Help me Obi-Wan F-listies

[feliciakw]

So. Geo and I are reading a hilarious story as part of a presentation at the end of the month. And the roles I'm going to read are native Texans. The problem being that my Southern accent is kind of generic and mostly based on my Virginia aunt, who has more of a lilt than a twang. One of the characters I'm reading will have the lilt, but I want the other to have the twang.

So my question is this: Are there any websites that I can go to to actually listen to Texas dialects? I've found lots of websites that talk about the dialects, but none that have recordings to listen to. I'd kind of like to hear the real thing, rather than just kind of wing it.

You know?

Comments

[yasminke.livejournal.com]

Where in Texas? That's like saying they're from the South. East Texas doesn't sound like West and upper class Dallas doesn't sound like working class Orange (thank G-d). A girl down the hall from me in my freshman year was from Orange, while my immediate neighbours were from Dallas: all three were similarly stupefied when it came to falling snow, however.

Watch Texan news programs, or Friday Night Lights, Dallas, Walker, Texas Ranger. They all have "real" Texans among the cast (i.e., not just actors playing Texans).

[feliciakw.livejournal.com]

Well, the text I'm working with simply says "native Texans" so anywhere in Texas works. This is so brief, I'm not going to get into the differentiation between regions of TX.

I'll see if I can look up any clips from those shows on-line. Oh, or maybe Netflix on demand. Hm . . .

Thanks for the input.

[yasminke.livejournal.com]

Yes, but "native" doesn't say anything about social, so you'll have to decide that too.

I'd go with FNL, personally. Look at the coach and his wife.

[tahirire.livejournal.com]

Watch REEEEEEEEEEEALLY old J2 interviews - win/win!! :D

[feliciakw.livejournal.com]

Hee! Oh, now, you know when I saw that these characters were from Texas, I immediately thought, "But they [J2] don't use their accents on the show! What am I gonna do?"

[mlevins.livejournal.com]

Absolutely! Go to the IDEA website - International Dialects of English Archive(Yay Kansas University)
http://web.ku.edu/~idea/northamerica/usa/texas/texas.htm

[feliciakw.livejournal.com]

Let me just say this: Librarians are awesome!

I knew someone back in the day had posted a link to a site like this. I think it was actually back in the Tavern archives somewhere.

Thank you!

[mlevins.livejournal.com]

I've known about it for a long time, but I can't remember where I learned about it--maybe the Tav was it