{"id":982,"date":"2023-10-10T07:47:00","date_gmt":"2023-10-10T07:47:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/worldculturepictorial.com\/wcp-blog\/?p=982"},"modified":"2023-10-08T01:26:34","modified_gmt":"2023-10-08T01:26:34","slug":"iconic-american-southern-fades-with-gen-z","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worldculturepictorial.com\/wcp-blog\/iconic-american-southern-fades-with-gen-z\/","title":{"rendered":"One of America’s most iconic (and voted “most attractive”) accents is fading: the Southern drawl declining sharply in Gen Z"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n\nWell, bless their hearts \u2014 Gen Z is killing the Southern drawl, y\u2019all.<\/a>
That\u2019s according to a new study published in Language Variation and Change, which claims the classic Southern American accent has been slowly fading over time \u2014 with the younger generation now helping to hammer the final nail into the proverbial pine box.

\n\n\u201cToday\u2019s college students don\u2019t sound like their parents, who didn\u2019t sound like their own parents,\u201d Renwick reckoned. \u201cWe noticed that older speakers often had a thick Southern drawl, while current college students didn\u2019t.\u201d For example, the team found that older Georgia natives pronounced the word \u201cprize\u201d as prahz and \u201cface\u201d as fuh-eece, but the youngest speakers use prah-eez and fayce. Renwick said that \u201cchanges to the diphthong in \u2018prize\u2019 are the oldest characteristic pronunciation in Southern speech,\u201d with the distinctive speech trait having existed for \u201cwell over\u201d a century.

\n\n\u201cThe Southern pronunciation of words like \u2018face\u2019 emerged in the early 20th century. These are distinctive features of the traditional Southern drawl,\u201d she added. The most notable changes were found between Baby Boomers (those born between 1943 and 1964) and Generation X (born between 1965 and 1982). \u201cWe were surprised to see how rapidly the Southern accent drops away starting with Gen X,\u201d Renwick said.

\n\nStudy co-author Jon Forrest, UGA assistant professor in the department of linguistics, explained that \u201cthe demographics of the South have changed a lot with people moving into the area, especially post-World War II.\u201d But he also made sure to note that the loss of regional accents can be seen all across the country. \u201cWe are seeing similar shifts across many regions, and we might find people in California, Atlanta, Boston and Detroit that have similar speech characteristics,\u201d Forrest continued. \n\nFrom Paula Deen to Julia Roberts, the Georgia drawl is fading, y\u2019all<\/a>
\nStarting with children of baby boomers born between 1965 and 1982, the typical accent began dramatically slipping away \u2014 a change that is showcased within two famous Georgia natives: think Paula Deen\u2019s accent vs. Julia Roberts\u2019s shorter-sounding vowels.

\n\nBut it\u2019s not like people suddenly woke up and decided to adopt an accent like Cher Horowitz\u2019s in the film \u201cClueless.\u201d According to the study, the change was sparked by the migration from different parts of the country into Georgia and other Sun Belt states after World War II. \u201cYou now have a lot of people growing up in a world where there are a lot of different kinds of accents and ways of talking,\u201d said Jon Forrest, a University of Georgia professor who co-authored the study. \u201cAnd these Gen X kids would\u2019ve gone to school, for example, with people who had grown up somewhere else \u2014 so they gradually shifted their speech and passed that on to their children, and so on.\u201d

\n\nAfter analyzing voice samples from White people born and raised in Georgia between 1887 and 2003, the researchers noticed a big change in pronunciation: The distinctive Southern \u201cuh\u201d that gives words an extra vowel sound \u2014 think buh-eet for \u201cbeet\u201d or buh-eyt for \u201cbait\u201d \u2014 has faded, leaving a flatter, more pan-regional accent in its wake. \u201cWe found that all of those vowels are more Southern in older speakers, and less Southern in younger speakers \u2014 to the extent that younger speakers really have a completely different accent,\u201d Renwick added.

\n\nWhat\u2019s known as the stereotypical Southern accent actually began in the post-Civil War era \u2014 so no, the Hollywood-created accents in \u201cGone with the Wind\u201d are not really authentic. Around that time, words such as \u201cride,\u201d \u201cprize\u201d and \u201cbike\u201d suddenly became raahd, prahz and baahk. Over the next decades, more variations \u2014 such as the way \u201cpin\u201d and \u201cpen\u201d are pronounced the same way \u2014 would be added on until the accent reached its peak with the baby boomer generation.

\n\nThe phenomenon isn\u2019t limited to Georgia. The same thing is happening in Raleigh, N.C, Forrest said. Another example of how changes in demographics have shaken up language can be found in Miami, where decades of Latin American migration led to Spanish and English intertwining and evolving into a distinct dialect.

\n\n\u201cA lot of previous regional varieties are going away,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s not always monolithically, but we\u2019re seeing changes in accents that are similar to ones we see in other major urban areas across the United States.\u201d

\n\nSometimes, Forrest said, those changes could be subconscious and a product of people soaking up their peers\u2019 way of talking. But, for others, negative stereotypes surrounding the Southern accent might have played a role in their opting to supplant the drawl as \u201cwe tend to reconstruct people from their cultural symbols, including their dialect.\u201d

\n\nToday, with about 8.4% of people moving, according to 2021 US Census data, and Americans connected through technologies such as social media, accents continue, usually slowly, to shift.<\/a>
\nSometimes, though, the story isn\u2019t about slow change. It\u2019s about something dramatic happening. For instance, did you know an accent can change because of a Hollywood portrayal? The 1996 movie \u201cFargo\u201d made people in the Upper Midwest think twice about their vowel shift, according to Dennis Preston, Oklahoma State University professor emeritus of linguistics, who spoke in a podcast episode.

\n\nBut do we lose something with changing accents, especially those that come about because of social pressure? \u201cWe\u2019re eliminating a lot of the rich history that people come with when we encounter different people,\u201d Holiday said. \u201cI would hate to see \u2026 social pressure cause the disappearance of these varieties that can tell us so much about the world that we live in in our history.\u201d

\n\nThe lure of a Southern drawl at the movies<\/a>
\n\u201cThere are things you can get away with in this world, and things you can\u2019t.\u201d The voice is Matthew McConaughey\u2019s, and days after seeing him in \u201cMud,\u201d I can close my eyes and hear him still \u2014 a simple line echoing with the mysteries of a man caught in the emotional muck and Mississippi mud of Jeff Nichols\u2019 fine new drama.

\n\nMcConaughey\u2019s voice is like that, so specifically seasoned by Texas you know it sight unseen. That\u2019s the power of a drawl, the way it can wrap entire stories and an ocean of feelings in honeyed tones; the way it can fit a person, a character, like broken-in jeans.

\n\nMcConaughey, from the Hill Country that hugs Austin, comes by his drawl naturally, but its texture changes with each film he does. It almost disappeared in \u201cThe Lincoln Lawyer.\u201d It was thicker and meaner in \u201cKiller Joe\u201d; worried and worn in \u201cWe Are Marshall\u201d; sweatier in \u201cMagic Mike\u201d; wasted on \u201cThe Wedding Planner,\u201d when he was still in rom-com jail. But it has never been richer than it is in \u201cMud,\u201d pure gold spun out of love for a girl.

\n\nMe, I pay attention to the distinctions when movies try to tap into that homespun magic. I\u2019m fitful when Southern accents are forced, angered when they\u2019re false and hold them close when, like McConaughey\u2019s, they are true.

\n\nThe years have only deepened my affection for the flavor of Southern accents, and their presence in movies can transport me back to other places, other times: Like country ham, redeye gravy and grits at my grandmother\u2019s table next to Uncle SJ when I hear Tommy Lee Jones; a taste of great Aunt Ella\u2019s fried green tomatoes, hot and sweet, in Julia Roberts\u2019 warm tones; the scent of my granddaddy Harlen\u2019s tobacco curing in the barn conjured up by Robert Duvall; hogs being slopped \u2026 well, I won\u2019t mention who made me think of that last one. OK, Nicolas Cage in \u201cCon Air.\u201d

\n\nWhile a bad accent makes me cringe, the right inflection deepens and shades the story, and not just for me. It changes the texture of the experience for everyone. The way a weeping guitar can heighten anguish by clinging to a note, a drawl conveys so much more than mere words ever could. There is an easy wit that sneaks up on you, the humor often carrying an unexpected bite buried inside all that down-home irony, insight and cheek.

\n\nAccents, and specifically Southern ones, are an art form, yet sorely overlooked. Alabama is different from Georgia; North Florida distinct from South. Some of the best are from natives, but in \u201cJunebug,\u201d Amy Adams proved that being born in Italy and raised in Colorado didn\u2019t mean she couldn\u2019t bring home North Carolina. Sissy Spacek left every trace of Texas behind for her meticulous Oscar-winning turn as Kentucky\u2019s own Loretta Lynn in \u201cCoal Miner\u2019s Daughter.\u201d

\n\nAnd so, in an attempt to pay my respects, here are some of my favorite Southern movie drawls. Not a ranking but a range. On any given day, the one I love best depends on what place in my heart needs filling.

\n\nHey, Y\u2019all: Southern Accents Voted Most Attractive<\/a>
\nAccording to a survey by dating site Cupid.com, the sing-song honey sweetness of the Southern accent is the country\u2019s sexiest, and by a pretty significant margin. Cupid.com surveyed 2,000 men and women and determined that 36.5 percent of respondents voted the Southern accent the most attractive, with more men preferring it over women.

\n\n(unquote)

\n\nImage courtesy iStock<\/a> and Pinterest<\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(quote) Well, bless their hearts \u2014 Gen Z is killing the Southern drawl, y\u2019all. That\u2019s according to a new study published in Language Variation and Change, which claims the classic Southern American accent has been slowly fading over time \u2014 with the younger generation now helping to hammer the finalRead More →<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":21,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"_vp_format_video_url":"","_vp_image_focal_point":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,5,8,9,12],"tags":[46,79,26,27,25,18,78,35,52,28,41,30],"class_list":["entry","author-wcp-watchful-eye","post-982","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-art-and-poem","category-figures-and-facts","category-life-nature-society","category-movies-books-and-entertainment","category-us-and-world","tag-education","tag-entertainment","tag-facts","tag-figures","tag-history","tag-life","tag-movies","tag-news","tag-people","tag-places","tag-society","tag-travel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldculturepictorial.com\/wcp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/982","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldculturepictorial.com\/wcp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldculturepictorial.com\/wcp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldculturepictorial.com\/wcp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/21"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldculturepictorial.com\/wcp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=982"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worldculturepictorial.com\/wcp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/982\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldculturepictorial.com\/wcp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=982"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldculturepictorial.com\/wcp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=982"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldculturepictorial.com\/wcp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=982"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}