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Once in a while you'll run into a native Idahoan who speaks with a drawl. It's almost like they force it. I first noticed this phenomenon way before I ever even lived in Idaho. Remember Troy McClain from the original The Apprentice? He's from Boise and has (or at least had for "the show") a drawl almost as thick as a Tennessean. Maybe this phenomenon is exclusive to "southern" Idaho.
Last edited by KurtAngleDoesn'tSuck; 05-29-2014 at 11:28 PM..
While it's not exclusive to the southern end, it's more common.
Actually, the accent comes from the Missouri-Ohio border. it came along with the Mormons, who spent a long time there and also made many converts. But once away from it's home territory, the accent changed over time, as they always do.
Anthropologists gave it a name, as it's now a separate and distinctive accent only found in the Intermountain west. It's called The Sandpete County Accent, after the Utah county where it was first recorded. Nowadays, the accent has spread northward in Idaho all the way into Canada and all our surrounding states.
Interestingly, Idaho's accent now differs from the others a little due to the large numbers of Scandinavian immigrants who move here over 100 years ago. Their dialect layered a distinct 'throat' to the accent that the Utah, Wyoming, Nevada, N. California, Montana, Oregon and Arizona versions lack. Some folks who hear it think we sound like Minnesotans more than Missourians.
As a rule, the smaller and more isolated a community is, the thicker it's accent will be. Wherever the most people in such a community came from determines how all the others will eventually speak.
Sarah Palin has strong traces of the Idaho accent; it came from her parents, who spent many years here before moving to Alaska. Even though she was just a baby when they went to Alaska, her parent's speech remained Idahoan. She most likely got it from her mother- that's the way accents are passed on.
The entire west from Colorado to the Pacific has a distinct large region accent that sound different from the Mid-West accent and the Eastern accent. And the Southern accent as well. We never hear it ourselves much unless it's very thick.
I learned this from an Indian national who spent most of his life in Nairobi, Kenya before he ended up in Idaho teaching an anthropology class at one of the colleges I flunked out of. (I got an A out of him, though. It was a cool class.) He had his own thick Indian-British African accent, but could mimic the Sandpete exactly when he wanted to, and lots of others.
While it's not exclusive to the southern end, it's more common.
Actually, the accent comes from the Missouri-Ohio border. it came along with the Mormons, who spent a long time there and also made many converts. But once away from it's home territory, the accent changed over time, as they always do.
Anthropologists gave it a name, as it's now a separate and distinctive accent only found in the Intermountain west. It's called The Sandpete County Accent, after the Utah county where it was first recorded. Nowadays, the accent has spread northward in Idaho all the way into Canada and all our surrounding states.
Interestingly, Idaho's accent now differs from the others a little due to the large numbers of Scandinavian immigrants who move here over 100 years ago. Their dialect layered a distinct 'throat' to the accent that the Utah, Wyoming, Nevada, N. California, Montana, Oregon and Arizona versions lack. Some folks who hear it think we sound like Minnesotans more than Missourians.
As a rule, the smaller and more isolated a community is, the thicker it's accent will be. Wherever the most people in such a community came from determines how all the others will eventually speak.
Sarah Palin has strong traces of the Idaho accent; it came from her parents, who spent many years here before moving to Alaska. Even though she was just a baby when they went to Alaska, her parent's speech remained Idahoan. She most likely got it from her mother- that's the way accents are passed on.
The entire west from Colorado to the Pacific has a distinct large region accent that sound different from the Mid-West accent and the Eastern accent. And the Southern accent as well. We never hear it ourselves much unless it's very thick.
I learned this from an Indian national who spent most of his life in Nairobi, Kenya before he ended up in Idaho teaching an anthropology class at one of the colleges I flunked out of. (I got an A out of him, though. It was a cool class.) He had his own thick Indian-British African accent, but could mimic the Sandpete exactly when he wanted to, and lots of others.
Sarah Palin doesn't seem like she has an accent to me and I live in Colorado. Very interesting!
While it's not exclusive to the southern end, it's more common.
Actually, the accent comes from the Missouri-Ohio border. it came along with the Mormons, who spent a long time there and also made many converts. But once away from it's home territory, the accent changed over time, as they always do.
Anthropologists gave it a name, as it's now a separate and distinctive accent only found in the Intermountain west. It's called The Sandpete County Accent, after the Utah county where it was first recorded. Nowadays, the accent has spread northward in Idaho all the way into Canada and all our surrounding states.
Interestingly, Idaho's accent now differs from the others a little due to the large numbers of Scandinavian immigrants who move here over 100 years ago. Their dialect layered a distinct 'throat' to the accent that the Utah, Wyoming, Nevada, N. California, Montana, Oregon and Arizona versions lack. Some folks who hear it think we sound like Minnesotans more than Missourians.
As a rule, the smaller and more isolated a community is, the thicker it's accent will be. Wherever the most people in such a community came from determines how all the others will eventually speak.
Sarah Palin has strong traces of the Idaho accent; it came from her parents, who spent many years here before moving to Alaska. Even though she was just a baby when they went to Alaska, her parent's speech remained Idahoan. She most likely got it from her mother- that's the way accents are passed on.
The entire west from Colorado to the Pacific has a distinct large region accent that sound different from the Mid-West accent and the Eastern accent. And the Southern accent as well. We never hear it ourselves much unless it's very thick.
I learned this from an Indian national who spent most of his life in Nairobi, Kenya before he ended up in Idaho teaching an anthropology class at one of the colleges I flunked out of. (I got an A out of him, though. It was a cool class.) He had his own thick Indian-British African accent, but could mimic the Sandpete exactly when he wanted to, and lots of others.
Interesting answer, Mike. I don't hear an accent in Idaho natives. Perhaps as you mentioned, it's a regional west coast trend. At regional meetings, I can't identify by speech if someone is from MT, OR, WY, NV, UT, WA or ID. Maybe I've had too many years of listening to music via Headphones or Earbuds, and I can't hear the "Idaho Accent." Conversely, I've been asked frequently if I'm from NYC given how rapidly I talk.
Thinking about it, I believe this is the first time.ever that I've seen a discussion about an Idaho accent. There were the fur traders an! so many headed to San Francisco for their gold fortunes, who were a large portion of the first settlers in ID.
What I honestly do not know is if those people who settled in ID vs. San Francisco or other locations more west, predominantly were from the Mid-West or east coast. Given Homesteading laws and having enough supplies to last, it seems to to me the Mid-West would have had a greater number move. Due to the travel time, and having lived on homesteads previously, as well as packing not only furniture, clothing, flour, sugar, coffee etc. as well as crop and vegetable seeds and any farming plows etc. in their wagons. Also, it would be closer to return to the Mid-West to trade furs for supplies.
Kurt blocks my responses which is fine. This was an interesting question to think through.
Others may have totally different POV and I look forward to reading them.
I don't notice a different accent here in NID as such, but do catch some terms that seem unique. "You Betcha" (made famous by Sarah Palin) is something my inlaws of Scandanavian decent say. "Ount" as opposed to Aunt (ant). Moscow with a slient W. Worshington. There are a few others I can't think of right now. We have so many recent transplants that it's all kind of a mix right now.
You got it, MSR. Even if they live in relative isolation, which strengthens an accent, some of the folks still move around.
i can't hear my own accent, but I can hear what's probably mine in others, sometimes, and friends from other places say I have one. It's also true that children, who really do learn how to speak from their mothers, also pick up speech from other kids and their extended families as well.
Over time, it doesn't matter doesn't matter as much when an immigrant moved as to how long they stayed in the new place. In time, local accents in stable populations always change differently than the old place, and the old accent stays stronger in the new place for much longer.
All Americans are increasingly sounding more alike, but we still have an abundance of accents here in the U.S.
Some oddities: All Australians share the same accent. Canadian English is considered the most neutral in speech of all English speaking nations. (but that is not to say Canadian English is accent free; it only means their accents are the least strong.)
Our pronunciation of words constantly changes nationally. We all quit saying 'for' with an O sound long ago. It's now 'fer' or 'fur'. Another word I recently noticed has changed is 'tour'. We now tend to pronounce it 'tore' instead of 'too-wer'.
I don't notice a different accent here in NID as such, but do catch some terms that seem unique. "You Betcha" (made famous by Sarah Palin) is something my inlaws of Scandanavian decent say. "Ount" as opposed to Aunt (ant). Moscow with a slient W. Worshington. There are a few others I can't think of right now. We have so many recent transplants that it's all kind of a mix right now.
"You bet" or "you betcha" are both said more often here in Idaho than in other places. Idaho speech has a lot of Scandanavian in it. Lots of Swedes moved here in the early 1900's. They farmed in the south and logged in the north.
Regional sayings and expressions tend to last forever, as do regional terms. Idahoans are also known for calling the glove compartment in a car 'the jockey box', and we still call the edge of a roadway a barrow pit.
That's a very old English term. People used to use wheel barrows to push their items along at the edges of a road because the edges were often the easiest places to push the single wheel, and in time, the wheels created a trench that made the pushing easier. "Barrow" became 'borrow' over time, and in parts of Idaho, 'borrow' became 'bar' I hear 'bar pit' all the time.
In the midwest, the accent on a city's name often differs from the original. Cairo became pronounced Kay-ro in Illinois. Hurricane, Utah, is pronounced "Herkin" by it's citizens. Many citizens of St. Anthony, Idaho pronounce their town's name S'nAnth'ny, dropping out some of the vowels, and making one word out of two.
It's a natural way of distinguishing the new place from the old. Moscow has always been pronounced "Mosco" as a way of making it a distinctive name.
The natives like to insist others use their pronunciation. Nevada is a good example. They always pronounce their state's name with a flat A- "NevAda", but most of the country still pronounces it with a soft A- "Nevoda".
The leather leggings worn by cowboys in the intermountain west are always pronounced "shaps" by the folks who wear them. "Chaps" is never pronounced with a hard 'ch'. The odd thing with this word is chaps came up from Mexico; the vaqueros invented them, and they use the hard 'ch'. They were first called chapaderos, and the term is still used down there.
My family has lived in Idaho for 3 generations. My mom has been asked numerous times in her life where in the south she's from. She always laughs and says "Southern Idaho" with as much twang as she can force into it. I've been asked the same question once myself. I personally don't hear any accent in native Idahoans' speech. I've been told that news stations like hiring newscasters from this part of the country because we have the most neutral and universally understandable accents of any part of the US.
Quote:
and we still call the edge of a roadway a barrow pit
I've lived in Idaho all of my 36 years and I've never heard anyone use this phrase. Everything else in your post, I totally agree with, but I've never heard barrow pit, borrow pit, or bar pit. Everyone I know calls the edge of the road the shoulder.
Incidentally, Sarah Palin doesn't sound anything like anyone I know in Boise or Idaho Falls. I think she totally sounds like she is from Canada, I keep expecting her to say "eh?" at the end of each sentence. I assumed it was an Alaskan accent.
I have LDS relatives in the Preston area and they use "r" in certain words.
Example: warsh instead of wash. When I lived in Utah the "r" sound was common. I was always told it is an old mormon pioneer thing.
Sarah Palin doesn't seem like she has an accent to me and I live in Colorado. Very interesting!
To me, she sounds more like she's from Wisconsin. I've never heard an accent like hers in Colorado, but I don't stray out into rural Colorado.
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I Don't Hear a Difference in Natives
