I had an physics teacher in Napa, who said that we should cut the state in half, because we’d end up with the dietetic states: No Cal and Low Cal.
He also taught a bunch of entropy equations. Guess which I remember?
Well, I should have used an ellipsis, but if a hint of shock were needed, I’d have said: “Dude! I know, right?” Whereas “Dude… I know, right?” is weary resignation or knowing agreement.
Dude, I love the word “dude”.
Count me in on that. I lived in LA (Redondo Beach) from ages 4 through about 14 and it imprinted me. My word choice, inflection, and speech rhythm spot me as SoCal all the time. It’s been almost 30 years since I left and it’s still with me.
Even when I get imprinted with an overlay (Chicago or Virginia south) it’s still there as the very root of my speech. I figure it’ll be here for the rest of my life, dude.
Huh. Just occurred to me that I still call Lady Chance ‘Babe’ a thousand times a day.
“dude” and “cool” are common everywhere in the English speaking world.
When I lived in CA, I noticed that most SoCal folks - well, girls - had this “chirp” noise that they’d use a lot; listen to Missing Persons “Nobody Walks in LA” for an extreme example of this. The guys, all over CA from my observation, use something like a fast version of a Southern drawl. If that is a comprehensible statement. :dubious:
When I lived in Vermont, my Californiaisms that people really noticed were the words “bummer” and “stoked”. For example:
Dude, my car was covered with ice this morning and I had to scrape my windshield. It was such a bummer.
or
Dude, I’m going to Cali next weekend to visit my friend…I’m so stoked!
They had apparently never heard these terms before. “Stoked” was something you did to a fire.
It’s called uptalk, and as mentioned above, people of a certain age all over do it, and some adults, too. Frank Zappa recorded a song called “Valley Girl” in which his daughter talks like this throughout, and so some people call it “valspeak.” My understanding is that actually the valley girls picked it up from the surfers in Malibu–they would cross the Santa Monica Mountains and hang out at the beach, especially during the summer.
Dude, that is so true. I think that’s why I still use it–you can say anything with dude!
Most of these examples of a “California accent” are really examples of a “**Southern **California accent”. Those of us here in Northern California (NorCal is a SoCal term) have *no *accent. We speak the Queen’s English *exactly *as it was meant to be 
And putting “the” in front of highway numbers? That’s just hella weird, dude!
And you know you’ve reached Oregon when it’s always “I-5.”
I refuse to drop the ‘the’ from before the freeway number!
I was with this girl from New Orleans. She said I had a ‘surfer’ accent. I said, ‘Chya, as if!’ Seriously though, I don’t think I have an accent. However my third-grade teacher was a bit of a bitch who liked to criticise eight-year-olds. She made fun of my eight-year-old accent, and I’ve been aware of my diction since then. I know I have a SoCal cadence, but my actual pronunciations are (I believe) neutral. Except that I do tend to say ‘dude’.
And to answer ThirdOne: Born in L.A. (actually Lakewood), raised in San Diego and northern L.A. County. Moved to Washington in 2003.
My father was born and raised in Hollywood. But by the time I’d grown enough to really notice anything like that, we’d already spent many years in Texas, and apparently he had picked up something of a Texas accent to hear his family back in California go on about it. But his alleged Texas twang really never was all that strong, and I credit him with my not ever having had a very strong Texas accent. Him plus my Arkansas mother, but I don’t think I ever had a very strong Southern accent of any type. It came out sounding more Midwest than anything, probably a good compromise between the sounds of my two parents.
But yes, I did notice a particular California sound whenever I met up with my father’s relatives. Kind of an open brash sound.
It’s pretty unusual for someone to acquire an accent from parents. Usually it’s acquired from peers.
That was my theory anyway, since there were no Texas accents in the house. Don’t know how to explain it otherwise.
My mother, the linguist, contends that one can tell a native Californian by how he pronounces the words law and stop. A native will pronounce the vowels the same, while non-Californians have different vowel sounds for those two words, and in practice I’ve found that to be true.
Beyond that, I can only reiterate that one can tell the southern Californian by the fact that he properly identifies the freeways (the 405, the 10, the 5, etc.), while the northerner, strangely, does not.
How would they be pronounced differently? I’m curious to know.
(California-born and Arizona-raised here.)
You know, I never thought about it before, but I absolutly pronounce law and stop with the same vowel sound. I need to go find me a non native and get them to say them now.
I have always thought that a large part of the reason we “don’t” hav accents here is because the large number of transplants we have. All of those other accents blend into our native accent and sort of neutralize it.
I could be totally wrong though.
Psudo science is fun!
I’ve heard of linguists who can pin down where you’re from within a couple hundred miles.
I know! It’s a totally fun party game.
Imagine Hillary Clinton saying those words and you can see how the vowels are different.
Or even blocks, if the linguist in question is Henry Higgins.
Yeah, I pronounce law and stop with the same vowel sound. But I can’t think of how Hillary would say them any differently.
(Third-generation Californian.)
Crap. That’s like half of my daily conversation right there.
(2nd generation SoCalifornian, born in North LA county.)