11/17/09: On Palin, Obama, Accents and Double Standards

Accent #2: The Inner City Community Organizer
Photo: The Freedom Post

The Associated Press is trying to figure out the source of Sarah Palin's accent:

When Sarah Palin burst onto the national political stage there was a lot of talk about her distinctive way of talkin', you betcha.

Heck, she moved to Alaska when she was too young to speak and grew up in the small town of Wasilla, but doggone it, why did she talk like someone from the movie "Fargo"?

Three University of Wisconsin-Madison linguists tackled the conundrum in a research article to be published in the Journal of English Linguistics next month. The answer lies in something that happened in the 1930s.

Source: Associated Press

This isn't exactly "news," and it isn't exactly "new." A quick Google search for "Sarah Palin's accent" yields 88,000 results, most of them from the 2008 campaign:

Sarah Palin's accent explained: The Swamp

Placing Sarah Palin's accent

Sarah Palin's accent

Palin's Accent Examined : NPR

Mr. Verb: Sarah Palin's accent and American dialects

The overriding theme is one of confusion and ridicule caused by and aimed at Palin's manner of speech, which sounds to many like a Midwestern accent. The implication here is simple: Sarah Palin's accent is either a put-on or it is proof that she isn't too bright.

You betcha!

But... According to the UWM researchers, Palin's accent can be easily explained:

The UW researchers said people living in Alaska's Matanuska and Susitna valleys, where Wasilla is located, are largely descendants of farmers who moved there in the 1930s from the Upper Midwest. More than 200 farm families moved to the Wasilla area in 1935 as part of a government program to start a new farming community.

While Palin has the expected Upper Midwestern speech patterns, she also has what Salmons called "screaming hallmarks of western speech."

For example, Palin pronounces the word "feel" like "fill" and "peel" like "pill." Those inflections were not picked up on by the media or those who lampooned Palin, including Tina Fey on "Saturday Night Live," Salmons said.

"It wasn't part of the stereotype," he said.

They found that she dropped the -ing at the end of words nearly 12 percent of the time, said the words "darn" and heck" two times each, referred to her grandmother as "gramma" and offered a "shout out" to a third-grade class in Alaska.

Source: Associated Press

So there you go. Sarah Palin speaks like a woman from Wasilla, Alaska. Case closed.

But what about President Obama?

A similar search for information on Obama's accent yields only 7,200 results. That is interesting, given his unorthodox upbringing:

• Obama's mother was a white girl from Kansas, who lived in several states before moving to Hawaii at age 18. (Source: Wikipedia)
• Obama's father was born in Kenya and spent roughly five years in the United States in his early and mid-twenties. (Source: Wikipedia)
• Obama himself spent the first six years of his life in Hawaii and the next four in Indonesia, before moving back to Hawaii to live with his grandparents.
• Currently, African-Americans make up only 2.3% of Hawaii's population. It is safe to assume that number was never much higher in the 1970s. (Source: Wikipedia)
• Obama left Hawaii for Occidental College at the age of 18.

Given his diverse ancestry and unique upbringing, it would follow that the media would be fascinated by how it shaped our president. After all, he has three distinct speech patterns, each with its own tone and pacing. At times, he even shifts his accent depending on the audience.

Accent #1: The Northeastern Elitist

Accent #2: The Inner City Community Organizer

Accent #3: The Teleprompter Reader

So how did our president develop his speech patterns? Why does he "put on airs" when speaking to an affluent, liberal audience? Why does he put on a "blackcent" when speaking to inner city groups and unions? Why does his vocal delivery completely change when reading a teleprompter?

The people that raised him - his biological parents, step-father and maternal grandparents - were not African-American. They weren't Northeastern liberal elites. They were not descendants of a long line of measured, monotonous teleprompter readers.

According to The Linguist List, accents can continue to develop into a speaker's early twenties:

Accents can be expected to change until we are in our early twenties. This is usually the time we come to some sort of decision about who we are. But even after that, if you want (and need) to change your accent, you can.

To change your accent you have to want to. Really want to, deep down. This usually happens without much effort because you move to a new place, mix with different people, or develop new aspirations.

Source: The Linguist List

It would seem President Obama has three distinct ways of speaking to three different audiences. It would be nice to see ANY analysis of this by the Associated Press.

Don't hold your breath...