Writing VS. Saying

[Nittanylizard]

latch22 said:

And I've heard that there's a Connecticut accent, but I've never heard it myself. Supposedly, it has something to do with the R's. Maybe that comes from farther east in the state, though.

All I can think of is the Boston accent, where the letter 'R' does not exist ;D.

As far as writing speech phonetically, I believe it's better to keep it at a minimum and use speech patterns and other clues when possible to put the character's voice into the reader's head. Example:

She smiled at me. "Ziss is vedy nice."
vs.
She smiled at me, and I was tempted to ask her what Paris was really like when she spoke. "This is...how you say? Very nice."

Bad example, but the first one you have to translate, whereas the next one you can hear the accent because the narrator has indicated that the woman is from France, and she's kind of stumbling over her bad grammar. I went back to one of my stories and made a few changes once I was made aware of this, and it does come out much better without getting the reader confused. Now, if you're somebody like J.K. Rowling, you can get away with this, lol. But I think in general it's considered better to use phonetic spelling sparingly. Personally, I use "gonna" quite often. Gotta go back and fix some of those ;D.

As far as yeah and all it's forms - it drives me nuts when somebody uses "ya" or "yea" in place of "yeah" (as in, "Yea, I'm in the kitchen," Darry called back.). I read "ya" as "yah", and "yea" almost as "yay".

Liz

[latch22]

queenjaneapprxmtly said:

(Random, but I read this thing once where it said, You Know You're from Chicago When ... , and one of them was, "you measure distances from the city in minutes," or something, and I always do that. And I realized I just did it here. :p)

quote]

Thanks! (Okay, random, but there they go with those freakin' fireworks again... Can't they wait a couple of days?)

Ha, yeah, I do that with New York. I measure the distance in the time that it will take to get there. I kind of speak like that and I would pick it up more if I spent more time there... which is strange, if you think about it, since I'm not from New York... and Connecticut sucks, except for the weather. I suppose it's kind of pretty, but not in the southwest part of the state... *sighs*

I don't use "ya," and I never use "yer." I'm guilty of almost always using "yeah," though--but with the H!

Okay, I can hear it in my mind, now. It sounds an awful lot like New York, lol, except for the plural thing.

Thanks, and cheers!

[queenjaneapprxmtly]

Apparently that quote thing didn't work, lol. That's why I dislike HTML so ... it's famous for screwing up. At least in my experience, lol.

I hate using "yer," unless for a really strong type of dialect or accent, and "yea" really bugs me. Why is it so hard to type one extra letter? People are just really lazy these days.

I use "gonna" pretty much all the time, lol. Probably more than I should. But for some of my characters, "going to" just sounds weird, as you can well imagine. Another one people use a lot is "wanna" instead of "want to." :)

[fosterchild]

I use 'ya' all the time. As in 'See ya later.' I'd use 'you' if I were saying 'What're you doing?' 'Yeah' only fits for 'yeah.' lol

And, yes, I do tend to imagine how the characters would speak even as far as saying the lines as I write them.

Connecticut accent is most like Boston, I'd think. "Pahk the cah in Hahvahd Yahd."

Oh and I love 'y'all.' I use it all the time and I'm from NJ!

[latch22]

Darn HTML. It never works for me.

I've lived in Connecticut all of my life, and I've never heard anyone except my nana--who actually was born and raised in Boston--speak in any way similar to that. My best theory on that one is that the accent is associated with higher class, and money is associated with Connecticut... So many, many misconceptions...

I don't sound that way. I have a very peculiar accent, indeed. I noticed today that I mutilate my R's, or I skip them, or I slur them, the faster I speak... Example: Earlier, when I was saying, "It's not a smart thing to do," or something like that, it came out sounding like, "S'not a smut thing ta do." I sound like that when I speak quickly or when I'm excited. I enunciate more when I speak slowly. I sound kind of drunk when I when I speak quickly, lol.

I say the lines as I write them almost all of the time. As long as I know how they're pronouncing something, I don't feel the need to write it. I indicate it other ways and expect the reader to understand and apply whatever accent to whatever character that they're picturing.

Because HTML hates me, I'm just copying this:

As far as writing speech phonetically, I believe it's better to keep it at a minimum and use speech patterns and other clues when possible to put the character's voice into the reader's head.

I agree, Liz! I concur whole-heartedly, in fact.

I read "yea" as "yay." "Ya," to me, sounds like "yuh," but I still don't write it that way. I always write "you," even if I am guilty of "yeah."

Cheers!

[st.elmo-lover]

I have a Spanish teacher that is originally from Chicago and it's really funny to here him say Chicago because it sounds like he's replacing all of his vowels for different ones. It's really fun to make fun of him.

And then I have an uncle from near Boston and his accent comes out sometimes. He's a really loud man and I'm always listening to the way he speaks to make out his accent. Just to listen to it I guess. I love accents but I have to agree that sometimes in stories they are way over done. Especially the New York ones.

[fosterchild]

People do tend to over-exaggerate NY accents. And for the record (pet peeve) NO ONE really ever says 'New JOISEY.' EVER! lol

[samanthamae]

I'm completely guilty of using "ya" for "you" on occasions, but if I use that for "yes", I used y-e-a-h. Not y-a-h or y-e-a. One of my pet peeves is when people do that.

The "ing" thing turning into "in'" is used a lot in my writing, though I don't think I over do it. I hope not, anyway.

And I use "gonna" for "going to" and "wanna" for "want to" all the time. I don't think I've ever used "yer" for "your". Maybe.

I agree with the NY accent thing. Some people kinda do go over the edge with that.

[fosterchild]

LMAO!!! I love 'yins.' That's awesome!

[printandpolish]

Pahk the cah, my friends. Pahk the car.

Liz is right, the Boston accent does incredibly ridiculous things with the R, but it's simple to figure out. If it's in the middle of the word, you slur it, so park becomes paahk. At the end, make it an 'a', so sweater = sweata and quarter = quarta. And some times one goes where it doesn't belong at all, like 'warsh' for wash.

So, you see, now you can translate: "Hey, can I have a quarta for the bus? My cah won't stahhht. Mom, did you warsh my sweata?"

The midwest accent is fun too -- I went to college in Minnesota and had four years of, "Oh, for sure!" "For cute!" "Did you want to come with?" For a crash course, see the movie "Fargo."


You know what I hate? "Aren't" for "aunt. " I tend to pronouce it more "Ahnt" and one of my cousins says, "ant" but that "aren't" drives me crazy. One of my MIL's friends does it constantly: "Oh, we went to see your aren't." I always want to say, "And my isn't, too?"

Oh, and to answer the original question, I agree with Liz. I have never been able to read Huckleberry Finn because of the phonetic writing. I find it too distracting. JK Rowling writes Hagrid like that, in the Harry Potter books, and though I can hear it I find it hard to read.

[zevie]

printandpolish said:

The midwest accent is fun too -- I went to college in Minnesota and had four years of, "Oh, for sure!" "For cute!" "Did you want to come with?" For a crash course, see the movie "Fargo."

I hear all these things all the time! Didn't know it was weird though.

[printandpolish]

Not necessarily weird, Zev, just weird to the girl from Massachusetts who had only 25 letters in her alphabet!

[fairlane]

Between us New Zealanders and our Australian neighbours we have this 'thing' with the words -fish and chips-
Being on holiday in Aussie, the Australians kept saying to me "say fish and chips" and then falling about laughing when I did. They insist that we pronounce it "fush and chups", whereas to me it's them who are saying it "feesh and cheeps".

[Tensleep]

You know, I work in an office with a bunch of therapists - 3 of which are speech pathologists. I said something stupid the other day like "Yer gonna hafta take care of that" and I swear, they were all thinking I need speech therapy something awful....

I'm with Liz and Christine on Mark Twain. I just can't get past the vernacular. The furthest I got was taking an exerpt from one of his books for a story of mine and I was done with him. I mean, I live with a teen who communicates in grunts and annoying noises, so you know it's bad when I can't handle the level of broken english.