Wednesday, January 18, 2017

Not So Southern; Nor Northern

In their book, Hoi Toide on the Outer Banks, The Story of the Ocracoke Brogue, Walt Wolfram and Natalie Schilling-Estes comment that "mixed in with general southern vowels on Ocracoke are several that are clearly nonsouthern, even if they don't necessarily sound distinctly northern."

They go on to point out that "islanders fully recognize that the southern ah for i is a mainland pronunciation, not an island one." When eighth grade students heard a tape-recorded story told by a southerner who used the pronunciation raht tahm for "right time" they laughed and said, "That pronunciation sounds like Raleigh!"

Just goes to show you...Ocracoke is different from the North, and different from the South too.

Our latest Ocracoke Newsletter is Capt. Rob Temple's poem, "A Pirate's Christmas." You can read it hear: http://www.villagecraftsmen.com/news122116.htm

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