One of my uncles was born and raised in a blue collar Jersey (Joisy) City neighborhood. He had the classic Jersey City accent - bird was boid. Strangely, oil was pronounced as earl, and earl was pronounced as oil! How do these interesting local pronunciations evolve?

Does anyone know why the English put an r on the end of words which don't end with an r?
Princess Dianer
Americer
Austrailier
lawr
Florider, pronounced Floider

Would someone from England Please explain this?!

thanks

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Message: Does anyone know why the English put an r on the end of words which don't end with an r?
Princess Dianer
Americer
Austrailier
lawr
Florider, pronounced Floider

Would someone from England Please explain this?!

thanks

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This is also common in New England

For the record, not everyone who grew up in South Jersey has the New York accent. I have never pronounced Jersey "Joysey", and honestly don't know anyone who does. However water is pronounced "wudder" (rhymes with butter) instead of widda.

zootsi, I know that and so does everyone else. As if we didn't notice! That's why I was specific about getting a reply form "somone from England".

I'm from New England, and have nevah said idear, Dianer, or any of those othah words that supposedly have ahs added!:)

hehe, I love the adding of 'r's. If I had a nickel for all the time my east-coast relatives have had 'idears', i'd be a wealthy person.

I love this thread and find regional differences interesting, even those that make me crazy. I'm from western PA and many of us say "these ones" and "those ones". Apparently that is weird - or so says my husband who has lived all over the country. Is he right?

As far as "no problem", it does get a little tiring when used repetitively, but rather than thinking someone is suggesting that I might have been a problem for them, I liken it to my high school Spanish "de nada", as my instructor translated meaning "for nothing, or 'it was nothing' ". So I don't get my panties in a bunch over "no problem".

Up here in Minnesota we have a lot of wacked out Norweigians (more than the population of Norway) You here "uff" all day. It means "Oh No", "How Terrible", "Too bad Thor Clinkonhopson died", "The Hansonviger's house buned down", "Old lady Hovenhosen's lutefisk got stolen", etc.

BTW lutefisk is cod which is boiled untill it is all mushy and its totally tasteless.

Too funny jor!

But I DO really wonder why SOME native east coasters add those r's and some don't. Right in my own family I have examples. Maybe it's a speech impediment rather than an accent??? I remember "r" as being one of the most difficult letters to get straight, according to a speech therapist my daughter had in elementary school...

"....lutefisk is cod which is boiled untill it is all mushy and its totally tasteless." Yep, once was enough for me, jor. Isn't it traditionally "preserved" with lye too? I've never understood why my mother-in-law makes such a big deal about it every Christmas. That, and her meatballs. Uff Da!

beachbum, My mother used to make a big deal out of it ever Christmas until me and my brother refused to eat it. Now she makes just enough for herself and all is well in lutefisk land. You know your words well. The longer version is indeed "uff da" but only old people use the full version. My Grandma said it so much I thought it was an English word. That and naa, as in "naa uff da", Feeda (yuk), and a word for poor little chid which I can't think of right now. What is it?

I always thought Uff Da was the exact equivalent of Oy Vey in Yiddish.

Minnesota is a terrific speak study. My lifelong best friend and surrogate mother (she's 10 years older and was my right hand person raising my kids)moved from Hibbings, MN when she was 13. Not often but occasionally, she will come up with one that surprises me, even all these years later. She does the "uff da"- rarely, but she does. One time it was when her husband fell off their roof taking down Santa's sleigh. Never knew where that came from, jor.

Once I read a pre-history book that detailed a main female character with a slight birth defect/lisp speech impediment. The entire tribe's descendants all ended up speaking another dialect and separated from the group in the eventual story line.

You should hear the combinations of accents some have developed in Chicago, and I am very good at understanding people because of it. Others are amazed.
If they speak slowly enough and try for English, I can almost understand anyone. ALMOST! One day trying to do renal research in Lithuanian accent with "med talk vocabulary" became quite a challenge.

Recently while in England, my husband (from MS)made the remark that, "On our next vacation we need to go someplace where they speak English."

We live in TX & have distinct & very nasal "Tayxahs Ayuksents" but it's the, "he goes" & "I'm like" junk that drives us nuts. Even the parents of the young people start to talk that way instead of trying to educate their teens to use better grammar. Also, what is this "gravelly" sound that young girls deliberately put into their voices?

JJ5, great story about your friend. But I wonder if her background is Finn because that area has lots of Finns (Finnland), and maybe she learned Uff da from the Norwiegians.

Interesting story about the pre-history book. An increadibaly similar thing happened in Portugal hundreds of years ago. The Portugesse and Spanish spoke very simular until a Portugesse King was born with a slight birth defect/lisp speech impediment. In order to conform to the King the portugesse started using the same lisp. It is still very present. The Spainish pronounce "beer" something like "servasha" and the Portugesse say something like "thervasha".

dianee, I lived in Texas for a few years. I know exactly what you mean and when I returned for vacations to Minnestoa I could do a "Ross Perot" immitation that blew people away! I also know what you mean by that gravelly voice that girls use. Its everywere. I think they do it to act bored and throw adults off.

Great Uff Da story. I had a friend in college from a small town in North Dakota who once uttered that phrase after a few drinks, we never let her live it down, in fact on more than one occaision she had to suffer being called 'hey uff da'.

We used to have a very good word - route. (The Andrews Sisters sang about it in "Get your kicks on Route 66.)

Then football announcers started talking about a "down and out rawght" and route has disappeared. While rout is a perfectly good word and very discriptive, I don't we should have allowed it to replace route.

Also, I believe "seen" has now become the required past tense of see. I can't believe the number of times I see someone interviewed on the news who says, "I seen......" or "Then we seen....." Don't even think of using SAW unless you're talking about cutting some wood.

ziggydoo - one of my coworkers uses "seen" as such, it drives me nuts.

jor, she is mixed, but mostly Norweigan, I asked. She is a 10 on the human scale, and needs a heart valve replaced soon. We will all be praying double time on that day.

The young crowd (19-22) that surround me every day on the job, have a terrible tendency to talk in the wrong tense also. He says and he does etc. "And then he says, and then she goes....." and that is so prevalent that I have gotten to reply at times. "And then he went to get his lunch?" (Putting it in the correct tense as if I didn't understand the sequence, instead of correcting their English.) And big surprise, I do notice that several are actually using the right tense after a semester or so.
Speech in every aspect is catchy, it is probably one of the most essentially human aspects actually. If you hear it long enough, you may well have it come out that way also. Close environment is pivotal, and you can well understand isolation making groups unintelligable to one another although having the same base "language."