Are Texas Born Blacks And Hispanics Least Likely To Have the Stereotypical Texan Accent ? (San Antonio: fit in, school district)

[Canine*Castle]

Originally Posted by bresilhac

There's no doubt about it. Rural communities in Texas are super friendly and make going to the country that much more enjoyable. I love rural Texas, rural Virginia too. They are just great places to visit and I would live out there if I could afford it.

Oh, I fell in love with rural Virginia, but rural Texas will have to do for me. Thank gosh I'm living rural.

[blueskies49]

Originally Posted by jread

I think that even Texas-born whites are less likely to have the stereotypical accent these days. Texas has urbanized tremendously over the past 15-years or so and has evolved to more of a generic "American accent". This is especially true in the larger cities (Houston, Dallas, San Antonio, Austin, etc.) where much of the population isn't even from Texas. I've even noticed that many people I grew up with don't have accent, even if their parents/grandparents do have one.

I think the "Texas accent" is slowly fading away over time and may be totally absent one day except for the very rural and isolated areas. I still would never call it "southern" though, as it's much different from anything you'd hear in the Southeastern part of the country. Also, accents vary greatly depending on what part of Texas you visit.

There is no such thing as a generic American accent. Each region of the country has it's own accent, some more noticeable than others. Also, there is no "one" Southern accent, each state has it's own dialect whether we're talking about Alabama, Tennessee, South Carolina, etc. Linguists say that the Texas accent is a combination of Southern accents. It is still alive and well in the rural areas as well as the not-so-rural towns. My stepkids range in age from 22 to 10 and grew up in Forney and they all have that Southern "country" dialect. My daughter grew up in the city (Arlington) and her out-of-state cousins say she has an accent but of course it's not as strong as my stepkids'.

You're right, though, jread, accents do change over time. I can tell the difference between the accents of my midwestern and californian coworkers and native Texans, even the ones who grew up in the city. The way words and vowels are pronounced are different and I'll bet that you do have an accent although it might not be "country".

[jread]

Originally Posted by blueskies49

There is no such thing as a generic American accent. Each region of the country has it's own accent, some more noticeable than others. Also, there is no "one" Southern accent, each state has it's own dialect whether we're talking about Alabama, Tennessee, South Carolina, etc. Linguists say that the Texas accent is a combination of Southern accents. It is still alive and well in the rural areas as well as the not-so-rural towns. My stepkids range in age from 22 to 10 and grew up in Forney and they all have that Southern "country" dialect. My daughter grew up in the city (Arlington) and her out-of-state cousins say she has an accent but of course it's not as strong as my stepkids'.

You're right, though, jread, accents do change over time. I can tell the difference between the accents of my midwestern and californian coworkers and native Texans, even the ones who grew up in the city. The way words and vowels are pronounced are different and I'll bet that you do have an accent although it might not be "country".

I do think there's a generic accent... I mainly equate it with the way people sound in Hollywood. I could not tell the difference between people in Austin and people in San Diego, or Portland, or Indianapolis, or Las Vegas, etc. It tends to be prominent in urban areas throughout the country.

I have lived in Texas my entire life, but nobody knows where I'm from until I tell them. The only slang word I use regularly is "y'all"

[Alatex]

I still would never call it "southern" though, as it's much different from anything you'd hear in the Southeastern part of the country.

As a lifelong Alabamian, I almost never hear what I think of as "familiar" accents in central Texas (Austin-San Antonio), BUT when I visited Tyler, I heard a lot of people who sound exactly like people I know in west Alabama.

Oddly enough, over the years, the three states people ever guess that I'm from from my accent are "Alabama, Mississippi, or Texas." I had never spent any significant time in Texas until this year, but my mother grew up visiting a whole lot of Texas relatives, and her father was indeed from Mississippi.

I can also add that I know a few people who grew up in Tuscaloosa, AL who have zero southern accent whatsoever as far as I can tell. Their parents came from other areas, and they talk like their parents.

[ZeroTX]

My mom is from Alabama, my dad's from Arkansas, I was born in Texas, and to me the only difference between an Alabama accent and a Texas accent is that they talk slow in Alabama.... fast in Texas.

[tstone]

Originally Posted by jread

I do think there's a generic accent... I mainly equate it with the way people sound in Hollywood. I could not tell the difference between people in Austin and people in San Diego, or Portland, or Indianapolis, or Las Vegas, etc. It tends to be prominent in urban areas throughout the country.

Generic or General?

Many people along the coast of CA have their own accents different from the Midwest. Slightly different. I can hear it every time. Good luck finding someone from there admitting to it, though!!!

As far as the OP goes, the only Hispanics with southern accents are in deep E/SE TX. Believe it or not. It's not really the TX variation though.

If you're out & about enough, you may hear a Vietnamese/Texan/Southern cross in Houston, believe it or not.

There's also a big "German Belt" in the state from Austin-San Antonio to Houston-Galveston and many of those people sound "generic" (general), even in the small towns where generations of people have lived. Certainly that has to have some influence on the big cities as well. I'm seeing articles that say those cities were 30-something % German at the beginning of statehood. So as far as S. Central & SE Texas goes, there are likely many influences that go back to the days of statehood. German, Mexican, Anglo, AA, Cajun, transplants, etc....

[txstate]

ALREADY means yes

[tstone]

Originally Posted by txstate

ALREADY means yes

Well it does in the hoods, and some wannabe tweens through college age kids say this over & over.

[bamba_boy]

Originally Posted by lifertexan

I thought it was "yona come too"

My rural black Texas born first wife and her family would always say "finta" as in "I'm finta bake some sweet potata pie". I could put it into context that it meant a future tense as in my yankee English "I'm going to bake some sweet potatoe pie". However, just what the history or entymology of "finta" was I couldn't for the life of me figure out for years. Then I developed a friendship with an elderly white man that lived his whole life in central Texas and got my clue. He would say "I'm a-fixin' ta (fixing to) make sweet potata pie" . Aha, this was the missing link to the origin of "finta":

I am going to -[texanization] -> I am fixing to -[more texanization]-> I'm a-fixin' ta -[black texanization]-> I'm finta.


Thus "I am going to" through several iterations becomes "I'm finta". I'm no linguistics professor but I think this might be a good example of how one language mutates into another similar but mutually pretty much unintelligable language like Portuguese is to Spanish.

I think if one put a bubble-dome over Texas, cut off the TX cable and satellite links, and came back in 2 or 3 centuries, "Texan" might be a whole new language that the rest of the English-speaking world would be unable to understand. :-)

[blueskies49]

Originally Posted by Alatex

As a lifelong Alabamian, I almost never hear what I think of as "familiar" accents in central Texas (Austin-San Antonio), BUT when I visited Tyler, I heard a lot of people who sound exactly like people I know in west Alabama.

Oddly enough, over the years, the three states people ever guess that I'm from from my accent are "Alabama, Mississippi, or Texas." I had never spent any significant time in Texas until this year, but my mother grew up visiting a whole lot of Texas relatives, and her father was indeed from Mississippi.

I can also add that I know a few people who grew up in Tuscaloosa, AL who have zero southern accent whatsoever as far as I can tell. Their parents came from other areas, and they talk like their parents.

TexasReb would know better than me but from what I understand, Texas was settled by those from Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee, etc. from all over the South. The Southerners mixed with the Germans and Czechs and also the Tejanos who were already here. I saw a program on tv about language and the linguist said that the Texas accent is a mix of Southern accents. Alot of original settlers in the Fort Worth area were from Tennessee.

Originally Posted by jread

I do think there's a generic accent... I mainly equate it with the way people sound in Hollywood. I could not tell the difference between people in Austin and people in San Diego, or Portland, or Indianapolis, or Las Vegas, etc. It tends to be prominent in urban areas throughout the country.

I have lived in Texas my entire life, but nobody knows where I'm from until I tell them. The only slang word I use regularly is "y'all"

You brought to mind a coworker of mine who I couldn't figure out if he was a native Texan or not. I once asked where he was from and he said Dublin. That could be why he didn't have much of the "typical" Texas accent.

Originally Posted by bamba_boy

My rural black Texas born first wife and her family would always say "finta" as in "I'm finta bake some sweet potata pie". I could put it into context that it meant a future tense as in my yankee English "I'm going to bake some sweet potatoe pie". However, just what the history or entymology of "finta" was I couldn't for the life of me figure out for years. Then I developed a friendship with an elderly white man that lived his whole life in central Texas and got my clue. He would say "I'm a-fixin' ta (fixing to) make sweet potata pie" . Aha, this was the missing link to the origin of "finta":

Not just rural blacks, I have heard rural whites also say "finta".