Boaz residents, please help. Researchers from the Dictionary of American Regional English at UW - Madison are looking for people who have lived in Boaz or surrounding area for at least 15 years to complete the survey at the link below. If you can help, please do. They want to know what words people from Boaz use for everyday use. Do You Speak Wisconsin? Between 1965 and 1970, graduate students from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and other institutions hit the road to capture the unique character of the way Americans speak. They recorded the words, phrases, pronunciations, and pieces of grammar and syntax that vary from one part of the country to another. That groundbreaking work provided the basis for the Dictionary of American Regional English (widely known as DARE), an authoritative reference work that only recently reached the end of the alphabet. Its completion was celebrated in The New York Times (2/24/12), The Wall Street Journal (2/21/12), and The Chronicle of Higher Education (3/4/12), among many other places. Those intrepid researchers traveled in “Word Wagons”—campers that were specially outfitted with stove, sink, and bed, as well as a large questionnaire asking about the words people use in their everyday lives, and the reel-to-reel recording device necessary to capture the voices of Americans in more than 1,000 communities across the country. Only now are DARE researchers heading back into the field for the first time since the original survey was conducted. And they are starting in Wisconsin! But unlike 50 years ago, the dictionary won’t be sending out researchers in Word Wagons. This pilot study, funded by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, will use an online survey rather than face-to-face interviews to trace the ways language has either changed or stayed the same in Wisconsin since the first round of fieldwork was done. In conjunction with the University of Wisconsin Survey Center, DARE staff will be using a web-based survey designed to gather data from the original 22 Wisconsin communities where it first did its fieldwork, plus 30 new ones chosen to reflect the state’s current demographics. The research will include large parts of the original Questionnaire plus new questions designed to reflect societal changes since the 1960s. As was true in the original survey, DARE will be looking for lifelong residents of the 22 original communities. This focus allows a concentrated study of local vocabulary over a significant period of time. In the new communities, they will seek long-term residents (those who have lived there at least fifteen years, preferably longer). Because it is important to compare vocabulary usage among different age groups, the researchers hope to include participants from three age ranges: 18 –30; 40–59; 60+. It’s certainly possible that people who would be ideal participants might not have computers; if their children, grandchildren, friends, or neighbors would assist them on their own computers or those at the public library, they could easily take part in this investigation of our local lexicon. This new Wisconsin research also includes the option of a telephone interview in which participants engage in conversation with a survey caller, read “The Story of Arthur the Rat,” and read a list of common words (awe, bag, caramel, etc.) that may illustrate differences in pronunciation from one region to another. (A composite recording of “Arthur the Rat,” by speakers from 9 different areas of the country, may be heard on the DARE website at dare.wisc.edu/?q=node%2F44. Differences in regional speech patterns will be immediately recognizable!) DARE’s Chief Editor Joan Houston Hall says that publication of the last volume of DARE was a huge milestone, but not the end of the work. American English has changed over the last half-century, and it is important to document how it has changed. Wisconsinites who would like to participate are invited to go to https://study.uwsc.wisc.edu/dare . To learn more about the DARE project, go to dare.wisc.edu and dare.news.wisc.edu/. What We Are Looking For For this new research in Wisconsin English, the Dictionary of American Regional English project is looking for people who have lived all their lives in these Wisconsin communities, which were surveyed in the original DARE fieldwork between 1965 and 1970: Algoma, Antigo, Bayfield, Belmont, Burlington, Florence, Janesville, Jefferson, Jim Falls, Juneau, LaCrosse, Lancaster, Manitowoc, Menomonee Falls, Necedah, New Berlin, Pepin, Portage, River Falls, Superior, Washington Island, Wautoma. The project is also looking for people who are long-term (at least fifteen years, preferably longer) residents of these communities: Argyle, Baraboo, Belgium, Boaz, Chippewa Falls, Delavan, Doylestown, Elderon, Elm Grove, Genoa City, Horicon, Howards Grove, Kewaunee, Linden, Madison, Marinette, Menasha, Milwaukee, New Lisbon, Ogdensburg, Oshkosh, Pleasant Prairie, Plymouth, Randolph, Richfield, Richland Center, South Milwaukee, Spooner, Watertown, Webster Not from any of the places listed above but still eager to participate? Fine! Responses from residents of other communities will be valuable as well. We welcome all Wisconsinites to fill out all or part of the online survey.
Posted on: Mon, 18 Nov 2013 17:33:58 +0000
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