Monday, October 3, 2011

Dialect Surveys

Language in general fascinates me. It's continually changing, yet we can understand what was written and spoken in decades, centuries, and millenia past. Somehow, I came across this site, which shows the results of a dialect survey conducted in the US. The information therein says a lot about how we speak in different parts of the country and why we might at times misunderstand what another English speaker is trying to say even though they're speaking our language. Yet we are also able to resolve those misunderstandings through our mutual language. Here are a few of my favorites:

Bag
Bubbler
Coupon
Modals
Tennessee responses
Wisconsin responses

I took a little run today to see Kat and drop off something for her—I was motivated to get moving after meeting with Andrea and Heather, two of my teammates for the Ragnar Relay. I had so much (exhausting) fun doing this last year (blog, video) that I decided to do it again this year. Go Team The Village People!

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