I have lately been made aware of certain quirks to my usage of the English language. There was a time when I would try to remove these non-standard affectations, so as to appear more educated. But lately, I just stopped caring.
You see, I come from the DC suburbs of Maryland (pronounced like "merlin" - [mɹ̩lɪn]), went to school in the district, but have parents from Boston. And then I went to college in Boston. For the last eight years I've lived in LA, so I assume I sound more west coast than anything else at this point. From time to time I get told that I say a few things incorrectly. However, I believe, like most linguists, that correctness has more to do with context and dialect. So, from here on out I'll just speak as feels natural, without regard to the details. To that end, here are some notes on things that sound correct to me, in the Nick Dialect.
"Orange," "iron," "tired," and "forest" are one-syllable words. Ask me to say them sometime. (In IPA, I think I'd write "iron" as [aɹn])
"Caught" and "cot" are different words that sound different. West coast speakers appear to be unable to say "caught." But now here I am judging correctness, just like I said I wouldn't. :-)
"Yeah" [jæ:] and "nah" [næ:] (not [naw]) are acceptable forms of "yes" and "no."
"Route" (as in route 66 or route 2) has two acceptable pronunciations: [ɹæʊt] and [ɹut].
The following sentences sound completely correct to me:
"We might should try using google video search here" ("Perhaps we should...")
"Where y'all from?" ("Where are you all from?" I think is how others might say it)
"This here's the latest Android phone." ("This is" rather than "This here's")
"He dove into the pool." (Apparently "dived" is more standard? That sounds so wrong.)
"Hi hon! Let's go down to the ocean." ("Hello, dear. Let's visit a beach-front town.")
"I'd like coffee, regular." (With cream or half-and-half and two sugars.)
"When you get to the rotary, take the third right." (A rotary is a traffic circle in the northeast.)
Some of this is vaguely Southern American, yet the DC suburbs are far from southern, and I sound nothing like Paula Deen. Other parts of this match a midlands accent that can be found in north-central Maryland and south-central Pennsylvania. That much, at least, matches where I grew up. Except most midlands accents call coke, er I mean soda, "pop." Seriously, who says that? Oh, and when I get angry while driving, I sometimes break out a mild Bostonian accent. Because I was always angry while driving in Boston.
