Do we talk funny?

Is there a Rocky Mountain Accent?

I've always thought that Denverites sound like Minnesotans trying to tone it down a bit.

It is more likely that because of the extensive immigration of people from elsewhere, that the Rocky Mountain West is still in a state of profound linguistic flux; development of accents and dialects requires some degree of isolation. I would point out that there are distinct accents and language patterns in the West, such as that of Native Americans.

There is a very distinctive New Mexico accent- influenced by Spanish, Dine, and other NA dialects, and it isn't a twangy Texas derivative-it's really quite different and sing-songy.

I'm from Wisconsin, (home of o mi gawd, there's locusts in the crawps accent) and it took me ten years to figure out the accent in Montana. People born in MT mix up certain vowel sounds, like Don and Dawn sound the same as do cot and caught. I thought Montanans had the generic accent, and it's subtle, but there's still an accent.

Then there's "creek" and "crick" and "soda" and "pop." When I came home from back east camping with my Dad, I asked him if he could go down to the "creek" and get me a "soda." And he said he would not. But he would go down to the "crick" and get me a "pop." He then asked what they had done to his daughter.

What about "coyote"? I say "Ky-Yote." Most easterners seem to say "Ky-Yo-Tee." But the correct Spanish pronounciation is "Ky-Yo-Tee," so maybe "Ky-Yote" is a Nebraska-ism that slipped into my speech through my parents.

Jenny, Montanans say Ky-Ote too. I wonder how others in the West say it.

And how about Racoon? I say Rah-coon but I think easterners say Ruh-coon.

I've often heard that the reason there are so many call centers set up in Iowa and Nebraska is because they don't have a distinct accent.

or maybe it's because, unlike Boulder, one can still raise a family on 35K per year.

Although the population influx has an impact and dilutes regional dialects, dialect for a region is for "natives." There is a distinct accent among native Coloradoans -- I can easily hear the difference between the native and the California import. I also know New Mexico's "sing songy" accent that Emily referred.

These are speech patterns -- how and where the tongue touches the roof of the mouth and so forth, not variations on coyote or racoon or whatever.

Coloradoans def. have an accent. It's very subtle, but it sounds a tiny bit midwestern, tiny bit Canadian, tiny bit "other" to my ears. It gets pronounced as you head farther out west (provided you're talking to a native).

Spanish coyote is mor like Ko-YO-te, but it's a Native American adoption anyway, I think, so why split hairs, right?

The singsongy N. Mex. accent also breaks into southern colorado, like around San Luis.

And of course, as David Cross once noted, the redneck accent is native to everywhere.

"F__ you, maan, Ahm from Statesburuh, Jorja."

"Well, F__ you, maan, this's how we do it in Bozeman, Montanah."

"Hey,F__ all y'all, this's how we do it in Ankradge, Alaaskuh!"

Before I moved to Montana I always thought I drove a car. Now I drive a "Ve-hick-al".

My sister and brother-in-law moved to south central Colorado from Ohio in 1979. Their three sons, all born and raised in Colorado, definitely have an accent. It sounds to me like a cross between a Canadian and a Minnesotan accent - definite emphases on the "ow" and "ah". I now live in the Philadelphia area which has so many different dialects - I have learned to distinguish in which borough or township people live according to their dialects.

Colorado is part of the Western dialect. The Western dialect stretches from Washington state to the Western corner of Texas, and includes everything in between. It is the largest dialect region in the US.

-> It may be defined as the area with fronting of /uw/ but not fronting of /ow/... Ah, well, that makes everything clear. <-

It does actually :) That means that the sounds "uw" (as in "do") is pronounced in the front of the mouth before "t" and "d", and "ow" (as in "go"), is pronounced in the back of the mouth with rounded lips. This distinguishes the West from, for example, the North Central dialect. To hear what an extremely rounded and back "ow" sounds like, watch the movie "Fargo" set in North Dakota, and Minnesota (the North Central region), where "o" is *extremely* back and rounded. Watch a Valley Girl/surfer dude movie set in California, to hear an *extremely* fronted and unrounded version of both /uw/ and /ow/. Compare how the actors in both of those movies pronounce those vowels.

-> , along with the low back merger of /o/ and /oh/.? -<
/o/ is the vowel in the word "cot"; /oh/ is the vowel in the word "caught". The West (as well as several other dialects, such as the North Central) is distinguished from other dialects (such as the Northern dialect: e.g. Wisconsin), because cot and caught are merged. That means that speakers in the West pronounce the vowels in those words (cot/caught; tot-taught; odd-ought) identically, and perceive them to be the same sounds, even when speakers who pronounce them differently sy them. This is in contrast to, for example, southern Wisconsin, where "cot" and "caught" sound completely different--cot is pronounced with unrounded lips; caught with rounded lips (almost sounds like cohaht).

-> (except for Peter Jennings, who never did eliminate the occasional Canadian “aboot? for “about) -<
That's what's known as "Canadian raising". The word "about" in most of the U.S. is pronounced as a "diphthong" consisting of the sounds "ah" and "oo" (as in food). You can hear that it is composed of two vowels if you say "ah" and "oo" very quickly. It sounds like "ow", which is in the word "about". Many speakers in the Western/Central dialect region in Canada produce this sound as "uh" followed by "oo" before the letters, p, t, k, f, and th. The "uh"+"oo" sound is not found in dialects of North American English that do not have "Canadian raising", so it sounds like "aboot" or "aboat" to many Americans--although it is not really aboot/aboat--it is actually "uh-buh-oot" (if you say it really fast.)

>> But, according to this article in Wikipedia, Colorado is not the template for standard American speech—Iowa holds that distinction. “General American is the name given to the accent used by most TV network announcers; it is most similar to the local accents of Iowa and adjacent parts of Nebraska, Northern Ohio, and Illinois <<

Actually that particular article in Wikipedia is not quite that accurate :( There really is no formal standard for "General American". It's pretty much what you try to speak to eliminate your accent. It's actually rather based on the pronunciation in the Great Lakes region in the 1950s. Practically no modern accent (especially not the one in the Great Lakes region, as it has diverged a lot from what it sounded like in the '50s) is exactly "General American". But... many accents come close to it, including the Midlands (e.g. Nebraska), as well as the West/Central Canadian accent AND the Western accent.

-> According to one dialect website, “some words that came from [the Rocky Mountain] dialect are kick off (to die), cache (hiding place), and bushed (tired). They also call jelly doughnuts bismarks.�? That’s news to me—I’ve never heard anyone order a “bismark�? for breakfast. <-

Yeah, it's funny reading old books and websites on dialects, as so many words have died out a long time ago.

-> or the region is fairly quirk free <-

It's pretty similar to the "General American" 1950's midwestern broadcast accent...except for the cot-caught merger. So...that means that people who are used to hearing those vowels pronounced distinct will hear a slight accent. Although the regions that *do* pronounce them differently often have a much stronger accent.

The West itself is fairly homogenous, with a few exceptions. For example many Northwesterners will pronounce the word "bag" to rhyme with "beg". Many Southwesterners (and Northwesterners too) will pronounce (the vowel in) "beg" and "vague" the same way. In other dialect regions the vowels in these words are pronounced differently.

-> “yellow�? is pronounced “yallow <-

That's called the Canadian (vowel) Shift. It affects many speakers in the Western US as well, but is called the "Canadian" shift because the greatest majority of speakers that have it are in Canada. It's the opposite of a shift going on in the Northern Midwest. It shifts the vowel in "kettle" to close to "cattle". It also makes "cat" sound like how Midwesterners say "cot" (midwesterners have an opposite shift: cat -> kee-uht) It can even cause some misunderstandings between Westerners (and Canadians) and Midwesterners :) There is another similar vowel shift in California that is influencing Colorado, as well as Arizona, Oregon, and New Mexico, called the "California vowel shift". It's the same as the Canadian vowel shift, but includes some more features.

Thanks for the education, Moi.

im not sure about the others but minnesotans don't have an accent. mybe we do but i never noticed n e thing weird. maybe thats b cuz im minnesotan

Wow, great comments here. For my part I've noticed that I say "fer", in place of "for" in different contexts. Consider the following exchange: "what is that for?" " it's fer measuring, why what did you think it was for?" Come to think of it the "ur" in measure seems to be pronounced "er" as well.

>> For my part I've noticed that I say "fer", in place of "for" in different contexts. <<

"For" is reduced because it is unstressed. It's not limited to the West. All rhotic (r-pronouncing) North American English speakers do that, unless they are trying to speak really carefully.

real simple people...new mexico, southern colorado, parts of arizona, texas, california...these are all areas with large latino populations and our accent is different because of the spanish influence on "normal english" pronunciation. I am from southern colorado, and the only people who can distinguish the difference in accents from Pueblo CO south to Santa Fe are people from this region. Obviously, we don't all have the accent, but I know I do and I'm proud of it!

We Don't Pronounce our "T"'s
Just ask us to say mountain
We'll say "mao-in"

I was born here and I was never sure if I had a accent but I do say pop instead of soda..

I think all of us Colorado natives grew up saying "pop" instead of soda. As for this "yallow" thing, I really only hear it from people of Mexican descent, who also tend to say "yous" instead of "you."

It's all about the vowels. If you're from Colorado you're going to say you're vowels wrong...

Colorado/ Nevada....both said with the long a like in 'rat' (although I would argue those two are right)

I say melk instead of milk, pellow instead of pillow, venilla instead vanilla,

I can't say my t's correctly either. Mountain is moun-n.

I was born in Texas but grew up in Albuquerque N.M. I recently moved back to texas and everyone tells me I have a accent I just don't know what kind. Lol...