Dialect Resources

Hi Carol,

The voice exercise sounds like a marvelous idea, and for me I’d like to

see the conflict exercise done soon.

Really, anyone you choose would be a good idea they are all good.

I’m interested in seeing how Mary will work the Swedish dialect of her

father into a piece of writing. Dialects can be inferred through description

and the scene exercise you created would be useful in helping achieve this.

Here’s two good articles on dialect that might be useful.

http://www.tiedtothetracks.com/storytelling/archives/000601.htm

http://www.fictionaddiction.net/articles/contributed/michaelsdialogue.html

More often than not in a crowd, I’m the silent one for I love to listen

to people talk. The vernacular here in America is vast; believe it or not,

certain phrases are unique to the area. If we each set down and wrote certain

phrases that are used in the area we come from, you’d see the dialect

differences.

Take the most simplest thing like a soft drink, here in the northern part

of Alabama--you want to go for a coke—could mean any form of soft drink

from a mountain dew to a Pepsi or the ever famous coca cola.

Put that pot on the eye. ( Before I explain what it means I want to see

if anyone has ever heard the phrase before, and see if we have any down

home southern girls besides me. LOL)

Joan

**

A new message, "Here you go, dialect fans!," was posted on the Persist

and Publish <http://writersvillage.com/100/groups/139.cgi> by Nancy on

Sunday, 17 December 2006, at 3:49 p.m.

The message reads as follows:

                      -------------------------

Somebody named Samuel Stoddard has come up with a Web site called The

Dialectizer,

where you can type in text in standard English and "dialectize" it into

one of these: Redneck, Jive, Cockney, Elmer Fudd, Swedish Chef, Moron,

Pig Latin, or Hacker. You can also paste in a link to a Web page and see

that page rewritten in dialect. It's supposed to be funny, but it's kind

of interesting to dialectize a Web page (say, a news article) and then

try to read it.

Anyway, if you want to play with the Dialectizer, the link below will take

you there.

--Nancy