Long Island Mike
Senior Member
Accents from Toronto,Canadian and US accents...and a mention about NY/LI...
Mystic Point and Everyone: Good topic here on accents-they fascinate me to a large extent!
I noticed your mention of Brooklyn and Staten Island concerning Woodbridge-I first thought of Woodbridge,New Jersey because of its close proximity to Staten Island in northern Middlesex County,NJ but I now realize that you mean Woodbridge,Ontario...
Southern Brooklyn and Staten Island was noted recently in a NY Post story as one of the last strongholds of the heavy New York accent...and I will also mention that the Long Island accent has been noted as slowly disappearing...many also note the "Jersey" accent which is spoken basically only in northeastern NJ near NYC...you notice the change the further you go south in NJ from central Ocean County across to the Trenton area...if you looked at the boundary line of the two original area codes
in NJ (201 N and 609 S) it practically denoted the two large regional dialects spoken in NJ-the northern type found in the 201 area and the Middle Atlantic/Philadelphia type found in the 609 area...
I remember that WNY and the Ontario Niagara Region has a close relationship traditionally-it does not surprise me that the accents have "crossed the border" in more ways then one...I remember some Buffalo area people I once dealt with describe the local accent as "Canadian" but as an outsider I did notice the difference...I remember a noticeable difference even in both sides of Niagara Falls!
The accents of the US East Coast are much more localized then the large regional coverage in both the US and Canadian midwest...the US Midwestern or "Lakes" accent begins in central/western NY State and goes across NW PA,Northern Ohio
and Indiana and practically all of Michigan towards Chicago and mostly NW towards Wisconsin and Minnesota...
I knew that there were Canadian regional dialects like the Eastern Ontario and Newfoundland accents and I found that even Winnipeg-even though it is near the US on a land border and solidly in the Midwest-had noticeably different speech then nearby North Dakota...
I once had a strong Long Island accent but I did live outside of the NY area for most of the 90s-and I know from talking to people I know that I have lost some of it or perhaps the hard edge...I remember traveling to Toronto in basically the 80s and I recall that my accent was a dead giveaway that I was not from the Toronto area...
In closing I do find accents neat but I also have noticed changes-especially in regional accents and I do agree that some are sadly disappearing...
Thoughts and insight from LI MIKE
Mystic Point and Everyone: Good topic here on accents-they fascinate me to a large extent!
I noticed your mention of Brooklyn and Staten Island concerning Woodbridge-I first thought of Woodbridge,New Jersey because of its close proximity to Staten Island in northern Middlesex County,NJ but I now realize that you mean Woodbridge,Ontario...
Southern Brooklyn and Staten Island was noted recently in a NY Post story as one of the last strongholds of the heavy New York accent...and I will also mention that the Long Island accent has been noted as slowly disappearing...many also note the "Jersey" accent which is spoken basically only in northeastern NJ near NYC...you notice the change the further you go south in NJ from central Ocean County across to the Trenton area...if you looked at the boundary line of the two original area codes
in NJ (201 N and 609 S) it practically denoted the two large regional dialects spoken in NJ-the northern type found in the 201 area and the Middle Atlantic/Philadelphia type found in the 609 area...
I remember that WNY and the Ontario Niagara Region has a close relationship traditionally-it does not surprise me that the accents have "crossed the border" in more ways then one...I remember some Buffalo area people I once dealt with describe the local accent as "Canadian" but as an outsider I did notice the difference...I remember a noticeable difference even in both sides of Niagara Falls!
The accents of the US East Coast are much more localized then the large regional coverage in both the US and Canadian midwest...the US Midwestern or "Lakes" accent begins in central/western NY State and goes across NW PA,Northern Ohio
and Indiana and practically all of Michigan towards Chicago and mostly NW towards Wisconsin and Minnesota...
I knew that there were Canadian regional dialects like the Eastern Ontario and Newfoundland accents and I found that even Winnipeg-even though it is near the US on a land border and solidly in the Midwest-had noticeably different speech then nearby North Dakota...
I once had a strong Long Island accent but I did live outside of the NY area for most of the 90s-and I know from talking to people I know that I have lost some of it or perhaps the hard edge...I remember traveling to Toronto in basically the 80s and I recall that my accent was a dead giveaway that I was not from the Toronto area...
In closing I do find accents neat but I also have noticed changes-especially in regional accents and I do agree that some are sadly disappearing...
Thoughts and insight from LI MIKE