Central PA Accent (Pittsburgh, Scranton, York: home, university, living in)

[Pureblood]

What are your thoughts on this article. I feel that it is accurate.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central...ylvania_accent

One thing that I and my family say that is not listed on here is like
Where are you gon? Hard to describe how it is said. It is not goin but kind of like gone.

Same thing with what are you don? Maybe it is just that we are lazy I never picked it up until I went to college and my friends pointed it out.

[CookieSkoon]

I know a lot of southern-tier New Yorkers who sound like that. I'm one of them. X3

Maybe it's a north/central Appalachian thing?

[Pureblood]

It might be. People say my gram has a southern like accent but she lived and the same town in blair d county all her life and never even visited the south

[CookieSkoon]

Originally Posted by Pureblood

It might be. People say my gram has a southern like accent but she lived and the same town in blair d county all her life and never even visited the south

Yeah. When I moved to Baton Rouge in 2006 people kept guessing I was from West Virginia or Virginia proper. Even got a Tennessee once. But nope, I grew up within walking distance of PA in them northerly hills.

They are always surprised when I tell them.

[LibraGirl123]

Originally Posted by Pureblood

What are your thoughts on this article.

What article?

[Pureblood]

Oppps Central Pennsylvania accent - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Thanks I thought I posted the link.

[CookieSkoon]

Yup. A lot of folks I know speak like that. Extending into southern tier New York as well. I recognized almost every single example they gave.

I always say "they was" instead of "they were". Strangely enough I always type in proper English. Well... as proper as I can get it to be.

[ki0eh]

I never heard "redd up," or "sweeper" used for a powered appliance usually labeled "vacuum cleaner" on the box, in a quarter century plus in central NY state. I have dealt with a lot of rural public officials, and would say that rural Dauphin County sounds a little different than, say rural Bedford County mostly because some Pittsburghese seems to creep in. After a while away from CNY when I go back I really start to hear the Great Lakes-ish intonation that seems gradually lost from Tioga through Lycoming counties. It is kinda strange to hear a Scranton priest in Tioga County PA because that's quite a difference in speech patterns even within the same Roman Catholic diocese. Although one does not have to go far, local officials in Susquehanna County sound closer to those in Cortland County NY than they do to bordering Lackawanna County.

I do wish I were better able to characterize what I hear.

[PA2UK]

There are some notable geographic exceptions. State College in Centre County, home to the main campus of the Pennsylvania State University, has students and faculty from all over the world. Most people living in State College do not have a strong Central Pennsylvania accent, while just ten miles away in the county-seat of Bellefonte, the accent is commonly heard.

That sounds accurate. I grew up in State College (which means to students, I was a "townie") and I don't use the vast majority of the speech characteristics in this article, neither did my friends. But we always called people from Bellefonte "Bellefontians" or "Bellefusions" because they were so very different from "us".

But I was under the impression that this came from the Pennsylvania "Dutch" (Germans), not Scots-Irish:

Use of the term redd or redd up to mean "to tidy". For example, "You've got to redd up before you can go outside." This is from the old Norse by way of Middle English and probably arrived with the Scots-Irish. (The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000)