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Where Are You Writing From? Tell me!

Hello, tender friends!

Who knew reading a book about computational linguists could give me so much insight into humanity and even the writing life? (Yes…books about computational linguistics…I rebuke Anthony’s words he says that that means I’m a nerd).

One of the things we love most about where we’ve lived the past 3.5 years is the fall weather! It will be in the 70s most of the week, so my Cub and I get to take photos like these.

70 degrees in November!? Yes!

But even though I live in southwest Virginia, I don’t identify as being from the state. Cringe if you want, but you don’t take the Jersey out of the girl. I’ve moved more times than I can count throughout my life, and this map showing regional speech patterns just tickled me:

When I realized that immediacy speech patterns in New Jersey are the same as California and the Northeast, everything clicked. I’ve always felt a sense of immediate kinship and ease when meeting people from California. (Despite all the moves, I know my speech patterns are New Jersey speech patterns).

When I lived in Barcelona, I made dear friends from the West Coast (Maniac Meg, I’m looking at you!) I currently reside in Virginia, and I have, unsurprisingly, made a dear friend from California here also.

The author notes that people in the white states tend to write with psychological distance and formality. This made so much sense to me!

Writing this blog, it’s been a mental hurdle for me to overcome the advice from my young school years: “Don’t ever use first person pronouns in your writing. No one wants to read that. Prove your point with facts.”

And no, this is definitely not a post bashing the tri-state area. I’m immeasurably grateful for the place that made me who I am. I also don’t hop on the bandwagon of thinking that people from the tri-state area are rude and arrogant, not just because I’m actually from there, but because I believe that good and bad people are everywhere. I don’t think any state or region of the world makes people good or evil.

When I commuted into Manhattan briefly for work (not in publishing, lol), total strangers helped me with my bags on the subway. Why do people think New Yorkers aren’t friendly? Feel free to weigh in if you see it differently.

The greatness of that city was built on the backs of immigrants, and that energy- the energy of new opportunity in the New World, the energy of possibility and the belief that life sometimes does grant us the wildest dreams of our hearts- persists.

But what I really want to know is this: where are you writing from? Do you find yourself connecting with bloggers from a particular region? One of the things I love about this forum is that it enables me to see what’s going on in people’s lives all over the country and even the world. What a tremendous privilege!

Perhaps these regional differences in speech language patterns account for what some people perceive to be negative attributes in people from different places. I don’t know. (I didn’t know that Southerners express distaste so openly for people from the tri-state area until I moved to Virginia).

Maybe understanding regional speech differences will inspire compassion for people who communicate differently. I don’t know that either. But I do know that the world is mostly good and mostly full of good people.

The gates of heaven will be flooded with people of every tribe and tongue (Revelation 7:9-10). My goal is for my set of friends throughout life to be as diverse as heaven.

That means part of my job is convincing people in Virginia I’m not a “damn Yankee!” Whatever that actually means. Wish me luck!

(Do I look like a southerner? I’m trying to blend in without using “y’all” because it’s physically impossible for me to use that word or “ain’t.” If a song on the radio contains the word “ain’t,” I stop singing along. Unless it’s Kanye. There might be a future post there).

Okay, that’s all for today, tender friends! Thank you for stopping by and thank you to the new friends! I’ll be sharing a post on self compassion on Thursday.

Thank you for sharing!

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  1. jacarroll71

    Fascinating to think about how diverse the USA is. My parents were New Yorkers (Mt. Vernon and Long Island). They moved to SWVA during WWII. My mom never lost her NYC accent, but dad had sad and hard memories of growing up and also having a tough time in business in NY. I mostly grew up in the Roanoke area but after college at VT I lived in DC, Ft. Worth-Dallas, Manila, N. California, Buenos Aires, South Carolina, TX and back to VA after that long trek over 45 years. My wife, Mary, took a linguistics course at Roanoke College. The prof prided himself on being able to correctly detect the accent of every one of his students. He could even pinpoint which area of VA some of them were from. He was lost on Mary. Ha. She was bilingual (English-Argentine Spanish) and had lived most of the places i mentioned and he couldn’t guess she grew up 20 minutes from the RC campus.

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    1. Stacey

      I’m sorry to hear about your dad’s sad and hard memories of growing up and business!

      That’s so interesting about your wife’s professor. I knew you’d lived in Buenos Aires but didn’t know about all the other places in the US.

      Thanks for sharing a bit of your family’s history, John! I agree- it’s amazing how diverse the US is.

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  2. ladysheepdog

    I hope you get more input. I’m originally from Southern California (26 years with a six month stint in The Orlando Florida area when I was about 24.) I’ve been in San Antonio, TX for 28 years. I have a Texas drawl now, I can hear it myself. Y’all (though I still use “you guys”) is definitely a daily vocab usage thing for me. Ain’t is used more for emphasis, maybe. Though I would say, “I ain’t doing that!” with a re-iteration of, “I am NOT doing that!” statement. My parents were originally from the Midwest, so saying things like “worsh” instead of “wash” is something I have done and have tried to change, to some success.

    Growing up was breakfast, lunch and dinner or supper depending on what word you chose to use. Also front room and living room was the same room, as we only had one; versus our current house has a living room and a front room, which has had to be referred to as the orange room as when I tried to communicate with my kids to do anything in or with the front room they would get confused. The room is painted orange, I would have to say, “Put it in the orange room.” or whatever, for them to understand my instructions. Its still painted orange and is still called the orange room.

    “Dude!” & “Like I don’t think so!” are my Californian influences coming out. Though I was never a surfer, I did and do use some of the language. Californians are more accepting and open, or at least used to be, than San Antonians. I took three years of Spanish in high school and Hispanic people in California were over joyed to find out I knew some Spanish. But here in SA, TX, I get attitude and looks of, “What are you doing?” and “Oh no, she knows what we are saying.” Very frustrating. Technically SA, TX is part of the Bible Belt and “Christians” here are very cliquish and being new at a church, especially if they find out you are not from here, seems to cause ostracism. They will deny it, but that’s how it feels and what the looks on their faces say. Churches in California are very welcoming of whomever, of course not across the board, but most of them. Again, at least when I was living there. Once you came, you were family, period, even if you weren’t saved yet. Here in SA, its seem you have to earn your acceptance and family status, hmmm, not very Christ like, no?

    They are my blogs and I know I don’t have to follow any grammatical or formal English rules, so I say things however I want. I don’t care what the proper “drive and keep your readers” etiquette/rules are. You read my stuff or you don’t, whatever. When I comment on other peoples blog sites I do try to show some curtesy and respect for their rules or possible rules. I’m not saying I’m 100% on that, but I do endeavor to reach that goal.

    Anyway, I think that’s enough my perspective for now. Feel free to reply with any questions, comments or complaints. Hugs.

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    1. Stacey

      Susan, I’m so sorry that you feel churches in your area are cliquish. I’m also sorry to hear that your ability to speak Spanish isn’t appreciated. I’ve found some of my closest friendships with Hispanic women after the initial, “wait, where are you from?” as I obviously don’t look Hispanic. One of my dear friends here in VA is from El Salvador, and it’s a peaceful friendship because we raise our kids so similarly.

      Thanks for sharing your history of moving around. I always enjoy hearing where other people live or have lived! Hugs to you, friend!

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  3. Regal woman@TransamEagle

    It is an interesting subject. One of my seminary professors was advanced in this concept of how words develop culture. I tried to incorporate that with my last team at work. We had a very cohesive group, thankfully, and it was an experience with people I won’t soon forget. My very first professional job was made up of no less than 15 first-generation cultures. We went from a Level 1 tribe (“Tribal Leadership”) to about a 4 (even 5 at times) after about 8 years together. I contribute that growth to our manager hiring well, our use of diversity training (and availability of up to date resources by our company) over years 5 and 6. Also, I enjoyed incorporating Djembe “drum circle” techniques that my son taught me…when words fail. (He visited Jamaica and is a musician). Thanks for bringing up such an interesting topic, Stacey!

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    1. Stacey

      Thanks for providing such an interesting response, Teresa! What does level 4 or 5 mean?

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      1. Regal woman@TransamEagle

        Based on the tribal Leadership book score!

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  4. Jeffrey H. King

    I’m from Toledo, OH, but I’ve lived in Memphis since 2012. My BA was earned in Ohio and my master’s in Michigan, so I’m sure that education influences my writing more than where I live now.

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    1. Stacey

      Interesting. I find my education factoring in less and less in my communication style the older I get and the more I move. I purposely stopped writing long, grammatically complex sentences at the same time I started writing professionally. But certain elements of home remain with me even though I haven’t lived there for 15 years.

      I see that Ohio and Tennessee are slightly different colors on the map. I wonder if people can tell you’re from Ohio based on your speech patterns in Tennessee.

      Thank you for weighing in, Jeff!

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      1. Jeffrey H. King

        My accent is probably the real give-away on my northern roots. Something else I just thought of reading your comment – my time in acting and writing scripts probably factor in, as not every character is going to have the same speech patterns. I showed Tom Hanks a script I wrote when I apprenticed under him at a Shakespeare festival. He said I had a very good ear for writing dialogue.

        One other story about accents giving you away – and maybe speech patterns – my wife and I had spent the day at the Palace of Versailles. We met a couple young ladies on holiday at a nearby restaurant. The one girl guessed we were from Ohio. When we asked how she could tell, she said she spent a summer there with an uncle who taught at Findlay College. She recognized our “flat Ohio accent.” Talk about coincidences!!

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    2. Stacey

      That’s so cool! I hadn’t thought about your experience reading scripts, but that is SPOT ON! I was actually thinking about this the other day, because although I never pursued professional theater or even college level theater, many of my friends who later became writers did. I always thought that the years they spent studying scripts Shirley impacted their writing style later on.

      That is amazing that you have a good year for writing dialogue! That’s actually one of my writerly goals, because I know that I’m not good at it!

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      1. Jeffrey H. King

        If you can’t find scripts to read, just watch movies and really pay attention to how the different characters speak. It’s also interesting to watch whoever is NOT speaking in a scene.

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    3. Stacey

      That’s so cool! I hadn’t thought about your experience reading scripts, but that is SPOT ON! I was actually thinking about this the other day, because although I never pursued professional theater or even college level theater, many of my friends who later became writers did. I always thought that the years they spent studying scripts surely impacted their writing style later on.

      That is amazing that you have a good year for writing dialogue! That’s actually one of my writerly goals, because I know that I’m not good at it!

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  5. Awakening Wonders

    Currently I am writing from the great state of Texas!

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    1. Stacey

      Wonderful things come from Texas, Mary! Like you!!

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