Canada's Panamerica Identity

[rousseau]

Originally Posted by Bcasey25raptor

Those in seattle failed to pick up on any noticeable differences and I DID notice a difference in Calgary.

Why do you get so defensive and attack me for my observations?

I'm sorry but I'm sticking to my guns on this.

I felt more at home in a Starbucks in Seattle than I did in Calgary.

It's like your setting them up for me to knock them down.

First of all, I'm not the one being defensive on this. You are.

Secondly, the accent in Calgary is about the farthest thing from a drawl imaginable in this country. A drawl is characterized by long, drawn-out short As and Os, among other things. In Calgary the short As and Os are clipped. In fact, this is where one of the main differences between Western Canada and southern Ontario occurs: in southern Ontario "dance" sounds closer to dayance, though of course it isn't quite so exaggerated as over the border in Michigan or New York, much less when you get further south into the South.

Thirdly...awesome that you're "sticking to your guns" on this. Yes, please do insist that people in Seattle thought you sounded just like them while posting a video of yourself where you don't sound like them. It's like a surrealist project. You could hold up an egg and say "this is not an egg." And it would (or might) be art.

But we've got educated knowledge and academic study on North American accents combined with an actual video showing that you don't sound like people in Washington state on the one hand, and your anecdotal story on the other.

[Denscity]

I have also heard the Calgary drawl. And the Tim Hortons Ontario accent. "Oot n aboot".

[Procrastinational]

Originally Posted by YoungRepublic

What is an Ontario accent anyway?

Basically just a general Canadian accent. I would describe it as similar to a Western Canadian accent with a bit more of your stereotypical Canadian accent added in.
Whenever I go to Ontario I'm always quite surprised as to how often people say "Eh". It's something that just isn't quite as common on the west coast. People in Ontario also seem to raise their vowels a little more than out west. And... I find the way people say "about" out east stands out as being a bit odd, whereas in the Vancouver area, the pronunciation of "about" sounds a little closer to how someone would say it in Seattle.
A little more like "abowt", a little less like "aboat".

It's not all that hard to distinguish someone from Ontario in Vancouver just by listening to them talk.

The city of Toronto is a whole other animal though. So many combinations of accents in a fairly small area.



And I agree that Calgary has a slight drawl, but it's not really like the south, as it's a drawl on top of a Canadian accent. Definitely distinct.

[rousseau]

Originally Posted by Procrastinational

And I agree that Calgary has a slight drawl...

First video search result for "Calgary accent":

• Video Link

The very first word he says in the list is "ant" with a clipped short A vowel. He doesn't say anything close to ayant, which is a feature of a southern drawl. A southern Ontario accent would be closer on the continuum toward ayant, though, again, not as much as in Michigan or farther along in the American South.

He does it again with "salmon." It's a clipped A, not a drawn out A as in sayamin. And again with "Alabama," which isn't at all like Alabayama.

His vowels in "ant," "salmon" and "Alabama" are classic markers of Western Canadian English from Vancouver to Winnipeg. This is well-established. You're hearing it right here in this video. It's not necessarily a drastic difference that would make him stand out in Toronto the way someone from Kentucky would draw double-takes, certainly, but it's noticeable.

Crikey, are people on crack tonight? First you've got someone claiming that the Vancouver accent is indistinguishable from Seattle, and now you've got people saying that Calgary has a drawl?

Pass the pipe, man!

[Procrastinational]

Originally Posted by rousseau

First video search result for "Calgary accent":

• Video Link

The very first word he says in the list is "ant" with a clipped short A vowel. He doesn't say anything close to ayant, which is a feature of a southern drawl. A southern Ontario accent would be closer on the continuum toward ayant, though, again, not as much as in Michigan or farther along in the American South.

He does it again with "salmon." It's a clipped A, not a drawn out A as in sayamin. And again with "Alabama," which isn't at all like Alabayama.

His vowels in "ant," "salmon" and "Alabama" are classic markers of Western Canadian English from Vancouver to Winnipeg. This is well-established. You're hearing it right here in this video. It's not necessarily a drastic difference that would make him stand out in Toronto the way someone from Kentucky would draw double-takes, certainly, but it's noticeable.

Crikey, are people on crack tonight? First you've got someone claiming that the Vancouver accent is indistinguishable from Seattle, and now you've got people saying that Calgary has a drawl?

Pass the pipe, man!

There have been a few people I've met that had what I would describe as some sort of drawl. Not necessarily the same type of drawl you'd find in the south, but something noticeable. In each case, the person with the accent had a working class background, and grew up in Calgary.
The only instance in that particular video where I hear it a little bit is in the way he says "Alberta" right near the end. Sounds a bit like he's saying "Alburda".

I still stand by my statement of the accent of younger people in the Metro Vancouver area being more similar to that of Seattle than that of Toronto. They are by no means indistinguishable, but in Seattle, a local would pick up on someone from Toronto being from Canada before they figured out the same thing about someone from Vancouver.

Funnily enough, when flipping through radio stations while driving, it's much less obvious when you stumble upon a station from Bellingham, WA than when you stumble onto a Canadian station playing programming from Toronto. Most of the time I don't really catch onto the fact that I'm listening to an American station until they start giving the temperature in F. On the other hand, less than a minute into some programming from Ontario and the cringeworthy "aboat" rears its ugly head.

Edit: Results on youtube for Ontario accent tag sound way different from anything you hear out west. "Rooral" lol
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3HFeH5eyS3U&spfreload=10

[Doady]

Originally Posted by niwell

If there's one thing on the internet that annoys me (obviously there are FAR more than one, but I digress), it's South American's attacking anyone who refers to the United States as "America". Yeah, we get it, it's all the new world or whatever. But people from the US refer to themselves as American, and so does pretty much everywhere else in the world. I'd never think to refer to myself as American simply because I reside on the North American continent.

No offense, but this notion that someone who is North American isn't American is just incredibly stupid and illogical. That's like saying South Asians aren't Asian, or South Africans aren't African.

United States of America is the country. America is not a country. It's simple really. If you can't understand something so simple, that's your problem.

And just because most people believe something doesn't make it right. Most people in the world believe that homosexuality is wrong. Does that mean homosexuality is wrong?

North Americans aren't Americans. LOL, give me a break.

[tremblay]

Originally Posted by rousseau

Quebec and New York/Vermont? 'Nuff said.

For what it's worth I feel Québec -or southern Québec at least- is much closer to Vermont and upstate New York culturally than to Southern Ontario. A whole lot of French-Canadian ancestry over there, sugar shack/maple syrup culture, skiing, more socialist views, etc. And Adirondacks, Maine beaches, NYC, Boston attract a whole lot of tourists from Québec.

[kool maudit]

i was once a far greater proponent of the north-south-is-the-true-north-american-axis than i now am. i think that a great deal of my former faith in this ideal had a lot to do with a certain dyspepsia regarding the canadian federal dialogue (i was sick of how canada... sounded when it talked about itself. in some ways i still am), and my aesthetic preference for certain sorts of places, for a certain visual ideal.

looking at canada both in the rear-view mirror and from a distance, i have come to feel that the differences between montreal and boston, and the similarities (or cultural continuities, really) between montreal and vancouver are both more significant than i once maintained.

this does not replace my earlier view (that basically held that north america's true divisions were the temporal, "waves of settlement" ones), but it reduces its importance. the truth is, architecture, development patterns and spatial idiosyncracies are interesting but they are simply do not play as large a role in canadian or american life as i once argued, and certain country-specific circumstances play much larger roles than i once allowed.

canadians seem... canadian. americans are clearly a linked people, but there are differences (australians are also a linked people). the differences are slightly closer to the portugal/brazil scale than they are to austria /germany, which in turn is probably closer to the more minimal spread that i once argued for.

[Stryker]

Originally Posted by Doady

No offense, but this notion that someone who is North American isn't American is just incredibly stupid and illogical. That's like saying South Asians aren't Asian, or South Africans aren't African.

United States of America is the country. America is not a country. It's simple really. If you can't understand something so simple, that's your problem.

And just because most people believe something doesn't make it right. Most people in the world believe that homosexuality is wrong. Does that mean homosexuality is wrong?

North Americans aren't Americans. LOL, give me a break.

Panamerican, or citizens of the americas does just fine.

Personally I feel the term PanAmerican is far better for a whole continents worth of people.


Anyways this thread is getting absurd.

It was suppose to be about how people across the america's are similar and instead has been nothing but fixating on the minor differences between different parts of north american culture.

If you think american's and Canadians are honestly so disimilar you'd be shocked about latin americans and there differences.

That being said, a true identity of Panamericans is the idea that a country's identity is far removed from just language.

[kool maudit]

i don't find the term "panamerican" very useful as anything beyond a vague aspiration, like those "twin city/sister city"-type things, or the pen pals one's fifth-grade teacher arranges. after all, if we are to surpass particulars such as language, what is the point of hewing to landmasses? why does there need to be an intermediate step between "canadian" and "world-citizen"?

it would seem that, once one has altered one's definitions of culture and cultural in-groupism so as to account for both nova scotians and bolivians, it would be relatively simple to just go full global. or are we "panamericans" meant to have some sort of definition-requiring conflict with the pan-eurasians or pan-africans in future?

perhaps the archipelagic australomelanesians have some unpleasantness brewing as well.

[Stryker]

Originally Posted by kool maudit

i don't find the term "panamerican" very useful as anything beyond a vague aspiration, like those "twin city/sister city"-type things, or the pen pals one's fifth-grade teacher arranges. after all, if we are to surpass particulars such as language, what is the point of hewing to landmasses? why does there need to be an intermediate step between "canadian" and "world-citizen"?

it would seem that, once one has altered one's definitions of culture and cultural in-groupism so as to account for both nova scotians and bolivians, it would be relatively simple to just go full global. or are we "panamericans" meant to have some sort of definition-requiring conflict with the pan-eurasians or pan-africans in future?

perhaps the archipelagic australomelanesians have some unpleasantness brewing as well.

Well the idea I think goes like this.

If we can possible accept this sacriledge that canada and the US are far more in common than canada paired with any other country, how else can this connection be expanded.

Again thinking forward to the future, where The US-mexico connection is becoming far stronger. So the idea that canada exists part of this panamerican realm isn't totally out there.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by kwoldtimer

In Latin America "continente" and "hemisferio" are used interchangeably to mean "The Americas". I agree, however, that North and South America are two different continents.

In Spanish at least, there is a term for people from the U.S. which does not include a reference to "American": it is "Estadounidense". It also exists in French (Étatsunien) but is far less used than in Spanish.

Also note that in Quebec French the idea of using the word "Amérique" (America) to describe something continental that includes Quebec is far from being as verboten as in English Canada.

For example, I believe the front page taglines of the two major newspapers in Montreal have the word Amérique in the them:

La Presse: le plus grand quotidien français d'Amérique

Le Journal de Montréal: le no 1 des quotidiens français d'Amérique

You also have Amérique-this and Amérique-that names for stuff here and there in Quebec. One of the largest publishing houses in Quebec is called Québec-Amérique.

That said, the word "Américains" in French is still reserved for people from the United States in French.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by SignalHillHiker

As for vertical being more... I think you're wrong. I think, if we all went out for a beer, one from each state, I sure as hell wouldn't be with the TO crowd. I'd be with the Maritimes, and New England. And we'd be having a time. And you'd be with NYC or whoever. If this happened, you and I would be introduced via Boston/New York getting together and doing it - NOT by meeting each other face value. And the west would be with each other.

I've seen it actually happen too often to believe it's not the natural reaction.

Québécois would be with the Acadians, or perhaps with the people from France.

[Nouvellecosse]

Originally Posted by Doady

No offense, but this notion that someone who is North American isn't American is just incredibly stupid and illogical. That's like saying South Asians aren't Asian, or South Africans aren't African.

United States of America is the country. America is not a country. It's simple really. If you can't understand something so simple, that's your problem.

And just because most people believe something doesn't make it right. Most people in the world believe that homosexuality is wrong. Does that mean homosexuality is wrong?

North Americans aren't Americans. LOL, give me a break.

I think the prevailing nomenclature works just fine. We don't really talk collectively about people in North and South America that often for the term American to be useful as a descriptor of that. We have North America and things that are North American, we have South America and things that are South American, and we have America the country and thing that are American. There isn't any other practical adjective for things relating to the US so this system works the best. And doing what works the best is the most logical.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by SignalHillHiker

I really don't think so.

It's not that I go to Boston and there's some kinship or friendship as there is Ireland, but there is a familiarity. Boston feels like it should be the largest city in whatever country St. John's is part of.

.

This is a really good way of describing the connection of much of Atlantic Canada with New England. (Which I know all about since I am originally fromt here and have lots of relatives all over the region.)

[MolsonExport]

Originally Posted by rousseau

It's not that hard a concept to understand:

In the English language "America" refers to the United States, and "American" refers to a citizen of the United States.

Some other languages use "America" to mean the entire landmass from top to bottom, notably Spanish (and, I think, Portuguese). But there's a good argument to be made that that doesn't really make a lot of sense, as it is actually two continents.

Not one. Two.

What they really mean by "America" is the "New World," and that's a problematic concept in itself due to its Eurocentrism. See what I just did there?

Latin Americans can blather on all they want that "America is a continent," but that doesn't make it so, and we are under no obligation to change our terminology for their benefit. They sound like miserable, small-minded cranks when they hold forth on how wrong they think we are about this.

It's a meaningless, tedious argument that nobody cares about save for them. I've heard it before, and I just laugh, shrug my shoulders and change the topic. Or order another beer.

This. Make that two beers.

[Acajack]

Regarding hunting and fishing in Ontario (and even the southern part of the province), it's definitely a thing there, as evidenced by the fact that Canada's first (perhaps) and largest (likely) Bass Pro Shop Outdoor World is in Vaughan just 8 km from Toronto city limits.

People who report seeing no hunting culture at all in their regions may be having a bit of selection bias.

Sure, it might be less than in many parts of the States and even in southern Ontario.

Or perhaps you're going in the "right" direction for hunters in the U.S. (I-75 N going to the UP is a prime route) but not the right one in Canada. Tryh Highway 400 in the northern suburbs of Toronto going north in the fall for example.

[MolsonExport]

Originally Posted by rousseau

That's not true at all. We've gone over this before on this board.

Ontario has very little connection to New York or Michigan, save perhaps for economically with the car industry. They feel completely different. They are cut off from us by the water. Toronto does not feel or look even the slightest bit like Buffalo or Detroit, Chicago or Cleveland, etc. Not in the slightest.

Quebec and New York/Vermont? 'Nuff said. The borders are real cultural and social demarcations, they aren't just arbitrary lines in the sand.

You have a greater case for the similarity between the rural Prairies and North Dakota, etc. As for BC and Washngton, I've heard impassioned arguments both for and against cultural similarities. Same for Atlantic Canada and New England.

But this notion of greater vertical affinities than horizontal ones for Canada vis-a-vis the U.S. is overblown. It's a cute notion that doesn't stand up to scrutiny. Any Canadian in Toronto is going to feel a more immediate affinity with someone in Vancouver in terms of shared culture and history than he will with someone from Detroit. In spite of how much we are influenced by the U.S., we really are oriented horizontally.

Having said that, I see no evidence anywhere that Canadians are more open to the notion of America as the New World than America as the United States. We speak the same language as the people immediately south of us, and have shared a lot of mass media culture for a good century or more, so we've taken their use of "America" on board. I don't see it changing.

Right again. And I should think, patently obvious to most of those that have travelled about Canada, the US, and beyond. Superficial architectural similarities, city layouts (e.g., the "Boston/St. John's "Fuck You" Road network meme), and some ethnic heritage notwithstanding. There is a tremendous shared sociocultural affinity between people in Vancouver and Toronto; far more so than between say, Portland and Vancouver, or Toronto and Cleveland.

I was in South America this summer. It is nothing at all like Canada. It seemed more alien, culturally-speaking, than any of the places I have visited in Europe or in East Asia.

[MolsonExport]

Oh, come on, this is starting to get ridiculous. Just for starters, the people in Calgary have the same accent as you do, but as soon as you cross the border into Washington they sound very different.

Right again. I lived in Vancouver for years....I could see the USA from my apartment window; I could literally see the Peace Arch and I completely agree that the accent was shockingly different despite geographical proximity. Walking in downtown Seattle, I was distinctly reminded of being in an American city in terms of the way people interacted (or, not) with one another, despite the obvious physical built-form similarities to Vancouver.

[Nouvellecosse]

And of course, a lot of the superficial, built form elements are vestiges of our history rather than reflective our of current cultures. After all, there was a time when British North America basically all was mostly the same.