Discussion Post #9

[Emma Butcher]

If I receive a research grant to conduct a linguistic study of my target language and culture, I would love to look at the different dialects and how they are changing. In class, we talked about how the accent in Iowa is one of the most basic accents, and some areas are losing their accent, and it is turning into a basic “Iowa accent”. I know that dialects and accents are not the same thing, but I would like to see if there is a similar pattern as the accents in the USA. My first plan of action would be to visit all the different areas that have different dialects. I would talk to the people in the area and try to see the difference in the dialects. I would also like to see the different dialects connected to different cultures in Korea. For example, Seoul has a specific dialect in the city and that dialect is different from a dialect in the country. My next plan of action would be to talk to the younger people in each of the areas with different dialects, along with talking to the elderly. I would compare the difference in their dialects and see if the younger generation is starting to move away from the dialect in their area and move towards the Seoul dialect. This is like the USA and how many parents may have an accent, but their children lose it. The third part of the plan would be to talk to the elderly and ask them about how their parents talked to get insight into how the dialect has changed from their parents to them. I would then ask them their opinion on the younger generation and the changing of dialects. All this research would show me how the dialects have changed and if different areas are losing their dialects and turning to the Seoul dialect. I would like to use the IPA Chart to look at different words and sounds to see how they have been changing and if the dialect is forgotten. Using this chart would be important to my research because it would tell me not only how the dialects pronounce sounds differently but also how the generations within those dialects would pronounce sounds differently. I hope that my results will show me how likely it would be for all the dialects to slowly disappear as generations get older.