a "baygle" which meant that the reporter still didn't know the answer to the first question.

Aren't accents fun?

[MacKenzie]

As a native New Englander, I'd theorized that the disappearance of the letter "R" was because New England had had 350 years of maritime history. You can not yell the sound of the letter "R" from weatherdeck to crow's nest, or from one ship to another (try yelling "lob-sterrrrr." It comes out "lob-stahhhh.") I assumed that whalers and fisherman developed this tendency to replace "R" with "AH", and then upon returning to shore would propagate this to their families.

I expect your theory is good. I have some friends from Maine that transplanted down heyah ta Nawth Ca-lie-nah. I always accuse them of "moving the R". As in, "Drawr me a pic-shah."

Next, I discovered in the mid-west, some folks had a tendency to add the letter "R" where none was required. People would "warsh" their clothes in "warter."

Also very prevalent in Southern Appalachia.

[MacKenzie]

I had a primary school teacher and family members who added "R" to oil (sounded like "oral").

Ya mean modur earl?

[Kiltedjohn]

A couple of off-the-cuff examples.

1) A friend was asking, in the north-East of Scotland, for directions to a place called "Sandend". The locals seemed completely baffled. Eventually, one of them said, "...unless you mean San-EEN". Apparently that was the local pronunciation!

2) On a flight-simulation programme, the traffic controllers (supposedly in Edinburgh) gave me clearance to fly to "Glas-gow" (as in "now"). They don't say it that way in Scotland!