On Mon, 17 Oct 2005 01:32:39 +0000 (UTC),
pedricks@ozemail.com.au("Merilyn Pedrick") wrote:
Dear James
I recall reading somewhere that it is in the mountains of Kentucky (?) where
the local speech is similar to what Elizabethan English speech must have
sounded like.
Merilyn Pedrick
Aldgate, South Australia
Actually, that's what Americans call an 'urban myth'.
There is a seed of truth in any myth, though, and
the truth here is that evolution of language proceeds
slower in isolated communities than in more well-traveled
communities.
So it is true that some communities in Appalachia
(western Kentucky, Virginia and Tennessee, most of
West Virginia and parts of other states, notably southern
Ohio) might even today have local dialects which are
more similar to older forms of English.
And it's true that some of the gullah-speakers of the
Mid-Atlantic states' outer islands mimic the language
of 200 years ago, much more than modern English speech.
But there is no reasonable assumption to be made,
regarding what spoken English sounded like 400 years
ago. Old poetry can tell us much about pronunciations,
but cannot tell us how whole phonemes have undergone
changes in pronunciation. 400 years ago, "yard" would
have rhymed with "bard", as it does today, but back then
both of them would have rhymed with how we pronounce
"cared" today: <kayrd>. Yared? Bared?
The point is that English has always been a mish-mash.
Saying that this or that current dialect resembles this
or that other historical dialect is like saying that the Nile
resembles the Mississippi because they both have water.
Elizabethan English had thoroughly anglicized several
arabic words, and had preserved plenty of saxon words.
So when is the "Queen's English" writ in stone?
Even the most remote dialect of American gullah has
internalized hundereds of words from sources outside
the community, and has changed the pronunciation and
usage of many more since the community's foundation.
Pidgin is a mish-mash. Gullah is a mish-mash. And
English itself is certainly a mish-mash, for the past
22 centuries at least.
SL
-------Original Message-------
From:
Jwc1870@aol.comDate: 10/17/05 03:44:47
To:
GEN-MEDIEVAL-L@rootsweb.comSubject: Re: Languages (OT ?)
Dear Merilyn, Leo and others,
I don`t quite understand how We
are to know with any hope of precision whether or not American, Australian
or
modern British is closer in pronunciation to Anglo Saxon, late Medieval
Court
English (ie between 1400-1500 ) , Elizabethan (abt 1560- 1605) or later
forms or even of which classes it is supposed these dialects actually do
derive
from. Interesting the speech of New England coastal Fishermen is not so
very
different from that of the Texas Cowboy, possibly because of the extensive
migrations into the west prior to and following the American Civil War.
Sincerely,
James W Cummings
Dixmont, Maine USA
I been to Maine and i been to Texas, and ya'll sound
nothing alike. Migrations, schmigrations. Texan English
is distinct from the general 'southern accent' and distinct
frm the general 'mid-plains accent'. The Texas drawl is
sure as hell distinct from the Lobsterman's drawl, to my
ears at least.
SL