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Week 14 Discussion

Language and Culture

Let’s start with the quiz!

Get out your device, use the access code on the board, and complete the quiz!

Any questions about the Data Analysis assignment?

First things first

  • How do linguists find relevant background research for their research questions?
    • Remember, as researchers, we must find credible sources that comment on linguistic data.
    • You are NOT finding more sources of data. You already have your data: our corpus of Country Songs!
    • We need to collect additional thoughts from other professionals in order to make a case for our own research.
  • Olivia and Dr. Cramer’s faves?
    • Google Scholar
    • UK Library Databases (or just the library itself – books are cool!)
    • Linguistics and Languages Behavior Abstracts (LLBA)

Quick Review

  • Language is a mediator between worlds, and so is the media!
  • What makes a movie good?
    • A good story = one that gets audiences on board
    • Good characters = ones that we get to “know” quickly
  • How do we get to know them?
    • 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
    • Problems using adult stereotypes for character development in kid movies?
  • Some actors do a good job, but…
  • Some actors can’t quite get the accent!
  • How are they supposed to change how they talk?!
    • A good understanding of the vocal anatomy and what it means to configure your vocal apparatus to make sounds differently!
    • Dialect coaches and the IPA
  • Why does it matter?
  • White Lotus is super popular (but Dr. Cramer knows NOTHING about it except this…)
    • Accents are a big part of the commentary/critique – especially Southern ones!
    • Have you watched it? What do you think?
  • Let’s a watch a short clip from the trailer – focus on the first guy in the yellow shirt
  • Now let’s listen to the actor (Jason Isaacs) talk about doing the accent!
  • Last one – here is a short video commentary about the accent

Activity time!

Next week!

  • Monday and Wednesday in Singletary
    • Can you make your own language?
    • Do animals use language?
    • Read LA Times article
  • Quiz 12 next Friday (last one!)
  • Extra credit and Data Analysis assignment!

Activity time!

First, let’s watch this clip of Kyra Sedgwick (the first woman who speaks) in the TV show “The Closer” and answer a few questions: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TVZxAsNC66I

What kind of accent does she have? Does it sound authentic? Why/why not?

If you’re not familiar with the show, it’s about Brenda Johnson, a Los Angeles Police Department deputy chief and CIA-trained interrogator who is originally from Atlanta, Georgia and has a reputation as an interrogator who not only solves a case, but also obtains confessions that lead to convictions, thus “closing” the case. What impact does having this accent have on the story/character? Even if you don’t know the show, how do you feel about a person in this role having this accent?

Where is the actress actually from? Does that change any of your thoughts?

  • Now, read this short clip from a story about the show: https://variety.com/2009/scene/markets-festivals/sedgwick-perfects-southern-accent-1118004602/
    • “I grew up in the South with really smart people who had that accent, and every time I saw them on television, they seemed like the stupidest people on the face of the earth. Like the accent was a badge of inferiority,” he explains. “I thought, as long as we’re doing something different, how about if the woman lead with the Southern accent is the smartest person in the room instead of the most ignorant?” (Duff, one of the producers, who is from Texas)
  • You can read the rest (it talks about how she perfected it), but what do you think of this accent being used, given the “story-value” it has for the producers? ::: {.notes}

Read quote aloud. Connect back to first part of activity. If they aren’t jumping to talk, you can provide your own take. My take is that some people go straight to the stereotypes of Southerners as stupid, and it won’t get better than that until the media creators also try to shift the narrative. This producer was trying to do that. My own experiences with being a (basically) competent Southern person in a woman-shaped body are such that I have experienced the “you are the exception to the rule” bit; but the more people have exposure to different kinds of Southernness, the less likely I am to experience that. I can just be a Southern woman without the stereotype first, exceptionality second thing.

:::