this post was submitted on 16 Mar 2025
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for example, i鈥檝e heard of the U.S. dialect of Spanish.

some states like mine (Minnesota) have american norwegian (which I might learn along with european Norwegian)

does chicago speak the european version or is there a us dialect?

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[鈥揮 Fondots@lemmy.world 2 points 12 hours ago (1 children)

One small data point I'm able to offer

My family is polish, were a few generations removed from the old country, no one really speaks more than a handful of words of polish. There's a pretty decent amount of people with polish ancestry around us in the Philly area, and one thing that kind of sticks out to me is "kielbasa"

The pronunciation around here has been sort of twisted into something like "ku-bah-see" and it's pretty universal around these parts, not sure how widespread that is in the rest of the country.

I think "kielbasy" is the actual Polish plural for kielbasa, so I suppose that's part of how the pronunciation got twisted.

Bonus fun fact- there is/was a Polish organized crime group active in parts of Philly that was sometimes known as the "kielbasa posse" which rhymes when pronounced that way.

I'm also pretty sure the pronunciations of "babcia" and "dziadek" (grandmother and grandfather) in my family are more than a bit off from standard polish too, though I think that comes down to more to just us trying to say polish words with an American accent.

[鈥揮 Lupa@lemmy.ml 1 points 10 hours ago

Pittsburgh area says ku-bah-see/kiel-bah-see, too

[鈥揮 Vanth@reddthat.com 3 points 13 hours ago

I've been told my polish sounds "old". I know only a little bit, learned from grandparents and great grandparents. However they were speaking in the early 1900s when they left Poland for the US, that's the Polish I grew up hearing.

I grew up in the Midwest where there were quite a few 2nd, 3rd, + generation Polish Americans. Now I live on the East Coast where there are more people who immigrated from Poland in the last ~20 years in addition to the generational families and they sound quite a bit different from what I grew up with.

[鈥揮 alexsystem@lemmings.world 3 points 15 hours ago

(poniewa偶 m贸wisz o j臋zyku polskim i wiem, 偶e m贸wisz po polsku)

moja rodzina (macocha i tata) m贸wi po polsku z ameryka艅skim akcentem. moja macocha jest native speakerem j臋zyka polskiego i nauczy艂a si臋 angielskiego jako dziecko. poniewa偶 dorasta艂a w chicago, jej angielski sta艂 si臋 lepszy ni偶 jej polski i teraz m贸wi z ameryka艅skim akcentem.

m贸j tata nauczy艂 si臋 polskiego od mojej macochy, on jest amerykaninem i te偶 nauczy艂 si臋 od kogo艣 z ameryka艅skim akcentem.

translation

my family (stepmom and dad) speak polish with american accents. my stepmom is a native speaker of polish and learned english as a child. because she grew up in chicago, her english became better than her polish and now she speaks with an american accent.

my dad learned polish from my stepmom, he is american and also learned from someone with an american accent.

[鈥揮 HobbitFoot@thelemmy.club 3 points 17 hours ago

I don't know, but if there is one, I'd expect one to be in New Jersey.

[鈥揮 southsamurai@sh.itjust.works 3 points 17 hours ago

Maybe? My family is from the southern Appalachians, but we've spread all over.

One ancestor married and had kids with a polish lady, and moved to Pennsylvania. So, that branch tended to marry with other polish descended people more often than not. Their accent is different from people I've known from Pennsylvania, which includes some of my wife's family.

So I tend to believe that the polish american accent does exist. Thing is, I don't know enough about Chicago's history to even start to pick away at their accents and how they came about. But I would still say that if there's been a significant Polish population there, it's almost certain that there is one