History
The origins of the dialect are diverse, and the source of many features is probably not recoverable. Labov has pointed out that the short-A split is found in southern England as mentioned above. He also claims that the vocalization and subsequent loss of (R) was copied from the prestigious London pronunciation, and so it started among the upper classes in New York and only later moved down the socioeconomic scale. This non-rhotic (R-less) aristocratic pronunciation can be heard, for instance, in recordings of Franklin D. Roosevelt. After WWII, the R-ful pronunciation (rhotic) became the prestige norm, and what was once the upper class pronunciation became a vernacular one.
Other vernacular pronunciations, such as the dental (D)s and (T)s may come from contact with languages such as Italian and Yiddish. Grammatical structures, such as the lack of inversion in indirect questions, have the flavor of contact with an immigrant language. As stated above, many words common in New York are of immigrant roots.
Read more about this topic: New York Dialect
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“History has neither the venerableness of antiquity, nor the freshness of the modern. It does as if it would go to the beginning of things, which natural history might with reason assume to do; but consider the Universal History, and then tell us,—when did burdock and plantain sprout first?”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Tell me of the height of the mountains of the moon, or of the diameter of space, and I may believe you, but of the secret history of the Almighty, and I shall pronounce thee mad.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“When the coherence of the parts of a stone, or even that composition of parts which renders it extended; when these familiar objects, I say, are so inexplicable, and contain circumstances so repugnant and contradictory; with what assurance can we decide concerning the origin of worlds, or trace their history from eternity to eternity?”
—David Hume (1711–1776)