North-Central American English

North-Central American English is an American English dialect, or dialect in formation, native to the Upper Midwestern United States, an area that somewhat overlaps with speakers of the separate Inland Northern dialect situated more in the eastern Great Lakes region.[1] In the United States, it is also known as the Upper Midwestern or North-Central dialect and stereotypically recognized as a Minnesota accent or sometimes Wisconsin accent (excluding Wisconsin's Milwaukee metropolitan area). It is considered to have developed in a residual dialect region from the neighboring Western, Inland Northern, and Canadian dialect regions.[2]

North-Central American English
RegionUpper Midwest
Early forms
Language codes
ISO 639-3–
GlottologNone

If a strict cot–caught merger is used to define the North-Central regional dialect, it covers the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, the northern border of Wisconsin, the whole northern half of Minnesota, some of northern South Dakota, and most of North Dakota;[3] otherwise, the dialect may be considered to extend to all of Minnesota, North Dakota, most of South Dakota, northern Iowa, and all of Wisconsin outside of the eastern ridges and lowlands.[4]

History and geography
Percentage of the U.S. in 2000, by county, with Scandinavian heritage; note Minnesota.
Percentage of the U.S. in 2000, by county, with Finnish heritage; note the upper regions of Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan.

The appearance of monophthongs in this region is sometimes attributed to the high degree of Scandinavian and German immigration to these northern states in the late 19th century. The linguist Erik R. Thomas argues that these monophthongs are the product of language contact and notes that other areas in which they occur are places in which speakers of other languages have influenced such as the Pennsylvania "Dutch" region.[5] An alternative account posits that the monophthongal variants represent historical retentions since diphthongization of the mid vowels seems to have been a relatively recent phenomenon in the history of the English language, appeared within the last few centuries, and has not affected all dialects in the United Kingdom The monophthongs heard in this region may stem from the influence of Scots-Irish or other British dialects that maintain such forms. The fact that the monophthongs also appear in Canadian English may lend support to this account since Scots-Irish speech is known as an important influence in Canada.

People living in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan (whose demonym and sometimes sub-dialect is known as "Yooper," deriving from the acronym "U.P." for "Upper Peninsula"), many northern areas of the Lower Peninsula of Michigan, and in Northern Wisconsin are largely of Finnish, French Canadian, Cornish, Scandinavian, German, and/or Native American descent. The North-Central dialect is so strongly influenced by those areas' languages and by Canada that speakers from other areas may have difficulty understanding it. Almost half the Finnish immigrants to the U.S. settled in the Upper Peninsula, and some joined Scandinavians who moved on to Minnesota. Another sub-dialect is spoken in Southcentral Alaska's Matanuska-Susitna Valley because it was settled in the 1930s (during the Great Depression) by immigrants from the North-Central dialect region.[6][7]

Phonology

Not all of these characteristics are unique to the North-Central region:

Vowels
  • /u/ and /oʊ/ are "conservative" in this region: they do not undergo the fronting that is common in some other regions of the United States. In addition to being conservative, /oʊ/ may have undergone monophthongization to [o]. The same is true for /eɪ/, which can be realized as [e], but data suggest that monophthongal variants are more common for /oʊ/ than for /eɪ/, and that they are more common in coat than in ago or road, which may indicate phonological conditioning. Regionally, monophthongal mid vowels are more common in the northern tier of states and occur more frequently in Minnesota and the Dakotas but much rarer in Iowa and Nebraska.[1] The appearance of monophthongs in the region is sometimes explained due to the high degree of Scandinavians and German immigration to these northern states in the late nineteenth century. Erik R. Thomas argues that the monophthongs are the product of language contact and notes that other areas in which they occur are places in which speakers of other languages have had an influence, such as the Pennsylvania "Dutch" region.[8] An alternative account posits that the monophthongal variants represent historical retentions. Diphthongization of the mid vowels seems to have been a relatively recent phenomenon, appearing within the last few centuries, and did not affect all dialects in the United Kingdom. The monophthongs that are heard in this region may stem from the influence of Scots-Irish or other British dialects that maintain such forms. The fact that the monophthongs also appear in Canadian English may lend support to this account since Scots-Irish speech is known as an important influence in Canada.
  • Some or partial evidence of the Northern Cities Vowel Shift, which normally defines neighboring Inland Northern American English, exists in North-Central American English. For example, /æ/ may be generally raised and /ɑ/ generally fronted in comparison to other American English accents.[9]
  • Some speakers exhibit extreme raising of /æ/ before voiced velars (/ɡ/ and /ŋ/), with an up-glide, and so bag sounds close to beg or is even raised like the first syllable of bagel. Other examples are the words flag and agriculture.[2]
  • Raising of /aɪ/ is found in the region and occurs before some voiced consonants. For example, many speakers pronounce fire, tiger, and spider with the raised vowel.[10] Some speakers in this region raise /aʊ/ as well.[11]
  • The onset of /aʊ/ if it is not subject to raising is often quite far back and results in pronunciations like [ɑʊ].
  • The cot–caught merger is common throughout the region,[2] and the vowel can be quite forward: [ä].
  • The words roof and root may be variously pronounced with either /ʊ/ or /u/; that is, with the vowel of foot or boot, respectively. That is highly variable, however, and the words are pronounced both ways in other parts of the country.
  • The North-Central accent shows certain General American features, such as rhoticity and the Mary-marry-merry merger, as well as a lack of both the pen–pin merger of the American South and the Canadian shift.[2]

Consonants

Word-initial th-stopping is possible among speakers of working-class backgrounds, especially with pronouns: 'deez' for these, 'doze' for those, 'dem' for them, etc. In addition, traces of a pitch accent as in Swedish and Norwegian persist in some areas of heavy Norwegian or Swedish settlement and among people who grew up in those areas, some of whom are not of Scandinavian descent.

Phonemic incidence

Certain phonemes appear in particular words and set the North-Central dialect apart from some other American English:[12]

  • absurd often uses /z/ (rather than /s/)
  • across may end with a final /st/ and rhyme with cost, particularly in Wisconsin
  • anti often uses /aɪ/ (rather than /i/)
  • aunt often uses /ɑ/ (rather than /æ/)
  • roof often uses /ʊ/ (rather than /u/)[13]
  • turbine often uses /ən/ (rather than /aɪn/) and so has the same pronunciation as turban
  • Words spelled with ag, such as bag or ragged, use /eɪ/ or /ɛ/ (rather than /æ/)
  • Final -ing in nouns and nonfinite verb endings tends to be realized as [in] (rather than /ɪŋ/) and so morning with g-dropping is [ˈmoɹnin][14]

Grammar

In this dialect, the preposition with is used without an object as an adverb in phrases like come with, as in Do you want to come with? for the standard Do you want to come with me? or with us? In standard English, other prepositions can be used as adverbs, like go down (down as adverb) for go down the stairs (down as preposition). With is not typically used in that way in Standard English (particularly in British and Irish English), and that feature likely came from languages spoken by some immigrants, such as Scandinavian (Danish, Swedish, Norwegian), German, or Dutch and Luxembourgish, all of which have the construction, like Danish and Swedish kom med or German komm mit.[15][16]

The adverb "yet" may be used in a phrase such as "I need to clean this room yet" to mean "still," particularly around Wisconsin and the Upper Peninsula. "Shut the lights" may mean "shut off the lights," particularly in the same places.[12]

Vocabulary

Sub-varieties

A North-Central "dialect island" exists in southcentral Alaska's Matanuska-Susitna Valley, since, in the 1930s, it absorbed large numbers of settlers from Michigan, Minnesota, and Wisconsin.[6] "Yooper" English spoken in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and Iron Range English spoken in Minnesota's Mesabi Iron Range are strong sub-varieties of the North-Central dialect, largely influenced by Fenno-Scandinavian immigration to those areas around the beginning of the twentieth century. Iron Range English is sometimes called "Rayncher" English (an eye spelling of "Ranger").[22]

Upper Peninsula English

English of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan,[23] plus some bordering areas of northeast Wisconsin,[24] colloquially known as U.P. or "Yooper" English,[25] or Yoopanese,[26] is a North-Central sub-variety with some additional influences from Finnish-speaking immigrants to the region. However, younger speakers may be starting to align closer to nearby Standard Canadian English, according to a recent study of Marquette County.[23]

The traditional Yooper accent is associated with certain features: the alveolar stops /d/ and /t/ in place of the English dental fricatives /ð/ and /θ/ (like in "then" and "thigh", so that then (/ðɛn/) becomes den (/dɛn/), etc.); the German/Scandinavian affirmative ja [jä] to mean 'yeah' or 'yes' (often Anglicized in spelling to ya); the filler or question tag eh or hey at the ends of sentences, as in Canadian English; notably raised nuclei in the vowels /aʊ/ and /aɪ/; the word youse as a second-personal plural noun, like you guys in neighboring dialects; and a marked deletion of to the (e.g., "I'm going store," "We went mall," and "We'll go Green Bay"), influenced by Finnish, which does not have any articles corresponding to a, an, or the.

The Upper Midwestern accent is made conspicuous, often to the point of parody or near-parody, in the film Fargo (especially as displayed by Frances McDormand's character Marge Gunderson) and the radio program A Prairie Home Companion (as displayed by many minor characters, especially those voiced by Sue Scott, with whom lead characters, most frequently male roles voiced by Garrison Keillor). It is also evident in the film New in Town.

Notable lifelong native speakers

See also

Notes
  1. Allen, Harold B. (1973). The Linguistic Atlas of the Upper Midwest. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. ISBN 0-8166-0686-2.
  2. Labov, William; Sharon Ash; Charles Boberg (2006). The Atlas of North American English. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. ISBN 3-11-016746-8.
  3. Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006), p. 148
  4. "Map: North Central Region". Telsur Project. University of Pennsylvania.
  5. Thomas, Erik R. (2001). An Acoustic Analysis of Vowel Variation in New World English. Publication of the American Dialect Society. Durham: Duke University Press. p. 85. ISBN 0-8223-6494-8.
  6. Purnell, T.; Raimy, E.; Salmons, J. (2009). "Defining Dialect, Perceiving Dialect, and New Dialect Formation: Sarah Palin's Speech". Journal of English Linguistics. 37 (4): 331–355 [346, 349]. doi:10.1177/0075424209348685. S2CID 144147617.
  7. Pinker, Steven (October 4, 2008). "Everything You Heard is Wrong". The New York Times. p. A19.
  8. Thomas, Erik R. (2001). An Acoustic Analysis of Vowel Variation in New World English. Publication of the American Dialect Society 85. Durham: Duke University Press. ISBN 0-8223-6494-8
  9. Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006:204)
  10. Vance, Timothy J. (1987). ""Canadian Raising" in Some Dialects of the Northern United States". American Speech. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. 62 (3): 195–210. doi:10.2307/454805. JSTOR 454805.
  11. Kurath, Hans; Raven I. McDavid (1961). The Pronunciation of English in the Atlantic States. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. ISBN 0-8173-0129-1.
  12. Jøhndal, Marius et al. (2018) [2004-2006]. "The UWM Dialect Survey". Cambridge University.
  13. Labov et al., 2006, p. 292
  14. Hunter, Marsha; Johnson, Brian K. (2009). "Articulators and Articulation". The Articulate Advocate: New Techniques of Persuasion for Trial Attorneys. Crown King Books. p. 92. ISBN 9780979689505. Regional Accents ... A distinguishing characteristic of the Upper Midwestern accent is the tendency to turn the 'ing' sound into 'een,' with a cheerful 'Good morneen!'
  15. Spartz, John M (2008). Do you want to come with?: A cross-dialectal, multi-field, variationist investigation of with as particle selected by motion verbs in the Minnesota dialect of English (Ph.D. thesis). Purdue University.
  16. Stevens, Heidi (December 8, 2010). "What's with 'come with'? Investigating the origins (and proper use) of this and other Midwesternisms". Chicago Tribune. Retrieved September 14, 2013.
  17. Vaux, Bert, Scott A. Golder, Rebecca Starr, and Britt Bolen. (2000-2005) The Dialect Survey. Survey and maps.
  18. Cassidy, Frederic Gomes, and Joan Houston Hall (eds). (2002) Dictionary of American Regional English. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
  19. Mohr, Howard. (1987) How to Talk Minnesotan: A Visitor's Guide. New York: Penguin.
  20. Brogan, Dylan (2021-09-06). "Garage versus ramp". Isthmus | Madison, Wisconsin. Retrieved 2022-04-09.
  21. Binder, David (14 September 1995). "Upper Peninsula Journal: Yes, They're Yoopers, and Proud of it". New York Times. p. A16.
  22. Kalibabky, Mike (1996). Hawdaw Talk rayncher, and Iron range Words of Wisdom. Chisolm, Minnesota: Moonlight Press.
  23. Rankinen, Wil (Fall 2014). "The Michigan Upper Peninsula English Vowel System in Finnish American Communities in Marquette County". American Speech. 89 (3): 312–347. doi:10.1215/00031283-2848989. eISSN 1527-2133. ISSN 0003-1283. Archived from the original on December 28, 2016. Retrieved October 25, 2015.
  24. Jenkins, Richard (May 21, 2015). "Linguistics Professor Provides Insight into 'Yooper' Accent Trends". The Daily Globe. Ironwood, MI. Archived from the original on November 17, 2015. Retrieved November 13, 2015.
  25. Remlinger, Kathryn; Salmons, Joseph & von Schneidemesser, Luanna (Summer 2009). "Revised Perceptions: Changing Dialect Perceptions in Wisconsin and Michigan's Upper Peninsula". American Speech. 84 (2): 176–191. doi:10.1215/00031283-2009-014. eISSN 1527-2133. ISSN 0003-1283. Retrieved November 13, 2015.
  26. Zimmerman, Karla (2010). "Great Lakes: Lake Lovers' Trail". In Benson, Sara; Balfour, Amy (eds.). USA's Best Trips: 99 Themed Itineraries Across America. Oakland: Lonely Planet. p. 350. ISBN 9781741797350. OCLC 668112230. Retrieved January 30, 2016 – via Google Books.
    Kleine, Ted (June 18, 1998). "Turning Yoopanese". Chicago Reader. Archived from the original on February 5, 2016. Retrieved January 30, 2016.
  27. Smith, Candace (2016). "Seth Meyers forced back to work in hilarious ‘Making a Murderer’ spoof." New York Daily News. NYDailyNews.com
  28. Weigel, David (2011). "Michele Bachmann for President!" GQ. Condé Nast.
  29. "What Americans sound like". The Economist. The Economist Newspaper Limited 2011.

References
  • Kortmand, Bernd; Schneider, Edgar W. (2004). A Handbook of Varieties of English. Walter de Gruyter. ISBN 978-3-11-017532-5.
  • Labov, William; Ash, Sharon; Boberg, Charles (2006). The Atlas of North American English. Berlin: Mouton-de Gruyter. pp. 187–208. ISBN 3-11-016746-8.
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