Walking into the greatest coffee store in the world today I realized that I had forgotten to bring my wallet. As I explained to the clerk that I would run home and get it, I caught myself drawling my explanation: "Ah left muh wallet at home." I do this fairly often. In an embarrassing situation, I will drawl where I wouldn't normally. I also drawl when I'm making a smart remark or telling a funny story, or when I'm describing myself in some kind of self-deprecating way.
I picked the drawl almost immediately after arriving in Texas (nearly ten years ago—holy smokes). It's pleasurable to use, and it captures some linguistically expressed aspect of Texas culture that I like. Something like, heat and humidity make everything long and slow, including language. I can't say at the moment whether I also use local diphthongs; that's a point fine enough that I'd have to actually catch myself doing it. I have adopted certain local vocabulary, most notably "y'all" and its possessive "y'alls'," and the occasional "fixin' to."
The universal "coke" (for all fizzy drinks) is something I've never been able to use, but since I've been here, surrounded by a lot of people from the East Coast, I've stopped saying "pop" and mostly say "soda." That makes me sad, because even while growing up I knew that that word meant something in terms of regional identity. Nobody says "Soda" at home unless they mean the clear, bubbly water.
I am susceptible to these kinds of personal linguistic shifts in German, as well. I learned my German in the East Frisian north, and when things are really going well for me I still speak like someone from Schlicktown.* ("Nicht" sounds like "nech'," pushed up the throat with the broad back of the tongue and breathed out through the nose.) But when I spent time in Freiburg, things got a little confused; I noticed that the music of my sentences was swinging up and down, rather than ending on a distinct, downward, nasal sound. This was only made worse by the year in Munich, during which time I also stopped saying "gucken" and started using "schauen." I still have a hard time shaking that, and it's kind of embarrassing to me when I use it up north. Probably no one notices.
*the Wilhelmshaven link above wasn't working today, but normally it does...
Comments
heather, ah the melancholy of language... having also grown up a foreigner in germany, i learned my original german in Hesse--where every sentence ended with the plaintive ",..gell?" or the more formal ",gel-la?" i felt like a dork letting that slip out while living in dresden, the heart of saxony and where everyone speaks "Saechsisch"--a dialect i could understand and speak there, but which seems underwater to me now. "KAY-nuh AWW-noooong" was the reply if i was running late and wanted to know "up duh Booos es glake fur-buy?"
in my transplanted grad school home of IN, i've not been known to invoke a drawl, but i do have what i consider to be my "post-office voice"--a nice, uncertain "blonde" voice i deploy whenever i feel like bureaucrats aren't being helpful enough. works like a charm every time.
heather p
Posted by: heather at August 19, 2004 09:03 PM