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The New York dialect of the English language is spoken by most European Americans in New York City and much of its metropolitan area including Westchester and Rockland counties, the western half of Long Island, and a few cities in northeastern New Jersey. It is often considered to be one of the most recognizable accents within American English (Newman 2005). The English spoken in northeastern New Jersey, although often confused with that of New York City, is (outside a few cities very close to New York) actually a different dialect. Similarly, a variety of unrelated dialects are spoken in those parts of New York State outside the metropolitan area.
Geographic factors The New York dialect is closely confined to the geographically small but densely populated New York City Dialect Region, which consists of the city's five Boroughs, western and central Long Island, and the cities of Newark and Jersey City in New Jersey. However, the terms “New York English” and “New York dialect” are strictly speaking misnomers. The classic New York dialect is centered on middle and working class European Americans, and this ethnic cluster now accounts for less than half of the city’s population, although the same "White Flight" that reduced their numbers in the city has led to expansion of the dialect in the outlying areas to which they moved. Now, the most secure strongholds of the New York dialect are arguably the suburban areas of Nassau County, Suffolk County, and northeastern and southwestern Queens, although some strong New York dialect speakers do remain in urban sections of Queens, Staten Island, the Bronx, Brooklyn, and even Manhattan. It is often claimed that the dialect varies by neighborhood or borough, or that Long Islanders speak in a particular manner. In particular, many 20th-century New Yorkers have claimed to perceive a difference between Brooklyn and Bronx accents. This may be true, although no published study has found any feature that varies in this way beyond local names. Impressions that the dialect changes may also be a byproduct of class and/or ethnic variation. Ethnic and racial factors The variations of the New York accent are a result of the layering of ethnic speech from the waves of immigrants that settled in the city, starting with the Dutch and English, followed by the Irish, the Italian and the European Jews, among other groups. Over time, these collective influences "ganged" together to give New York its distinctive accent. * Some speakers claim that there are differences among speakers of European American New York English that break down along ethnic lines, particularly between the descendants of the Irish, Eastern European Jews, and Italians, the three main late 19th and early 20th Century immigrants. Evidence for this differentiation may be found in sociolinguistic research, in particular Labov's (1982), finding of differences in the rate and degree of the tensing and raising of (oh) and (aeh) of Italian American versus Jewish American New Yorkers. In the NPR interview linked below, Labov talks about Irish origin features being the most stigmatized. However, these differences are relatively minor, more of degree than kind. All groups share the relevant features. It is possible, of course, that there are substantial differences, but like geographic differences, these have not been found. That said, Sam Chwat, a prominent speech therapist, shares the widely held belief of native New Yorkers that it is possible to make clear distinctions among the accents of different ethnic groups: People talk about borough-defined New York accents, but, really, the different types of New York accents are ethnic," Mr. Chwat said. "You have the Jewish accent, as typified by Jackie Mason or Fran Drescher, the Italian accent -- Robert De Niro or Tony Danza. There's the Irish New York accent, like Rosie O'Donnell or Rudy Giuliani, "Of course he's not Irish, but he speaks with a New York Irish speech pattern". * One area that is likely to reveal robust patterns, however, is usage among Orthodox Jews, sometimes referred to as Yeshivish, for the parochial high schools members of this community attend. Such features include fully released final stops and certain Yiddish contact features, such as topicalizations of direct objects, (e.g., constructions such as Esther, she saw! or A dozen knishes, you bought!) There is also substantial use of Yiddish and particularly Hebrew words. However, it could be argued that such features are not characteristic of New York dialect because they exist among Orthodox Jews in other dialect regions. Still, in combination with other New York dialect features they are characteristic of a specific local ethno-religious community. There is no research, however, establishing these facts in the New York Dialect literature. African American New Yorkers often speak African American Vernacular English (AAVE), though with some New York Dialect features, as do most children of Black Caribbean immigrants. Many Latinos speak another distinct ethnolect, New York Latino English, characterized by a varying mix of traditional New York dialect and AAVE features along with features of Portuguese and Spanish origin. There is a tendency for middle and upper middle class members of both groups to use more New York dialect features and lower income residents to use fewer. Many East Asian American and Middle Eastern New Yorkers may also speak a recognizable variety, though one much closer to standard American English. Thus, within the dialect region, the dialect is predominantly, though not exclusively, European American. Social class factors Nevertheless, not even all European American New Yorkers use this variety. Upper-middle class European American New Yorkers and suburban residents from educated backgrounds often speak with less conspicuous accents; in particular, many, though hardly all, use rhotic pronunciations instead of the less prestigious non-rhotic pronunciations while maintaining some less stigmatized features such as the low back chain shift and the short a split (see below). Similarly, the children of professional white migrants from other parts of the US frequently do not have many New York dialect features, and as these two populations come to dominate the southern half of Manhattan and neighboring parts of Brooklyn, the dialect is retreating from their neighborhoods. Many teens attending expensive private prep schools are barely linguistically recognizable as New Yorkers. Nevertheless, many New Yorkers, particularly those of Southern and Eastern European descent from the middle- and working-class, retain varying degrees of what has been coined New Yorkese or Brooklynese, within their daily regular speech. Beyond New York Many Jewish-Americans, both Ashkenazic and Sephardic, throughout the United States have some features of a New York accent. This is the case even among some Jewish-Americans who have never lived in New York or New Jersey. This phenomenon is somewhat parallel to the spread of African American Vernacular English to the rest of the United States from its original location in the US South. Because so many Jewish-Americans have a New York-sounding accent, some people may mistakenly believe that a New York accent is a "Jewish accent," when actually, non-Jewish White New Yorkers have the same accent. Similarly, many Mafia films, most of them set in the 1940s, show many characters speaking English with a New York accent. This accent is sometimes associated with cab drivers living in the States. Pronunciation See the article International Phonetic Alphabet for explanations of the phonetic symbols used, as indicated between square brackets. These represent actual pronunciations. The symbols in curved parentheses () are variables, in this case historical word classes that have different realizations between and within dialects. This system was developed by William Labov. A link to a site with an example text read in various accents, including New York, can be found under external links. New York Dialect is predominantly characterized by the following sounds and speech patterns: Vowels In the most old-fashioned and extreme New York–area accents, the vowel sounds of words like girl and of words like oil both become a diphthong . This is often misperceived by speakers of other accents as a "reversal" of the "er" and "oy" sounds, so that girl is pronounced "goil" and oil is pronounced "erl"; this leads to the caricature of New Yorkers saying things like "Joizey" and "terlet". This particular speech pattern is no longer very prevalent; the character Archie Bunker was a good example of a speaker who had this feature. Younger New Yorkers (born since about 1950) are likely to use a rhotic in bird even if they use nonrhotic pronunciations of beard, bared, bard, board, boor, and butter. Similarly, the line-loin merger is sporadically heard in New York. Consonants Syntax Lexicon There are numerous words used mainly in New York, mostly associated with immigrant languages. A curious split in usage, reflective of the city's racial divide, involves the word punk. In the African American and Latino communities, the word tends to be used as a synomym for weak, someone unwilling or unable to defend her or usually himself or perhaps loser. That usage appears to descend from the AAVE meaning of male receptive participant in anal sex, a meaning which, in turn, may be largely lost among youth. Although this loser sense is expanding to younger European American and perhaps Asian American speakers with considerable contact with AAVE culture, an older usage, in which the term means youthful delinquent is probably still more common. Thus a newspaper article that refers to, say, some arrested muggers, as punks can have two different meanings to two different readers. Of course, the term also unambiguously means the follower of a particular musical and fashion peer cultural style (i.e. Punk rock). History The origins of the dialect are diverse, and the source of many features is probably not recoverable. Labov has pointed out that the short a split is found in southern England as mentioned above. He also claims that the vocalization and subsequent loss of (r) was copied from the prestigious London pronunciation, and so it started among the upper classes in New York and only later moved down the socioeconomic scale. This aristocratic r-lessness can be heard, for instance, in recordings of Franklin Roosevelt. After WWII, the r-ful pronunciation became the prestige norm, and what was once the upper class pronunciation became a vernacular one. Other vernacular pronunciations, such as the dental (d)'s and (t)'s may come from contact with languages such as Italian and Yiddish. Grammatical structures, such as the lack of inversion in indirect questions, have the flavor of contact with an immigrant language. As stated above, many words common in New York are of immigrant roots. Celebrities with New York accents Many celebrities have New York accents; a famous example of a very strong New York accent is often attributed to Joe Pesci, who was born in Newark. Others include Artie Lange, Danny DeVito, Joe Paterno, Billy Joel, Jeff Velocci, Muhammad Hassan, Bruce Willis, Paul Heyman, Regis Philbin, Woody Allen, Howard Stern, Ray Romano, Fran Drescher, Robert DeNiro, Al Pacino, Chazz Palminteri, Jerry Seinfeld, Mel Brooks, Barbra Streisand, Rodney Dangerfield, Bea Arthur, George Carlin, Zakk Wylde, Gilbert Gottfried, Ed Koch, Ed Burns, Rosie O'Donnell, Lloyd Banks, Cam'Ron, Jennifer Lopez, Peter Gallagher, Penny Marshall, Christopher Walken, "Mistress" Juliya Chernetsky, Vince Russo, Tazz, Bruce Arena, Andy Milonakis, Wendy Kaufman ("The Snapple Lady"), Gabe Kaplan, Steve Buscemi, Joe Pantoliano, Matt Dillon,Queen Latifah, Colin Quinn, Bugs Bunny, Al Goldstein, Cyndi Lauper, Robert Pastorelli, Carmine Giovinazzo, Joy Behar, Gerard Way, Eddie Cahill, Mike Tyson, Ron Palillo, Lil Kim, Tony Danza, Doris Roberts, Vanessa Ferlito, and Max Misch (DieselWeasel). Sportscaster Al Michaels also speaks with a New York accent sometimes, despite attending high school in Los Angeles. Famous bands with New York accents include The Beastie Boys, Dream Theater, The Ramones, The Velvet Underground, Anthrax, Type O Negative, and M.O.D.. See also | ||||||||
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