I think you’ll have no problem comprehending this.
Relatively speaking, Minneapolis is Birmingham, while I live somewhere in the Irish Sea off the coast of Dublin. We do have far fewer dialects over that distance.
Pharyngula
Evolution, development, and random biological ejaculations from a godless liberal
Up in northern Scandinavia, huge distances are the ‘default’ so I get Minnesota.
And England has retained a surprising number of dialects despite the attempts to eradicate everything that is not “received pronounciation” aka Public School / upper class English.
.
-Is Minnesota close to Wounded Knee? I wonder, because I read today is the 135th anniversary of that massacre.
@1 birgerjohansson
Wounded Knee is in the southwestern corner of South Dakota, which is on of the states west of Minnesota, so on the above map it would be in the Atlantic well southwest of Misen Head, Ireland. Whether you want to call that “close” is a judgment call which depends on your sense of scale.
my favorite subreddit is r/geology, where the threads often start with someone asking an interesting question (e.g., “Why can’t we build a tunnel between England and Ireland?”). The first couple of answers are usually detailed and informative, but then everything descends into a series of increasingly insane jokes and puns.
Many accents is right. My parents moved 25 miles south from Stratford upon Avon to Cheltenham a few years ago and the accents of the locals switched completely from West Midlands (Brummie-like) to (northern) West Country.
Where I used to live, near the South coast, you could instantly tell is someone was from Southampton or from a few miles outside the city.
You’d think with the rise of the monoculture the accents would have begun to die out, but they still appear to be thriving in the UK.
If I’ve understood that map mapping correctly, I live somewhere near Mankato. According to Wikipedia it has a remarkably similar population to the town+environs where I am, but it was founded almost exactly a century later.
Can you tell me, please, is it a nice place to live? If so, I might dig a wormhole in time for summer.
@Rich Woods
Mankato is a beautiful river town, with limestone bluffs and multiple colleges. It’s also near Rochester, home of the Mayo Clinic. The ground is currently frozen and covered in snow, as Minnesota is famously known for having northern winters. The worms are deep below the frost line until April.
@5 Rich Woods
Mankato is home to the Betsy-Tacy Society.
Also, there’s a state park with bison.
Someone put together a list of 25 Best & Fun Things to Do in Mankato. Somehow they could only come up with 5 items.
Most magats* will shout, ‘size matters’. We say, ‘pacific, honest quality of character matters more’
*ref.: tRUMP, and his malicious tiny toadstool (mind and mushroom)
UK has 12 times as many people as Minnesota, also, though that is not sufficient to explain the much larger ratio of dialects.
“An Englishman thinks a hundred miles is a long way; and American thinks a hundred years is a long time”. It is time that explains the accents.
In terms of both size and population, the UK is comparable to Florida. The US has multiple dialects too, though we have to travel much further than the next village to hear them in person. Television has leveled many dialects to midwestern pronunciation, even in the Derp South.
Sadly, we are murdering not only grammatically distinct languages but dialects as well. It makes the world poorer.
A while ago, I figured out that southern Ontario, where I’ve lived all my life, is roughly the same extent as all of Great Britain. And has about one-sixth as many people (but more bears and moose).
@11 Tethys
The UK has thrice the population of Florida. How is that comparable in terms of population?
Iasius @ 14
If we count alligators and invasive giant snakes as “aristocrats” Florida may achieve parity with UK.
@#1: A lot of early Minnesotans were immigrants from Scandinavia, so you may get the place even better than you think.
If we are talking about large sparsely populated territories… Something Lynna wrote at the infinite thread reminded me of “Dreamcathcher” a story by Stephen King.
A hostile alien grows in the digestive tract of a rural hunter and makes its exit through the rectum.
Fortunately, neither Minnesota nor other US states are under threat from such a weird, ugly, smelly entity. And if one showed up, I am sure everyone would fight it. Right?
(BTW the film version had a telepathic alien speaking with a posh British accent which reminds me of Boris Johnson)
USA states are rather small by Australian standards.
(“That’s not a knife… this is a knife.”)
Steve Morrison @ 16
Yes, but it must have been a shock for them to find vast tracts of good farmland without having to climb over stony hills everywhere. And straight roads not blocked by inconvenient geography. Weird.
John Morales @ 18
Yes, even the ‘small’ ones at the south of Australia are pretty big. Is Tasmania a separate state?
When I was an undergraduate in the late 70’s the Chemistry prof I worked for took a sabbatical and spent 6 months in Germany. On his return one of his comments was that the Europeans had absolutely no concept of just how large the US was. He said that where he was in Germany he was a 4 hour drive from 5 different countries.
@16
The most common ethnic heritage in Minnesota is German, but two world wars killed almost all the pride people might have had in claiming it. There is an Oktoberfest celebration in New Ulm, which is conveniently close to Mankato.
Check out the “Adam Turman Paul Bunyan & Babe the Blue Ox Throw” you can get from Faribault Mill, woven right there in the state of Minnesota.
Yes, Birger.
New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, Western Australia, Tasmania, Australian Capital Territory, Northern Territory are the States and (last two) Territories.
Almost the same land mass as the USA excluding Alaska, but many fewer States (and Territories).
And the US has almost 13 times the population, so it is that much more densely populated.
Not as far between towns and cities, compared to Oz.
(Perspective!)
I live in Massachusetts, northeastern USA, and both the state and general region are more densely populated than most other parts of the USA, though probably less densely populated than the UK. If you’ve grown up in this area, distances in other parts of the USA can be almost as shocking as they would be to someone from Western Europe.
What is interesting to me is how the strong regional accents congregate around the major ports. You have – or had- Cockney in London, Liverpudlian or Scouse around Liverpool and Geordie around Newcastle-on-Tyne, for example
We used to visit my maternal grandparents near Newcastle and I remember a local cleaning-lady whose accent was so thick it took me a couple of days to “tune in” before I could understand it even though she was speaking perfect English. I also remember Indian GP’s whose command of English was fine but their accents were so strong they were difficult to understand and I worried about medical errors that might arise,
Another interesting comparison of Minnesota to Europe besides physical size and population density is that the northern border of the state (let’s just say it’s at the 49th parallel) is roughly at the same latitude as Paris and the southern border of the state is roughly at the same latitude as Marseille.
Morris, MN is roughly same latitude as Milan (The one in Italy, not Milan, MN which is about 35 miles south of Morris and the name is pronounced MY-lin. Also nearby is the town of Montevideo, MN–guess how the locals pronounce that one.
My dad and his friend booked a fishing trip in the boundary waters and we started our journey in northeast Iowa.
Up we went doing it in one shot and it really felt like climbing uphill. I think the thing that made it feel so long…there wasn’t much on the AM and my dad chose polka.
the 45th parallel is about 300 m south my work place. i cross it driving home, so i change between being closer to the north pole and closer to the equator every day. also, i cross the Mississippi during my commute, so i change from the area where radio and tv stations change between starting with “W” and starting with “K”.
if you take the Broadway St bridge across the Mississippi you are very close to the spot where the above regions converge. Kinda like Four Corners Monument Navajo Tribal Park, but maybe not as cool. certainly more pedantic!
birgerjohansson @17
Yeah, I kinda liked the Dreamcatcher movie. I think it got some hate. The good alien character was played by Donnie Wahlberg, who I didn’t even recognize. He went all Yoda on steroids in the final showdown. The ginger Brit guy is Damian Lewis, who was in the TV series Homeland without an accent. He played Steve McQueen I guess in Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood, but I don’t recall him. I hatewatched that movie to put the controversial portrayal of Bruce Lee I had heard about in context. I hated that scene, but Brad Pitt taking on the Manson family with his loyal dog was cool. The dog was bad ass, the rest of the movie not so much.
John Morales @18
“That’s not a knife… this is a knife.” is a line the Outback legend Mick Taylor uses ironically in Wolf Creek. He was playing off the other Outback legend of course, but I’d much rather meet Dundee. Wolf Creek was a beautifully shot movie though featuring Australian landscapes.
Not quite Minnesota but I did finally watch Fargo not too long ago.
I am reading Louise Erdrich’s The Sentence which is set in Minnesota and recounts COVID and George Floyd’s murder among other stuff, like a ghost haunting the main character’s bookstore, from a Native American perspective.
[OT]
Hemidactylus @29, that’s the film’s tagline in various media, but not actually said in the actual movie.
FWTW.
John Morales @31
Then why did you quote it that way. I expected accuracy from you. Now you’re dragging me.
So “That’s not a knife. That’s a knife!” is it?
No wonder Mick Taylor got pissed then as this bloke quoted it wrong: https://www.youtube.com/watch?si=1Rl4qTF-Tystrsgj&v=nT2qFx9iSlM
Even the overlay is deceptive. Minnesota has an area of 86,943 sq miles. The island of great Britain while it looks larger is actually 80,823 sq miles, over 6000 sq miles less.
@ 18, 20 & 23 yes Australian states are big. When hordes of American troops descended on Australia in WW2 aside from the occasional clashes, (e.g., The Battle of Brisbane), Australians delighted in taking the mickey out of the yanks. There is a tale of a Texan bragging to an Australia rancher about how big his cattle ranch was throwing out figures such as distance to neighbours or the nearest town. The Australian always had a snappy comeback with much greater distances. Eventually the Texan claimed his ranch was so big it took all day to ride his horse to the front gate. The Australian replied; ”Yeah mate we used to have a horse like that but we shot the bugger”.
For the record the worlds largest cattle property is Anna Creek in South Australia at 9,142 sq miles, ( over 5.8 million acres) and on many properties the weekly or monthly shop is a long one day round trip. You wouldn’t want to forget to buy anything.
@Tethys #6, @Reginald Selkirk #7:
Thanks very much for your replies. Much of it does sound quite appealing (I like places off the beaten path).
I would add Mankato to my bucket list except that I’m not convinced that overthrowing Trump or his successor and dismantling all their evil anti-non-American ideas, policies and paramilitary organisations will happen in the mere decade or two I have left before my joints completely give out.
Rich @ 34:
Hell, we’re still dealing with the anti-non-American ideas, policies, and paramilitary organisations from when it was Morning Again in America. So I’m afraid your proposed timescale is overoptimistic.
My favorite illustration for the general public while I was Over There is that the shortest road match the Seattle Seahawks (“gridiron” football) could have was to San Francisco or Oakland — a substantially greater distance than one can travel on the Isle of Britain, and actually greater than the “immense” distance from Highbury (then Arsenal’s stadium) to Stadia Olimpico in Roma.
Because I wrote it verbatim from the actual original film scene:
John Morales @36
So you’re gaslighting now I see. In your @18 you quoted it as “That’s not a knife… this is a knife.” Yet now you’re telling me “Because I wrote it verbatim from the actual original film scene”. Which is it? Can’t be both.
@ ^
Is Morales trolling or senile? Which is it? Could be both.
df @38
pot meet kettle
Did Big Nurse screw up again and let you on the Internets?
[so, it has come to this]
In the film clip, a pimply-faced-youth character pulls a switchblade, and Croc sneers at it and pulls out a bigger knife.
Hemidactylus, you address an allusion to the very scene to which I linked.
(Like USA states vs Oz states, see? That’s the actual joke. Tricky!)
“So you’re gaslighting now I see. In your @18 you quoted it as “That’s not a knife… this is a knife.” Yet now you’re telling me “Because I wrote it verbatim from the actual original film scene”. Which is it? Can’t be both.”
Ah. I thought it was verbatim, but it was not.
Heh heh heh.
Point remains.
USA is not that big or sparse.
Apparently, parts of Ruzzia are that sparse. And cold!
(But they are not European, right? ;)
@Jaws #35:
Arsenal certainly did themselves no favours by moving to a new stadium even further away from the Stadio Olimpico…
@41. John Morales : “But they are not European, right?”
Pedantically speaking it depends which side of the Urals they’re on..
Like Turkey, Russia spans two continents – Asia and its European peninsula.
Probly best / safest if we just use the word Eurasian for both of them! Maybe?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eurasia
Book recommendation: The Last American Road Trip, by Sarah Kendzior.
Ah, geography. Having lived in Europe at a couple of points in time it was amazing to be able to drive over several borders in the course of hours or a day. And how could they comprehend taking three days of driving just to cross the province I live in if I drove westward from my home.. Add population and it is fascinating how many people are concentrated in Europe and the diversity of language, while the opposite is true here. But maps, its all a matter of projection!
@1 “…the attempts to eradicate everything that is not “received pronounciation” aka Public School / upper class English.”
I was struck by this claim, since my impression has been that the media, at least, has become much more open to a variety of dialects. I believe it is no longer the case, for example, that the BBC requires RP.
@46 “I believe it is no longer the case, for example, that the BBC requires RP.”
Since 1941, at least. They decided that named announcers with distinctive accents would be harder for Nazi propagandists to imitate. Enter Wilfred Pickles…
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/how-north-england-voice-overturned-bbc-tradition-180967208/
@1 “attempts to eradicate everything that is not “received pronounciation” aka Public School / upper class English.”
@46 “I was struck by this claim, since my impression has been that the media, at least, has become much more open to a variety of dialects”
That claim surprised me too. RP is (or was) a tribal badge denoting membership of an in-group; not speaking RP is a shibboleth that marks you as an outsider. Why would the insiders want to eradicate that?
seversky @25
I’m guessing you’ve not spent much time in the Black Country? ‘Yam’ is not just a fruit there, but also a word meaning either ‘are you’ or ‘you are’ depending on context.
@45
That sounds like Popeye-speak.
“I yam what I yam.”
richardh, “RP is (or was) a tribal badge denoting membership of an in-group; not speaking RP is a shibboleth that marks you as an outsider.”
The times, they are a’changin.
USA had similar; cf. https://www.backstage.com/magazine/article/what-is-a-transatlantic-accent-75376/