Midwesterners - Accent, or lack there of?

[vi edit]

I'm having a slight disagreement with some people. I said that midwesterners don't have an accent, or are lacking an accent.

Some members of another forum disagree. They say that midwesterners do have an accent - The Midwestern Accent.

Anybody have some insight on this?

 

[Isla]

When I think of a Midwestern accent, I think of Dan Rather.

It's very clean... I guess you could say I recognize it because it doesn't sound like a Northern or Southern accent.

You'd love my accent. It is what happens when Spanish people grow up in the South.

 

[Ausm]

I am from Wisconsin and I can notice different accents throughout the state...For Example, South of madison there are a ton of people from Norway who settled there and they definately have an accent. You go down to Milwaukee where there is a high concentration of German decendants and they have there own accent. You head up to Green Bay , you have a mixture of ,Polish,Norwegian, and German decendants that also have an accent.

I can also tell if a person is out of state because they do not pronounce Wisconsin correctly either.


Ausm

 

[Fausto]

You guys definitely have an accent. I have met people for the first time on occasion and have been able to guess they're from MN, WI, or MI based on that strange flat midwestern accent. I guess you just have to live somewhere else for a while to be able to hear it.

Conversely: I'm from michigan (lived there to age 18) and have lived in GA ever since. I don't have an accent to my ears, but all my friends back home rip on me for having a southern accent now.

 

[Beau]

I have no accent.

 

Im from the midwest.
Whenever people say I have an accent, I ask them who the people on TV sound like, me or them?
Thats right, its me.

<----No accent.

 

[Schadenfreude]

A "clean" accent? Isn't that an oxymoron? I dunno. I'm from Chicago, and some poeple say that I have a Chicagoan accent (very slightly) but I don't notice a difference between their speech and mine

. . ..

Some things you just can't find out by yourself, I suppose.

 

[slag]

no accent.

The people in Wisconsin have accents, West coasters have accents, oklahoma and further south people have accents, and easterners have accents, but generally midwesterners have no accent, just plain jane folks. Floridians have no accent either.

 

[vi edit]

I guess I've always realized that I've got a flat, fairly monotone, and very easy to understand "accent". Same as many midwesterners. I've always thought, and have had it explained to me that it's a "lack" of accent. No flair, pizzaz, or emotion if you will.

It's been explained to my (by a spanish teacher) that it's because of our lack of accent that it's desireable to reporters and actors because almost anyone who has learned the english language can understand you. Foreigners, southererners, easterners, northerners, ect.

 

[Isla]

Originally posted by: slag
no accent.

The people in Wisconsin have accents, West coasters have accents, oklahoma and further south people have accents, and easterners have accents, but generally midwesterners have no accent, just plain jane folks. Floridians have no accent either.

Floridians do have accents, but you have to listen carefully. I can tell a Plant City accent or a Gainesville accent from a mile away!

Now, in the bigger cities where all kinds of people have mixed, there is less of a discernable accent. But I can usually tell who's from where based on the tone and level of their twang.

<---native Floridian, slightest hint of Southern twang plus Spanish tone and cadence

 

[slag]

Wisconsinites typically pronounce it with a flat nasally A sound,

Wizcaaaaaansin


Its Wiscahnson.

short "A" sound.

 

[HomeBrewerDude]

ya you bat der is one of dem accents.

 

[Ausm]

Originally posted by: slag
Wisconsinites typically pronounce it with a flat nasally A sound, Wizcaaaaaansin Its Wiscahnson. short "A" sound.

Slag that exactly right...we take exception to people especially on TV who butcher our states pronounciation


Ausm

 

[Mill]

I can tell if someone is from the Midwest, just like I have a very strong southern accent. Just the other day a guy was in a gas station asking for directions. I asked him if he was from MN or WI and he said I am from MN how did you know? I said accent...

 

[Ausm]

Originally posted by: Fausto1
You guys definitely have an accent. I have met people for the first time on occasion and have been able to guess they're from MN, WI, or MI based on that strange flat midwestern accent. I guess you just have to live somewhere else for a while to be able to hear it. Conversely: I'm from michigan (lived there to age 18) and have lived in GA ever since. I don't have an accent to my ears, but all my friends back home rip on me for having a southern accent now.

Strange flat accent....hmm I miss the point there

Ausm

 

[Ausm]

Originally posted by: yamahaXS
ya you bat der is one of dem accents.

You must watch Al Linder's fishing shows

Ausm

 

[vi edit]

Originally posted by: Millennium
I can tell if someone is from the Midwest, just like I have a very strong southern accent. Just the other day a guy was in a gas station asking for directions. I asked him if he was from MN or WI and he said I am from MN how did you know? I said accent...

See, that's my problem.

Is one's definition of an accent nothing more than sounding different than themselves, or is an accent a variance from as plain and neutral of speaking as you can get?

 

[Fausto]

Originally posted by: ausm

Originally posted by: Fausto1
You guys definitely have an accent. I have met people for the first time on occasion and have been able to guess they're from MN, WI, or MI based on that strange flat midwestern accent. I guess you just have to live somewhere else for a while to be able to hear it. Conversely: I'm from michigan (lived there to age 18) and have lived in GA ever since. I don't have an accent to my ears, but all my friends back home rip on me for having a southern accent now.

Strange flat accent....hmm I miss the point there

Ausm

By "flat" I meant the way they pronounce certain things....vowels in particular. The word "sick" for example: the wisconsin accent makes it almost sound like it's pronounced with a short "a" to my southern-tuned ears. See what I'm getting at?

 

[vi edit]

one question -

Is it crick, or creek?

 

[Mill]

Originally posted by: vi_edit

Originally posted by: Millennium
I can tell if someone is from the Midwest, just like I have a very strong southern accent. Just the other day a guy was in a gas station asking for directions. I asked him if he was from MN or WI and he said I am from MN how did you know? I said accent...

See, that's my problem.

Is one's definition of an accent nothing more than sounding different than themselves, or is an accent a variance from as plain and neutral of speaking as you can get?

No, it was a distinct difference than what I consider neutral or normal. I can tell easily that most people have accents... mainly because I do.

 

[slag]

crick, just like Missouri is pronounced Missourah

 

[DuallyX]

Originally posted by: slag
no accent.

The people in Wisconsin have accents, West coasters have accents, oklahoma and further south people have accents, and easterners have accents, but generally midwesterners have no accent, just plain jane folks. Floridians have no accent either.

So pretty much Kansas, Nebraska and the Dokotas are safe--shoo!

 

[vi edit]

Oh, and I think that MinneSOTE'ins & Wisconsiners DO talk different than People from South Dakota, Central Illinois, and most of Iowa.

 

[Heisenberg]

Here in Kansas I don't think we have any kind of accent at all. That pretty much goes for Nebraska and Colorado too IMO.

 

[Hoober]

I'm from Indiana. I don't have an accent.


According to Mrs. Hoober, though, I have a pretty bad accent.

I think it's just the fact that people here in Colorado have accents.