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Regional dialects in North America are historically the most strongly differentiated along the Eastern seaboard, due to distinctive speech patterns of urban centers of the American East Coast like Boston, New York City, and certain Southern cities, all of these accents historically noted by their London-like r-dropping (called non-rhoticity), a feature gradually receding among younger ...
American English, sometimes called United States English or U.S. English, [b] is the set of varieties of the English language native to the United States. [4] English is the most widely spoken language in the United States; an official language in 32 of the 50 U.S. states; and the de facto common language used in government, education, and commerce throughout the nation. [5]
English-language scholar William A. Kretzschmar Jr. explains in a 2004 article that the term "General American" came to refer to "a presumed most common or 'default' form of American English, especially to be distinguished from marked regional speech of New England or the South" and referring especially to speech associated with the vaguely-defined "Midwest", despite any historical or present ...
North American English is a collective term for the dialects of the United States and Canada. It does not include the varieties of Caribbean English spoken in the West Indies. Rhoticity: Most North American English accents differ from Received Pronunciation and some other British dialects by being rhotic.
A Mid-Alantic accent is any of various accents of English that are perceived as blending features from both American and British English. [1] [2] Most commonly, the informal label of Mid-Atlantic accent, [3] [4] [5] or Transatlantic accent, [6] [2] [7] refers to certain non-rhotic speech taught and promoted in early 20th-century American schools of acting, voice, and elocution.
The accent rapidly declined following the end of World War II, presumably as a result of cultural and demographic changes in the U.S. entering the postwar era. [16] This American version of a "posh" accent has disappeared even among the American upper classes, as Americans have increasingly dissociated from the speaking styles of the East Coast elite. [15]
Dialects can be defined as "sub-forms of languages which are, in general, mutually comprehensible." [1] English speakers from different countries and regions use a variety of different accents (systems of pronunciation) as well as various localized words and grammatical constructions.
Southern American English or Southern U.S. English is a regional dialect [1] [2] or collection of dialects of American English spoken throughout the Southern United States, primarily by White Southerners and increasingly concentrated in more rural areas. [3]