Presentation Title

Author

Are actors good at dialects?

Language and Culture

Recall

  • We’re moving on from writing, computers, and acquisition
  • Now, we’re focusing on the interaction of language and culture
    • But isn’t that what the whole section on language in the world was about? Well, yeah!
    • The level of impact language has on society AND the level of impact society has on language!
    • Remember sociolinguistics and linguistic anthropology?
  • Pop culture (short for “popular culture”) is a set of practices/beliefs that are dominant in society at a certain point in time
    • That which is transmitted via the mass media and aimed particularly at younger people
    • Changes over time (what’s popular now is different than what used to be popular)
    • Can impact how a person views certain topics
    • Is, by definition, exclusionary – it cannot include all practices/beliefs; just the most prevalent
    • Can be seen as commercial, capitalistic
    • Can be seen as being in opposition to “high culture”

Pop culture

Language goes to the movies!

  • Language is a mediator between worlds
  • So is the media!
    • Information media delivers specific representations of the “real world”
    • Other kinds of media connect us to conceptual worlds, those of imagination and creativity!
  • We can explore how language is used in relation to movies
    • What was it like when we made the shift from silent films to speaking ones?
    • What is the “transatlantic accent”?
    • Do actors do a good job with accents/dialects? ::: {.notes}

Talk about these as research questions you could ask, see what kind of data they might need

:::

Storytelling

  • What makes a good story?
  • How do you know?
  • Who tells good stories?
  • Animated movies
    • Disney is the gold standard!
    • How do you make inanimate objects seem animate?

Q slide

Favorite Disney (or other animated) character?

Stereotypes

  • A stereotype is a cognitive structure that includes the beliefs, preconceived knowledge, and expectations about a particular social group as held by a particular perceiver
    • It’s about abstract knowledge of what it means to belong to a particular group, to have a particular set of characteristics
    • Widely held, fixed, and oversimplified
  • Where do these things come from?

Why do we do this?

  • According to cognitive psychologists, stereotypes are a natural part of human categorization processes
    • It’s cognitively efficient: Once you have the categories, you can save on processing time by not reconsidering each “member” of a group
    • It helps us predict our social world: We don’t have to worry because you can easily apply your categories to new individuals
    • It makes us feel good about ourselves: We like our own group (ingroup) better than other groups (outgroups)
    • It’s automatic?: They can even be activated and used without you being aware of it
      • Subliminal primes are stimuli that activate stereotypes without our conscious perception (subliminal messaging!)

How do we learn stereotypes?

  • According to social learning theory, we learn our stereotypes from
    • Our parents
    • Our peer groups
    • The media
  • What is Disney’s role?

Media

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yhZ0TKdgJGg (hyenas)

An Example: The Lion King

Good Guys Bad Guys Others
Simba, Mufasa Scar, hyenas Rafiki, Zazu
  • The Lion King , a Disney movie set in Africa, has good guys, bad guys, and others (like sidekicks)
  • How are they represented?
    • Good guys speak “standard”, bad guys don’t
    • Others have varying accents
Character Variety Character traits
Simba “Standard” (Anglo) Strong, love interest
Mufasa “Standard” (AA) Strong, noble, leader
Scar British Evil, smart, effeminate, snobbish
Hyenas AAE, Chicano English Stupid, lazy, lowly, comical
Zazu British Servant, authoritative
Rafiki “African” English All-knowing (?), crazy

Characters, varieties, and traits

  • Why do they do this?
    • To create an effect, help us “know” the character
      • Some of the personality is done through the animation
        • Ex. Scar is smaller than Mufasa, has a dark mane = not strong but evil
      • But you can build a better character through linguistic stereotypes!
  • Because logically…
    • Why would anyone in the African plains speak with an American or British accent anyway?
    • Why would two brothers have such differing accents?
    • Why would no characters speak an African language?
    • How can you make it palatable to an American audience?

What are the consequences when we use adult stereotypes about voices and social groups to create characters and narratives for consumption by children?

  • Disney can decide it wants to have certain voices to give life to their characters, but the extent to which this is done well is really on the actor (and their dialect coach , a person who helps actors craft a voice for characters in the context of a production)
    • Most actors are from a place and can use their native dialect to make the character come to life or the accent is less important to the story
    • Others work very hard at developing a specific accent and often appear in roles using only it
    • Others pick up new dialects for specific productions, working with a dialect coach to modify the phonetics of their speech
      • Other dialect features would be in the written script
      • Some of these are really good!
      • And some of these are really bad…

Back to the actors themselves

Media

https://www.buzzfeed.com/kaylayandoli/worst-accents-in-movies

Q slide

Name a movie/TV show and actor in it where you thought the accent was so terrible it was funny or distracted you from what was actually happening.

How do they do it?

Remember the IPA… 

The Vocal Tract

Media

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NvDvESEXcgE (accent expert)

Who cares?

  • Fans!!
    • Actors are under increased scrutiny – by native speakers and by people who are very familiar with certain accents – to be as realistic as possible
    • Social media, the internet, etc. = a place to discuss = a place to praise/bash
  • Even with fictional places?!
    • Whatever it is, it has to be believable, it has to be relatable, and it has to bring in money!
    • Plus, with the way technology is today, there is almost no excuse

What’s next?

  • Monday is a continuation of pop culture by asking, “Can you make your own language?”
    • A preview of LIN 200!
    • Hint: yes, you can!
  • Wednesday is about language and animals!
  • Quiz 11 in recitation on Friday
  • Be working on Data Analysis (ask questions!)
  • Extra credit!!