Okay, admittedly this doesn’t have a lot to do with management, arts or otherwise, but as a person who started out in theatre, I am always interested in dialects of different places. Linguist Rick Aschmann has created an interactive map of all the North American English dialects. It is really a fascinating project in terms of being able to look at the dialect boundaries for different dialects.
One of my original intentions was to point out just how small a geographic area the Greater New York City accent actually covers. I grew up just an hour north of NYC but constantly have people express amazement that I don’t have an accent. New York State isn’t New York City, kids, no matter what you see on television. But my intent was circumvented by the revelation that Downtown New Orleans is a sub-dialect of Greater New York City. Will wonders never cease!
Aschmann also has audio samples of different dialects and is grateful for suggestions and samples to add. I noticed that a lot of the samples were politicians. I figured this was because politicians posted a lot of their campaign ads on YouTube which made them good sources. Aschmann addresses this noting the different sources for dialect samples and why they tended to be reliable.
“DISCLAIMER: I do not necessarily agree with all of the people speaking here: I have simply selected them as good examples of their dialect! Nor does the fact that many of them are politicians indicate that I particularly like politicians: The fact is that politicians tend to retain their local dialect more than other public professions (actors, artists), to maintain their identity with the locals. Also, they talk in public a lot, so the data is readily available. Country singers and southern gospel singers also tend to be reliable, and I like them better than politicians. Somewhat surprisingly to me, NASCAR racers seem to be very reliable, also: even though they travel a lot for the races, they tend to raise their families in their old home town, from generation to generation, and don’t care in the least how they talk!”
We speak about the arts as a medium of expression that we don’t want to see disappear. The same can be said of many regional dialects. So take a look at the map and take pride in your dialect! (Even though you talk funny).
