Regional accents and dialects (Was: The best hard drives??

[Liam Proven]

On Wed, 18 Nov 2020 at 21:20, Fred Cisin via cctalk
<cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote:
>
> And the machines that Calcomp made (570, etc.) were called "plodders"

I am well-used to that one; I think all Brits are, from TV and cinema.

(Aside: it is amusing to me, at least, that some British actors
succeeded in Hollywood or TV analogues thereof, playing Americans, in
what to other Brits sound like unconvincing accents: Hugh Laurie
("House"), Bob Hoskins ("Who Framed Roger Rabbit?").)

> Nobody around here will use Worcestershire sauce, because they are
> afraid to even try to pronounce it.

It took me decades to realise, but P G Wodehouse's famed fictional
character Bertie Wooster has the same name. "Wooster" is just a
phonetic rendering of "Worcester". Any placename with "chester" or
variant thereof is ~2000 years old, because it derives from the Latin
"castrum" used by the Romans. Castra were Roman fortified bases.
Sounds drift a lot over two millennia.
Gloucester → "Gloster"
Leicester → "Lester"
Worcester → "Wooster"

My personal favourite is Woolfardisworthy. It's a pretty little
village, but its name sounds so different, they put the phonetic
version on signposts too, so outsiders can actually find it: Woolsery.


> For a while, I lived near "Bawlmer" (Baltimore)

Huh. I did not know Baltimore was not pronounced boll-tea-more.

I've watched this many times but never clocked on:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfIWX5vGTEk ← sweary but highly amusing

> (The most significant landmark is the B R O M O S E L T Z E R clock - what
> time is it when both hands are on 'O's?)

*Googles it* Coo...



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