Speech pattern and typographical variations across Canada

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by rousseau

Victualling?



Is that a holdover from a bygone era? A quick Google search suggests the strong possibility that these days the term is only used for restaurant business licences in Toronto and nowhere else.

Fascinating. And hilarious.

Howdy pardner! Step raht in and git yerself to some victualling in this here fine food emporium.

There is a similar word in French called "victuailles" which basically means "foodstuffs" I think. It's not used that often but it's not that obscure either.

[vid]

We have "victuals" in English, that's not an uncommon word, but to see it in verb form is new to me and I have a much larger vocabulary than most people I know. I know that I do because after using the word "victuals" among some people I knew, I had to explain what victuals were. They're foodstuffs, but not raw ingredients. A cake is a victual, but flour isn't, because you wouldn't eat flour as-is. Apparently it comes from a verb but I wasn't aware of that, we don't use it as a verb anymore.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by someone123

It's mostly an article about Newfoundland but the article implicitly argues that the Maritimes are more like Ontario or Western Canada than Newfoundland and I don't think this is correct.

Most Canadians probably can't even tell the difference between a Cape Breton and Newfoundland accent.

I know a lot of middle class urban Maritimers that have accents that would immediately stick out here. Plus the urban middle class of the Maritimes is full of Newfoundlanders. If you live in Halifax or Moncton and leave your house you will run into a variety of distinctive domestic accents every day. That is much less true in Toronto or Vancouver.

There is a lot of pressure to conform accent-wise in most of Canada because there is so little regional variation and differences in accents are associated with immigration. If you're a native English speaker it is relatively easy to conform to a different accent and if you're just interested in getting your point across that is the way to go rather than hearing 5 times a day about how you pronounce things in a strange way.

Nothing is ever 100%. To me the accent of the average person in Riverview and Lower Sackville definitely sounds different from a Newfoundland accent, and in spite of some east coast intonations, if I have to pick in most cases I'd probably find it closer to the accent in Nepean or Sherwood Park.

People in Moncton and Halifax who have Newfoundland-style accents are Newfoundlanders living in Moncton and Halifax. That's not a Moncton or Halifax accent they have - it's a Newfoundland accent. The same goes for the Cape Breton accent you are referring to which I assume is the Newfoundland-tinged accent that some people have in the mining region around Sydney-Glace Bay. Other parts of Cape Breton (and also some rural parts of mainland Nova Scotia) have more of a Scottish tinge to their accent, whereas the Newfoundland influence sounds more Irish.

One of my relatives is in her 70s and has been married to a Newfoundlander for close to 50 years. They lived on the island for a while and have also lived elsewhere. That person speaks French with an Acadian accent (her native accent) and speaks English with a Newfoundland accent. Neither of her accents are the local accents in either language of where they settled permanently and raised their kids.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by Acajack

One of my relatives is in her 70s and has been married to a Newfoundlander for close to 50 years. They lived on the island for a while and have also lived elsewhere. That person speaks French with an Acadian accent (her native accent) and speaks English with a Newfoundland accent. Neither of her accents are the local accents in either language of where they settled permanently and raised their kids.

Yet in the article the linguist talks about how Canada is "rich in accents" due to its immigrant population. People are still part of the linguistic landscape of a city whether they were born there or not.

In most growing cities in Canada the share of the population that was born locally is somewhat small, whereas it is very high in some rural areas. When I go back and visit the Halifax area, all of the people I visit have Atlantic-sounding accents (e.g. how they say "car") except for one whose parents are immigrants via Ontario (and he still gradually developed somewhat of an accent). This includes mostly locally-born people and a couple Newfoundlanders (who you run into all the time there). I've personally moved around a few times. Once when I moved from Vancouver to Halifax as a kid the other kids thought my BC-style pronunciation was hilarious. When I moved back here, people thought the Atlantic-style accent was weird. Lately I've met a couple newcomers here from NS and I instantly knew they were from there because of their accent.

I expect that in the long run the Atlantic accents will all disappear since it is a small region that doesn't produce a lot of its own media, and where there is a lot of population movement. But it's not my personal experience that this has already played out everywhere except Newfoundland. The dynamics in St. John's are also pretty similar to Halifax. Most of the heavy stereotypical accents you'll hear will be people who moved there from rural areas, and some people who have lived in or grew up in other parts of Canada will have a more muted accent. Younger locally-raised kids probably have much less of an accent there now than they would have 50 years ago.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by someone123

Yet in the article the linguist talks about how Canada is "rich in accents" due to its immigrant population. People are still part of the linguistic landscape of a city whether they were born there or not.

.

I know but it remains to be seen how much of a lasting impression they will leave on mainstream accents. In spite of what some people claim (e.g. citing some kids in a random part of the GTA who apparently speak with a hybrid of South Asian and Caribbean accents) I am not really seeing much so far.

Now, I am sure all of that the people who've come to live in our cities do influence local speech and accents to some degree, but it's a very slow, subtle process, as far as I can see.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by Acajack

I know but it remains to be seen how much of a lasting impression they will leave on mainstream accents. In spite of what some people claim (citing some kids in a random part of the GTA who apparently speak with a hybrid of South Asian and Caribbean accents) I am not really seeing much so far.

Now, I am sure all of that the people who've come to live in our cities do influence local speech and accents to some degree, but it's a very slow, subtle process, as far as I can see.

I don't think we will find that new long-lasting hybrid dialects will emerge in parts of the GTA. Instead we will get more and more standardized English, and maybe pockets of other languages that persist as long as there are segregated immigrant groups that maintain a connection to their home country.

But in my earlier post I was just talking about how if you go to these places today and you will hear these accents.

In the Atlantic case I think it's a bit different because there is a "general Atlantic" accent. In a place like Halifax, it's reinforced when people move there from Cape Breton or Newfoundland and it is weakened when people move there from Ontario. The impact of immigration is a bit murkier, although immigrants seem to lean a bit more toward generic Canadian or North American culture than regional stuff.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by someone123

I don't think we will find that new long-lasting hybrid dialects will emerge in parts of the GTA. Instead we will get more and more standardized English, and maybe pockets of other languages that persist as long as there are segregated immigrant groups that maintain a connection to their home country.
.

Yes, I think that's already played a role in largely moving the mainstream accent in the GTA away from any residual British influences and "hoser" type accents like you find in some other parts of Anglo-Canada, and more towards a very neutral generic North American accent and speech pattern.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by someone123

I expect that in the long run the Atlantic accents will all disappear since it is a small region that doesn't produce a lot of its own media, and where there is a lot of population movement. But it's not my personal experience that this has already played out everywhere except Newfoundland. The dynamics in St. John's are also pretty similar to Halifax. Most of the heavy stereotypical accents you'll hear will be people who moved there from rural areas, and some people who have lived in or grew up in other parts of Canada will have a more muted accent. Younger locally-raised kids probably have much less of an accent there now than they would have 50 years ago.

While clearly not as complete as in Canada west of the Ottawa River, my impression is that it is quite advanced in Atlantic Canadian cities like Halifax, Moncton, Fredericton, Charlottetown, etc. And that it has made significant inroads in the St. John's area as well. I've been meeting Townies from NL who have only the subtlest Newfoundland accent for over 20 years now. There were some who went to university with me.

As for Halifax, I have a number of cousins in their 30s who have lived their entire lives there. They're anglophones from multi-generational Maritime families and aside from a few intonations their accent isn't significantly different from those west of the Ottawa River.

I mean, they wouldn't stand out in the 416 anymore than this girl would, and she's from a small town maybe an hour or less from the CN Tower.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NZ_yXmXgUm0

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by someone123

Yet in the article the linguist talks about how Canada is "rich in accents" due to its immigrant population. People are still part of the linguistic landscape of a city whether they were born there or not.

In most growing cities in Canada the share of the population that was born locally is somewhat small, whereas it is very high in some rural areas. .

One thing I find interesting is how in spite of the fact that Americans are famously mobile all across their country, most regional accents still persist there.

The only instance that comes to mind for me where the local accent has been subsumed due to newcomers is in south Florida. And I am not really talking about the Hispanic dimension but rather the population of anglos there which generally doesn't have any type of southern accent, and whose speech is generally a mix of how "northerners" talk.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by Acajack

One thing I find interesting is how in spite of the fact that Americans are famously mobile all across their country, most regional accents still persist there.

The US is much larger and has bigger cultural and wealth divides. There are entire parallel sets of media outlets, vacation destinations, etc. for the difference groups. Canada has a couple of semi-domestic English language sources and thin regional content.

I would also bet that if you talked to a bunch of young kids in, say, Dallas, you'd get something a lot closer to the "TV accent" than you would have in 1950. But I've never been to Texas or any of the southern states (not counting the Southwest or California).

I was reading complaints the other day about how generic accents are in New York City compared to how they used to be. I think fine-grained geographically-based accents are a phenomenon that predate long-distance travel and mass media, and 1950-2000 will in retrospect be considered an interesting transitional era when cities were melting pots for these rural populations. In the future I think we will still have new accents and dialects, but they will be geographically spread out and based more around subcultures. They will also be more of a niche phenomenon, and more limited, since few people spend all of their time engrossed in a subculture (though maybe that will be more possible in the future).

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by someone123

The US is much larger and has bigger cultural and wealth divides. There are entire parallel sets of media outlets, vacation destinations, etc. for the difference groups. Canada has a couple of semi-domestic English language sources and thin regional content.

I would also bet that if you talked to a bunch of young kids in, say, Dallas, you'd get something a lot closer to the "TV accent" than you would have in 1950. But I've never been to Texas or any of the southern states (not counting the Southwest or California).

I was reading complaints the other day about how generic accents are in New York City compared to how they used to be. I think fine-grained geographically-based accents are a phenomenon that predate long-distance travel and mass media, and 1950-2000 will in retrospect be considered an interesting transitional era when cities were melting pots for these rural populations. In the future I think we will still have new accents and dialects, but they will be geographically spread out and based more around subcultures. They will also be more of a niche phenomenon, and more limited, since few people spend all of their time engrossed in a subculture (though maybe that will be more possible in the future).

Accents are definitely fading and converging within the U.S. as well. And across the anglosphere and other language "spheres" as well, I can imagine.

Just as a francophone there is a marked difference between what people in France "get" in terms of our colloquialisms compared to when I first started travelling there about 25 years ago. (And I also notice that many colloquialisms have completed died out among my kids' generation due to globalization and demographic changes. I've recalled before how my Franco-Ontarian wife once asked a group of kids if they wanted to go "aux vues", and all of them except my own kids reacted with blank stares. I guess the equivalent in English would be asking teens if they wanted to go to the "picture show" or the "nickelodeon".)

I'd also be interested in how far back in time you'd have to go before your typical Briton couldn't understand much coming out of the mouths of a average guest on, say, Jerry Springer. Certainly before the advent of television, and likely even more recently than that.

[Capsicum]

Originally Posted by someone123

Yet in the article the linguist talks about how Canada is "rich in accents" due to its immigrant population. People are still part of the linguistic landscape of a city whether they were born there or not.

Originally Posted by Acajack

I know but it remains to be seen how much of a lasting impression they will leave on mainstream accents. In spite of what some people claim (e.g. citing some kids in a random part of the GTA who apparently speak with a hybrid of South Asian and Caribbean accents) I am not really seeing much so far.

Now, I am sure all of that the people who've come to live in our cities do influence local speech and accents to some degree, but it's a very slow, subtle process, as far as I can see.

Originally Posted by someone123

I don't think we will find that new long-lasting hybrid dialects will emerge in parts of the GTA. Instead we will get more and more standardized English, and maybe pockets of other languages that persist as long as there are segregated immigrant groups that maintain a connection to their home country.

Canada doesn't really have that many examples of "ethnolects"?

That's to say, for example, speech local to an ethnic group, such as African American Vernacular English (known as "Ebonics" colloquially), or Chicano English (the English of Mexican-Americans) or the old-time Jewish American New Yorker accent, or the Italian American accent on the East coast.

These are not the non-native (English or French language) accents of first-generation Canadians discussed as "immigrant accents" as in the CBC article, but rather distinctive ways of speaking from born-and-bred native speakers of a certain ethnicity, of which there are many American examples. Some of their origins may lie in features carried from immigrant roots but they've become a characteristic of "locals".

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by Capsicum

Canada doesn't really have that many examples of "ethnolects"?

That's to say, for example, speech local to an ethnic group, such as African American Vernacular English (known as "Ebonics" colloquially), or Chicano English (the English of Mexican-Americans) or the old-time Jewish American New Yorker accent, or the Italian American accent on the East coast.

These are not the non-native (English or French language) accents of first-generation Canadians discussed as "immigrant accents" as in the CBC article, but rather distinctive ways of speaking from born-and-bred native speakers of a certain ethnicity, of which there are many American examples. Some of their origins may lie in features carried from immigrant roots but they've become a characteristics of "locals".

I guess "Newfinese" would count.

So would Chiac which is a kind of patois that mixes a ton of English words with French ones, but generally uses a French grammatical structure.

There might also be the Métis language Michif which is a mix of Plains Cree and French.

Acadian French as spoken in Nova Scotia probably qualifies as well.

[Capsicum]

Originally Posted by someone123

Yet in the article the linguist talks about how Canada is "rich in accents" due to its immigrant population. People are still part of the linguistic landscape of a city whether they were born there or not.

It's notable that the article mentions urban diversity of accents in Canada is mostly immigrant, but there are not really many homegrown non-immigrant urban accents that are distinctive. For example, in the US, a New York accent (granted, now fading away among the younger generation), a Philly accent etc. I don't think there's an accent that easily marks what city a Canadian came from, say a Winnipeg accent versus a Torontonian one. However, people do talk about the Ottawa Valley "twang". Are Canadian cities too new or there have been too few generations that lived in "big city Canada"continuously the way there were say multi-generational New Yorkers or Chicagoans? Maybe Canadian cities are composed of too many new arrivals, not just immigrants, but small-town folks from the same province or out-of-province, to have developed this.

A lot of the Canadian "ethnolects", ways of talking associated with an ethnic group that is born-and-bred, usually Métis or French Canadian, tends towards rural.

I'm not sure if ethnolects survived among rural immigrant communities that became multi-generational like Ukrainian homesteaders.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by Capsicum

It's notable that the article mentions urban diversity of accents in Canada is mostly immigrant, but there are not really many homegrown non-immigrant urban accents that are distinctive. For example, in the US, a New York accent (granted, now fading away among the younger generation), a Philly accent etc. I don't think there's an accent that easily marks what city a Canadian came from, say a Winnipeg accent versus a Torontonian one. However, people do talk about the Ottawa Valley "twang". Are Canadian cities too new or there have been too few generations that lived in "big city Canada"continuously the way there were say multi-generational New Yorkers or Chicagoans? Maybe Canadian cities are composed of too many new arrivals, not just immigrants, but small-town folks from the same province or out-of-province, to have developed this.

A lot of the Canadian "ethnolects", ways of talking associated with an ethnic group that is born-and-bred, usually Métis or French Canadian, tends towards rural.

I'm not sure if ethnolects survived among rural immigrant communities that became multi-generational like Ukrainian homesteaders.

Not really a Canadian ethnolect example (as it was probably Yiddish) but when I was younger and living in Ontario one of my good friends was from an Ashkenazi Jewish family from Montreal. Anglophone of course - no one over 60 today in that family speaks French AFAIK.

Anyway, one time I was in Montreal with my buddy and went to eat at The Brown Derby in Côte-des-Neiges. The waitress spoke to us entirely in English but it was peppered with Yiddish words. I remember at one point she said "I am just being faktata..." or something like that. I thought it was a pretty cool experience. My friends' relatives explained to me what that stuff meant.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by Capsicum

I'm not sure if ethnolects survived among rural immigrant communities that became multi-generational like Ukrainian homesteaders.

I'll chime in here as I have personal experience with that subject. I have first cousins who are around 50 give or take and like me, they are grandchildren of Ukrainian homesteaders. They have fairly thick accents for people born in Canada. Not a lot in terms of a distinctive dialect other than the rare occasional Ukrainian word thrown in there... really just a strong accent. They live about 2 hours north of Winnipeg (far away to make trips to the city a rarity, as in maybe a couple of times a year on average) on the edge of arable land, in a place where until recently, it was common to pull in 2 OTA channels on TV.

However, their kids, who are all teens and 20 somethings, have what are at most traces of accents. To hear them talk they sound fairly conventional but you can tell it's just a little bit different. It's really just a bit of spillover from the previous generation but I imagine their kids won't have any detectable accents.

I would think there must be a noticeable correlation between when TV (multichannel cable TV in particular) became commonplace and when accents started to erode.

[1overcosc]

Originally Posted by Acajack

Not really a Canadian ethnolect example (as it was probably Yiddish) but when I was younger and living in Ontario one of my good friends was from an Ashkenazi Jewish family from Montreal. Anglophone of course - no one over 60 today in that family speaks French AFAIK.

Anyway, one time I was in Montreal with my buddy and went to eat at The Brown Derby in Côte-des-Neiges. The waitress spoke to us entirely in English but it was peppered with Yiddish words. I remember at one point she said "I am just being faktata..." or something like that. I thought it was a pretty cool experience. My friends' relatives explained to me what that stuff meant.

"Yinglish", or the use of Yiddish words, is actually quite pervasive among North American Jews even today. I'm pretty far removed from my Jewish ancestors (you have to go back to my great-grandparents to find the most recent European-born ancestor, and my mother was the last person in my family to be raised according to Jewish customs) yet words like 'kvetch', 'mensch', 'schmata', 'shlep', etc. still enter my speech quite a bit.

Though this too is fading, as the more common Yiddish-isms become part of general North American slang and the more esoteric ones are forgotten by new generations. The Yiddish language itself is going extinct outside of the Hasidic community as almost nobody outside of it has transmitted the language to new generations since WWII.

[Andy6]

Originally Posted by esquire

I'll chime in here as I have personal experience with that subject. I have first cousins who are around 50 give or take and like me, they are grandchildren of Ukrainian homesteaders. They have fairly thick accents for people born in Canada. Not a lot in terms of a distinctive dialect other than the rare occasional Ukrainian word thrown in there... really just a strong accent. They live about 2 hours north of Winnipeg (far away to make trips to the city a rarity, as in maybe a couple of times a year on average) on the edge of arable land, in a place where until recently, it was common to pull in 2 OTA channels on TV.

I always remember the definition a fellow U of M philosophy student came up for the word "paradox" ... "two mallards flying over Winkler".

[esquire]

^ The accents run thick in some parts of rural Manitoba...

[Docere]

Originally Posted by Capsicum

Canada doesn't really have that many examples of "ethnolects"?

That's to say, for example, speech local to an ethnic group, such as African American Vernacular English (known as "Ebonics" colloquially), or Chicano English (the English of Mexican-Americans) or the old-time Jewish American New Yorker accent, or the Italian American accent on the East coast.

These are not the non-native (English or French language) accents of first-generation Canadians discussed as "immigrant accents" as in the CBC article, but rather distinctive ways of speaking from born-and-bred native speakers of a certain ethnicity, of which there are many American examples. Some of their origins may lie in features carried from immigrant roots but they've become a characteristic of "locals".

There's a Montreal Jewish accent. Irwin Cotler is a good example:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K1W6lywxnwU