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Location: where you sip the tea of the breasts of the spinsters of Utica
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I'm from Pittsfield originally, Wicked, a long time ago.
Quote:
Originally Posted by in_newengland
What? Maybe you have an accent.
Hot and cot rhyme to me., along with caught. He was NOT CAUGHT on the COT. A crow says caw. They all sound the same. Well, maybe caw is different, it's ah instead of aw. Totally confusing.
But CAUGHT is drawn out a little more.
Quote:
He had 3 hats and a cat (rhyme with at) after he was cawt (rhymes with bought.)
And he was caught on a cot. (rhymes with bought.)
You've got me even more confused now. In the first boldfaced statement you say that hot, cot, and caught all rhyme to you - that is, they are all pronounced the same.
In the second one, you say that cot and caught are pronounced the same, and thus hot would also rhyme with them.
That's what I was getting at with saying you pronounce it "He had 3 hawts and a cawt after he was cawt". "aw" was my way of indicating the sound in "bought". Awwww! ......... ahhhhhhhh, that's better, now I understand.
I say hot and cot to rhyme with swat. But I say caught the same way you do, to rhyme with bought, or for the "augh" to be pronounced like "Awww!" or awe.
So I say tomayto, and you say tomahto. But I shall not marry merry Mary, I won't give her any face time since she is a mime.
I'm from E.L. originally. You know.....driving along yesterday I was saying CAUGHT and COT out loud and they are slightly different. I'm supposed to be going back to WMass to visit this weekend and will check out how they/we say cot/caught.
I'm back from WMass and I checked on the (non) accent. They say caught exactly the same way they say cot.
I am not homesick for green mountains and a lush valley with a wide river. I am not homesick for green mountains and a lush valley..............(it was sooo nice to go back.)
Usually it's said that the WMass accent begins west of the Connecticut River. We pronounce our Rs and it just doesn't sound like the EMass accent. But even people from EMass who pronounce Rs and don't seem to have much of an accent still sound different to me.
When I have taken those online quizzes of what accent do you have, it usually says Ohio, New York State, standard American. To me it also sounds exactly like a Vermont accent or non-accent.
We have some different words too like grinder for sub and soda for tonic.
"My friend is wicked smaht" (Casey Affleck re: Matt Damon's dissing of a pompous MIT student in "Good Will Hunting".
THAT is my "gold standard" for how a "Bawstun" accent sounds and what I tell people to watch if they want a REAL example (not Hollywood) of how Bostonians speak.
That said, there is really NO one way of describing a "Western MA" accent. I've studied linguistics and tho' I'm no "'Enry 'Iggins", I DID once peg a guy as being from Newcastle, UK--(he sounded like Sting)--and the Brits call 'em Geordies), which is how I came by this thread!
There are just too many elements in the WMa accent that keep changing (mostly those dang college kids) but even their parents, who visit, like and stay! My mom is one. She went to UM before it was the StateU, along w/my dad. But unlike his emphasis on "proper English" (which is why I think I have NO ACCENT--heh-heh), she has preserved her unique, annoying and WEIRD combo of Mid-Mass-r-dropping-yet-dumber-sounding accent, with her own blend of of having grown up in "Sou'BRIDGE" (She is 100% French Canadian/Am).
So there you go--only the beginnings of an investigation of our accents, to which that guy Wm. Labov, only slightly understands.
I LOVE this topic and thread! Let's talk some more aboot it (as they'd say on "South Park"). Do I say "Grinder" When moved, yes. Packy? that too. But as for "Wicked"--never said it as a youn 'un (my Buckeye husband'll tell you that's a real expression...as in 'YOUNG' UN! What-choo doin'?"
Wicked even for me, with half my family in Worcester (poor sods!), was always a joke, but I'd say it to please the ones I liked. And isn't that what life's all about? Or aboot?
I just found this example of how WMass people talk. She talks the same way I do except for a few words. I noticed she said MassachuZetts, I don't put a Z in it but I've heard it that way in CT. Maybe she got that from NY, she said she lived in NY. Also, I say boy for bouy and she says buey. She says garage with a J sound, I say it with a harder G sound. I don't know anything about the round bug that curls up (does anybody?) I think the name for the sun shining when it's raining is sun showers but I only learned that on the internet; I never heard of that before.
I think this is a pretty good example of a WMass "accent."
1) Grinders
2) Tag Sales
3) Fried dough with Marinara sauce
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