General American phonological and phonetic description/discrimination. Types of accent.
The American variant of English has been very thoroughly described by many prominent scholars both in this country and in the USA. In this book, however, we shall try to follow the conception introduced by A.D.Shweitzer in his sociolinguistic approach to the treatment of contemporary speech situation in America (38).
The sociolinguistic situation in the United States is very complicated. It is moulded by certain linguistic, cultural, historic, demographic, geographic, political and other factors.
American English shows a lesser degree of dialect than British English due to some historical factors: the existence of Standard English when first English settlers came to America, the high mobility of population, internal migrations of different communities and so on. As regards pronunciation, however, it is not at all homogeneous. There are certain varieties of educated American speech.
In the USA three main types of cultivated speech are recognized: the Eastern type, the Southern type and Western or General American.
In the United States, this is an accent called General American, or GA. In fact, the label “General American” covers a range of accents which don’t exhibit any Eastern or Southern local colouring. General American is the pronunciation used by the majority of the population of the United States and by most US radio and TV announcers. It is also the model accent used in teaching English in such parts of the world as Central and South America, the Philippines, etc.
General American phonological and phonetic description/discrimination. Types of accent.
The American variant of English has been very thoroughly described by many prominent scholars both in this country and in the USA. In this book, however, we shall try to follow the conception introduced by A.D.Shweitzer in his sociolinguistic approach to the treatment of contemporary speech situation in America (38).
The sociolinguistic situation in the United States is very complicated. It is moulded by certain linguistic, cultural, historic, demographic, geographic, political and other factors.
American English shows a lesser degree of dialect than British English due to some historical factors: the existence of Standard English when first English settlers came to America, the high mobility of population, internal migrations of different communities and so on. As regards pronunciation, however, it is not at all homogeneous. There are certain varieties of educated American speech.
In the USA three main types of cultivated speech are recognized: the Eastern type, the Southern type and Western or General American.
In the United States, this is an accent called General American, or GA. In fact, the label “General American” covers a range of accents which don’t exhibit any Eastern or Southern local colouring. General American is the pronunciation used by the majority of the population of the United States and by most US radio and TV announcers. It is also the model accent used in teaching English in such parts of the world as Central and South America, the Philippines, etc.
