2009/11/03 by Thomas Purnell, Eric Raimy, Joseph Salmons · 25 citations
Psychology · Social Sciences · #British English #History #Law #Linguistic Variation and Morphology #Linguistics #Multilingual Education and Policy #Perception #Phonetics and Phonology Research #Political science #Politics #Presidential system #Psychology #Variation (astronomy)
paper · doi:10.1177/0075424209348685
published in Journal of English Linguistics 37(4), 331-355 (SAGE Publishing)
openalex publication_date 2009/11/03 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/05/21
Nonlinguists prove surprisingly good at recognizing dialects, even as dialects rapidly evolve. During the 2008 U.S. presidential election, Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin’s speech was intensely discussed among linguists, the media, and laypeople. Though Palin is from Alaska, her speech was often identified with the Upper Midwest.The authors explore what this mismatch can tell us about dialects and their perception, starting from a description of Palin’s speech as commented on in the media.They review some pragmatic features and provide quantitative treatment of her “g-dropping.” Then, they undertake acoustic analysis of Palin’s vowels and final /z/ devoicing, including Western features and features that create an impression of her speech as Upper Midwestern. Regional settlement history, research on “new dialect formation,” and research on perception of variation inform the authors’ finding that a few acoustic and other characteristics trigger a specific national perception of Palin’s verbal behavior.