Everyone should check this out:
http://www.pbs.org/speak/
I saw this film and it was great, but since there are so many accents it only scratch the surface. They focus on some of the
dialects.
Dialect Myths and Reality
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MYTH: A dialect is something that SOMEONE ELSE speaks.
REALITY: Everyone who speaks a language speaks some dialect of the language; it is not possible to speak a language without speaking a dialect of the language.
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MYTH: Dialects always have highly noticeable features that set them apart.
REALITY: Some dialects get much more attention than others; the status of a dialect, however, is unrelated to public commentary about its special characteristics.
*
MYTH: Only varieties of a language spoken by socially disfavored groups are dialects.
REALITY: The notion of dialect exists apart from the social status of the language variety; there are socially favored as well as socially disfavored dialects.
*
MYTH: Dialects result from unsuccessful attempts to speak the "correct" form of a language.
REALITY: Dialect speakers acquire their language by adopting the speech features of those around them, not by failing in their attempts to adopt standard language features.
*
MYTH: Dialects have no linguistic patterning in their own right; they are derivations from standard speech.
REALITY: Dialects, like all language systems, are systematic and regular; furthermore, socially disfavored dialects can be described with the same kind of precision as standard language varieties.
*
MYTH: Dialects inherently carry negative connotations.
REALITY: Dialects are not necessarily positively or negatively valued; their social values are derived strictly from the social position of their community of speakers.
Additional Resources
Source: Wolfram, W., & Schilling-Estes, N. American English: Dialects and Variation, Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1998.
(The Catfish house in Leesville
)
