Date:  Wed, 21 Jun 1995 08:50:52 -0700

From:  Peter McGraw <pmcgraw[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]CALVIN.LINFIELD.EDU>

Subject: Re: Maps



On Tue, 20 Jun 1995, Daniel S Goodman wrote:



> On Tue, 20 Jun 1995, William A. Kretzschmar, Jr. wrote:

>

> > I am not aware of any recent attempts to draw a New York City dialect

> > area. Carver's 1987 *American Regional Dialects* (with DARE evidence from

> > the 70s) doesn't do it, but does mention Metro New York in several places.

> > Labov has treated New York as a dialect in his work on modern urban sound

> > change (his *Principles of Linguistic Change*, Blackwell 1994, will give

> > pretty comprehensive references). Aside from those two, studies I know

> > come from before the 1960s.

> Thank you. I have the Carver book, and will look for the Labov book.

>

> I suspect there are people in the field who would be happy to investigate

> my question if I could provide the funding....

>

> > Whether or not Bayonne, NJ, belongs to a putative NYC dialect or not

> > seems to me to ask for sharp boundaries where none are to be expected.

> > The entire NYC-Philadelphia corridor seems to be pretty heavily populated

> > with people who work in either NYC or Philadelphia, so one might expect

> > heavy influences from the big cities throughout the region (of course

> > more influences the closer one is to either city).

>

> Understood. I grew up on or near what should, in theory, be the western

> boundary between the Hudson Valley and Upstate New York dialects. I've

> never been able to hear the difference.

>

> Dan Goodman dsg[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]maroon.tc.umn.edu

>



On the other hand...



I don't know whether Bayonne is some kind of linguistic island or not. (I

was only there once, and never left the car. What was clear even from

inside the car was a heavy Italian and I think also Irish presence.) But I

do know that on a drive from Maplewood, NJ, (where I lived at the time) to

Cape May, I went into a restaurant in some town along the way, and

realized that I had left the greater New York dialect area behind. The

difference was dramatic. Unfortunately I don't remember what town it was.



Peter McGraw

Linfield College

McMinnville, OR