DAVID MURDOCK: On language and dialect (and fascinating pronunciations)

I’m guessing that I’m not such as old a dog as I think — I’ve been learning some new tricks! But … they’re the same old tricks, only different.

Language, for example. Lately, I’ve had cause to look back over some of my old columns — five, six years in the past — and I’ve noticed a thing. I write differently now than I did back then. It’s a subtle difference, but it’s there. My writing style has been growing distinctly less formal over the years and growing more, for lack of a better word, “dialect-full.”

The definition of “dialect” in the Merriam-Webster online dictionary is helpful: “a regional variety of language distinguished by features of vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation from other regional varieties and constituting together with them a single language.” That definition features three points that I’ve been thinking about — “vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation.” Our particular dialect in Northeast Alabama has certain words not common in other varieties of English; we use them in a certain way; and we pronounce them a certain way.

Take the word “airish,” for example, meaning “chilly, cool,” according to the Merriam-Webster’s. It’s established enough to be in that dictionary, but my spellchecker just underlined it in red as a misspelling. One of those mornings last week when the temps hovered in the mid-20s, I texted my brother, “A mite airish today.” He knew exactly what I meant, that it was downright cold. That sort of understatement is a common feature of our dialect, so I’d add “style” to the definition of “dialect” that I quoted above.

Grammar is another distinguishing feature of our dialect. We follow rules of grammar and syntax, just not necessarily those of standard American English. We go our own way. There’s one structure that older speakers of Southern English use that has always fascinated me: the “habitual be.”

The “habitual be” is when someone says something like “She be sick.” Now, here’s the thing — that phrase is NOT the same as “She IS sick.” “She BE sick” means that she is habitually sick or always sick; “She IS sick” means she is sick right now, but will get better. Someone with a cold IS sick; someone with a chronic disease BE sick. Speakers of this particular dialect know the difference, but outsiders hear it as unsophisticated English. The “habitual be” seems to be fading away; I don’t hear it near as much as I once did.

And oh, pronunciation! We pronounce words a little differently around here. The most notable example that I can think of is pronouncing “pin” and “pen” exactly the same way. Frankly, I never even heard the difference until it was pointed out to me in college. It’s such a marked feature of Southern dialects in general that linguists call it the “pin-pen merger.”

I’m still fascinated by our pronunciations, too. My family has always pronounced our last name with a slight emphasis on the second syllable — “mur-DOCK.” In other parts of America (and in Ireland, I found), it’s pronounced “MUR-duck,” with the “dock” sounding the same as the waterfowl. I still laugh at non-Southerners trying to pronounce “Attalla,” too, and my GPS saying “Noccalula” gives me the giggle-fits.

Another one that I’ve noticed over the years is our regional pronunciation of the oi diphthong. Older folks around here pronounce it with a “long i” sound — “eye” instead of “oy.” In other words, we “bile” water, we do not “boyle” it. The most notable times I still hear that one is when someone refers to a diamondback as a “pie-zun snake,” not a “poy-son one.” Like the “habitual be,” though, that one is growing rarer and rarer. Most of the time when I hear it these days, it’s when someone is exaggerating a Southern accent, not pronouncing it naturally.

And if I were being truly “formal,” I would write “venomous snake.” “Poison” is ingested; “venom” is injected. Therefore, a snake has “venom,” not “poison.” I still know what someone means when they say “poison snake,” though.

Most of us “switch” easily between more and less formal styles of English, depending on the context. We are more formal with certain forms of address, and most of the time, we don’t notice the switch. I first noticed that in church as a child — public prayers in Evangelical churches are often prayed in a form of early modern English that replicates that of the King James Bible. We say “Thou” and “Thy” instead of “You” and “Your,” for example. Prayer is a “special language,” and we treat it accordingly.

And, I’ll end with this request. Usually when I’m introduced to someone new, the introduction includes, “He teaches English.” The person to whom I’m being introduced will usually joke, “I better watch how I’m talking, then.” Please don’t. I love to hear our dialect spoken. I truly do.

What does all this have to do with my personal writing style? Like I said, I’m getting more “dialect-full” as I mature as a writer. I no longer “fret” over how “proper” I sound — these days, I just write. I’m speaking to friends when I write this column — so I replicate the rhythms of my natural speech.

David Murdock is an English instructor at Gadsden State Community College. He can be contacted at murdockcolumn@yahoo.com. The opinions reflected are his own.

This article originally appeared on The Gadsden Times: David Murdock looks at language and dialect