The California Dialect 

I feel like "like" is now no way just californian thing. Might have started that way, but now even foreigners who speak english as a second language use it as a filler word or to say "she was like..."

This made me realise how influential the california accent is on english in countries where english isn't the native lsnguage and on the internet

The reason Bakersfield has the pin pen merger is because of the dust bowl. Immigrants from the affected areas moved to California and brought their dialects with them.

Quotative like is extremely useful for inexact quotation.

I scrolled by and I was entirely expecting two heads on the bear

Another thing to mention about “like,” it’s often paired with gesturing to show what the person might have been doing. Especially common if you are describing something personally slighting or weird, and a silence. I find myself saying sentences similar to “he told me that and i was like …[gesturing here]…” and the sentence ends.

Here's a fun California word: "hella". I think it originated in Oakland and is more associated with Northern California - specifically SF Bay Area (I read somewhere that they eschew the word in SoCal). Roughly equivalent to "extremely", use "hella" to turn any adjective into a superlative: That math test was hella hard! Everyone likes Susan cuz she's hella sweet! Dude, I forgot my girlfriend's birthday and she got hella mad! Use the word a few times and you may find it's hella fun!

As a Californian i never realized me and a lot of others even ended sentences on a high note

As a So Cal linguist, I enjoyed this video. Id be down to watch a video exploring the differences between norcal/socal dialects as well

Younger Romanian speakers use the word "gen" just like "like" from the California accent. This may have been a way to mimic the spoken American from popular media, but I can't be sure. The word itself means "kind" as in "kind of thing". Maybe this happened in other languages too, I'd love to know!

What I learned from this video as a Southerner is that I sound a lot like a Californian thanks to all my Internet access from a young age 💀

I feel like this is the basis for general american because I grew up in northern Kentucky and I talk like all of the changes you mentioned, and all of my friends there talk exactly like I do, and the people who are in the Chicago suburban area (where i am) talk like this too.

I got a 56 second ad and then a 51 second ad right after. The youtube ad situation is bullshit. I gotta say it was probably worth it

I know it's so, like, hard, but you got to keep, like, like, going! You have to win this for, like, like, like, like, the both of us!

frankly as for uptalk being a strategy for indicating that you're not done talking i'm kind of envious of californian speakers for this feature because i always, always get cut off in the middle of what i'm saying and people will just say whatever in response to the thing that i was only saying to set up the thing i actually wanted to say

Growing up in San Diego in 80s, we said "Dude' all the time. It doesnt refer to the person. It means something closer to "hey" or "yo". But more because we said if speaking to oneself alone like "dude its hot in here". Or it might be used to simply announce our own presence ie walk in where there are ppl and just say "dude". I thought everyone did this until i went to a desert camp w kids from a few different western states AZ etc and they were laughing "omg the CA kids really say dude constantly, wtf"

Loved this video! Thank you for making me discover the fact that I (a foreigner) speak Californian xD Keep up the linguistic content!

I personally grew up in the UK, but I have been exposed to the Internet for a while now, and I have consumed a lot of American and specifically California-made content by people with Californian accents. While I definitely haven't picked up the accent per se, I have definitely adopted the Californian usage of "like". Only now do I realise how funny it is with my British midlands accent combined with how often I use like as a filler, especially for how far back in my mouth I pronounce the /a/ sound in the diphthong in like. Very interesting video!

I watched a great RU-vid documentary (by FlameIsLucky incidentally) about one of the greatest skaters in the world, Yuto Horigome. In his late teens he came from Japan to live in California, despite barely speaking English, because of the skate culture here. I found it amusing when it showed Interviews after he had been here a while, speaking California skater English, interjecting “like” frequently, but still with a pretty noticeable Japanese accent. I love when cultures intermingle

I'm not a native English speaker, yet it seems I've picked up most of the pronuntiations found in California. to me, that feels amazing I do, however, tend to avoid uptalk, maybe out of personal aesthetic. what's funny though is that I've heard bilingual Spanish speakers use some crossover form of uptalk in their Spanish speech as well. I've thus never heard uptalk in a monolingual Spanish speaker's speech

That note about uptalk being used to hold the floor kind of blew my mind, because it makes so much sense and I'd never realized that effect before.

I’m Californian and I never realized I had (at least a little bit of) the dialect because about after I had to leave the state at about five (don’t ask why I don’t know) I spoke Korean for most of my life, and I got back in the East Coast because my grandparents had a house there and I’ve been told by my doctor I have an eastern shore accent but I feel like I lean on both sides.

uptalk was also noticed in the UK in the 40s-50s iirc, and even in Australia. I wonder if that influenced each other, or if it developed independently.

‘Like’ is an Essex thing in the UK, pronounced more ‘luy So… we was ‘lut ‘oh no, don’t do vat’, and ven he ‘luy… you get the idea

I love your video something you brought up that would be cool to look at in the future would be how media form California has kinda effect how the entire country talks

I've definitely heard several of these outside of California. I wonder how much of it has spread because of Hollywood and/or popular RU-vidrs?

This was good. However, you mainly focused on LA and didn’t mention the Bay Area, which has plenty of linguistic contributions. I’d recommend a part 2 for NorCal. Hella needs to be included, along with other slang.

im kinda shocked there was no mention of the vowel shift that although is thought to have started here, has been spreading or showing up in other dialects regardless of distance

As a Floridian, I've managed to speak in uptalk in daily convo. I only thought it was just how my peers talked and I use it to indicate I haven't even finished my talk like Im continuing it. Maybe my friends growing up were from Cali.

One thing to mention is the "L coloring" that has been happening in Southern California in the past few decades. That's when you say the diphthong in "day," but drop it when adding the adverbial suffix "-ly" so that "daily" ends up sounding very much like "dally," or "feelings" sounds like "fillings." Some have also commented here about how "also" sounds like "ohlso."

We say “You know like” to end a sentence. One of my favorite California things. Don’t know where it came from but it’s just part of the zeitgeist frfr

The up talk thing is so real. I literally never noticed you doing it, but im from california😅

You missed O-fronting! It's not just the U that is gradually moving to the front.

On the “like as describing body language” point, I often use like to combine what someone is saying and mixing it with what vibes I’m getting. So like if I’m quoting someone who was being a bitch, I could say “and they were like” then quote what they say but change it a bit to add in that aggressive vibe.

The best way I can tell who's not a local is by if they pronounce the t in Sacramento. Everyone I know (norcal) says it like sack-ra-meno.

I have a very similar accent to you, from Utah. Though, I have even more centralization of vowels going on I think. For whatever reason all my back vowels are centralized except for the ones involving r or l. So like, the FOOT vowel is schwa, the BOAT vowel is [əw], and GOOSE is [ʉ], same as you. I don't use dude much, but those usages of like are definitely in my vocabulary. I think California has had a big influence on the rest of the west, so that's probably why.

Idk why i just randomly decided to click on oldest and watch his first video

2:05 this is because of dust bowl migrants, and as someone who lives in sacramento and has family members who were dust bowl migrants, I'd say this extends further north. Its especially noticeable in rural areas of the central valley and in older people.

As a Californian, I change my pronunciation of “caught” cause sometimes I develop another accent in the middle of a sentence without meaning to. I have always enjoyed performing and as of recent I have a reason to (I found myself in a theater class in high school, going to junior year, hoping I get it again but idk if it’s a popular class). Since I was performing more, I was using more accents and stuff so I find myself doing them even more than I used to. And even before it was with great frequency.

my terminally online ass really just thought "why does the NCR bear on the thumbnail only have one head" forgetting that calafornia is actually a place.

Learnt a bit about myself today. Good looking out.

It's very apparent just how influential this dialect has been on General American English

As someone who has suffered in California their whole existence, I always felt my accent was the “default setting” accent, being very hard to pin down compared to other American accents such as southern, northeastern, Texan, and midwestern.

as an australian i always found the thing with yanks getting so miffed about uptalk really odd - considering it's something which virtually everyone here does pretty frequently regardless of any social groupings or region, i guess i just got used to it and never noticed its absence in media because so much of it is californian

Been studying Scandinavian languages lately and a lot of Californians (but especially in SoCal) say their o's similar to the Swedish and Norwegian Ö and Ø.

Thank you for putting into words what I've never been able to explain to my friends. Born and raised in Cali but am currently living in Washington and all my new friends make fun of the way i speak 😭

The frontal “u” is also pretty loose in the central valley, where I’m from. People barely move their mouths to pronounce it, making “dude” almost sound like “deed” sometimes

Hey otter dude, can you do one on the lower NY, New England, NJ accent(s)

Do the upper pensuila of Michigan!

We also say leg and egg with a long A instead of a short E. And melk.

Dude I feel called out

I usually talk until the sentence is at a high note and end it with something like “but” in a normal note

Me from St. Louis realizing I do the cot and caught merger: Also me realizing my family didn't grow up in St. Louis (I'm from originally from SW Missouri before my family moved): Huh. That's something. On another note: Good video.

That was like hella cool dude

People are gonna come back to this vid in 10 years and be like "omg, he changed so much since his first ever vid!" But I was here from it all, I am seeing the change in action! >:333 I'm a spoonful high, don't mind me

i’ve literally lived in the far far far east of us my whole life, never even set foot in the west or met anyone from there. but, i’ve been using “like” like that since basically when i first learned to talk. same with my parents (they’ve never been there) but my mom says it that same way. i guess i got it from her, but that makes me wonder where she got it from. even if i didn’t get it from her, probably from kids in my school. but where did they get it from then…? 🤔

Another interesting thing I’ve heard in SoCal is how also is pronounced. Many younger folks who grew up down here say Ohl-so instead of all-so. There’s a bit more nuance to the Ohl sound, but I’m terrible at identifying and transcribing diphthongs..

I never knew the high note was a Californian thing. I tend to find myself saying “like” and “dude” a lot as well lmao.

Tbh, I do most of these and I’ve never been to California 😂. Maybe they all originated there many years ago, but I’ve lived only in New Jersey, Philadelphia, DC, and Florida, and I’ve been speaking this way and hearing people speak this way (especially the Mary and “like” ones) for at least most of my life. Also, the way you said, “caught” was only accurate for NYC; my boyfriend from Ohio and I pronounce it very differently from that, but also not the same as cot, more like the awww vowel.

shocked "hella" wasn't mentioned even though it's a norcal thing

I was just thinking about "quotative" words! like your example of "like". Another one is "go/goes"... For example when telling a story.. He goes "I like pizza" so I go "me too"

I got into an argument many years ago while in line to donate blood about pin and pen. I was in a southern state and im orginally from the upper Midwest lol

This video showed me how close, and yet how far i am from californian english. I have all the mergers (except for pen and pin), i also say like for filler, but i don't uptalk, only small children do that when listing off things they don't really remember or are makung up on the spot, i also don't front my U's, but it does sound REMARKABLY close to how the stereotypical surfer says dude.

I used to live with a girl from LA and a girl from outside Toronto and to my (European) ears the Canadian sounded more Californian than the Californian. Idk if it's organic or because Californian media has influenced urban youth in Canada. The uptalk + copious amounts of vocal fry was crazy at times

As a Californian I feel called out on some of these😭 especially with the use of "like"

What you're a cat? How you change from cat to otter!

“The walls in the mall are like, totally totally tall!”

Native Western New Yorker here (Rust belt/Great Lakes, not city). I say pin and pen, and cot and caught differently, but merry/mary/marry are all the same. For cot/caught, it’s cAHt (cot) and cAWt (caught) for me. Cot is higher up/more forward in my mouth and caught feels like it’s in my throat. Anyhoooo

I worked as a remote staffing coordinator for a Bakersfield hospital. Oh my god they sucked so much.

My foreign friends find my English very easy to understand and I suspect it’s because so much of American pop culture is filmed in California, my home state

Can’t forget about using “the” in front of the interstate number. “The 5”, “the 405”… and not pronouncing like I-5 or just 5. Living outside of California now, but yes… I annoy many with uptalk… it’s unintentional.

Mordecai, when he is about to make a suggestion for a rambunctious activity to Rigby: 3:32

I'm curious if the pronunciation of 'both' differently is from California... My dad grew up in San Jose and I ended up adopting his pronunciation of it, which is very different from the pronunciation to many of my peers. We basically add an 'L' into the word after the 'O'.

The U fronting is so true. It’s the reason we sometimes ironically write dude or boobs as “dewd” or “bewbs” when we’re imitating Californians. I’d say it’s moving north too though; I hear younger speakers in Seattle using it as well (born and raised Seattleites). Cot/caught merger: Your “cot” is actually farther back than I’d expect. In the midwest where I grew up, “cot” is more front; our “caught” is closer to your “cot”. In the Pacific Northwest they’re merged but the merged vowel is higher, somewhere between the midwest “cot;” and British “cat.” Vowels are hard to describe. 😅 Uptalk may be originally Californian but I hear it in speakers from all over the country now. The one person I can think of who ALWAYS uses uptalk, is 100% New York. “Like” is just not Californian. I’m 65, and teachers were telling us not to say “like” as a filler when I was in junior high. One thing that has changed is the “quotative like”: “I was like, hi, and she was like, how are you?” When I was a kid, kids would say, “I go ‘hi;’ and she goes, ‘don’t talk to me now’!” It may have started in California, but I even hear it in British speakers these days. Every language has these filler words, as well as people who complain about them. :-)

There is a feature I've noticed in some older Californians of pronouncing "ell" like the name "Al." For example they might say, "So come to find out, he was still working out in Bal-flower"

Quotative like just feels so right to use, but I'm from the mid Atlantic

wait I'm from new Jersey, grew up here and everything. I pronounce cought and cot the same though

When you said dude with the Californian accent you sounded exactly like Mordecai from Regular Show

"...it can also be used to describe body language and expressions. For example, he was like waving his hands around." The word like in that sentence is just a filler word, as you can omit it and the meaning wouldn't change. Also, I was really surprised to find out I have a Californian accent. I'm a foreigner, English is my second language, and I was taught with Cambridge textbooks. I guess American media affects my accent more than I thought?

Its worth noting the the General American /u/ sound is not at all [u] (not to be mean or anything but it sounded very funny when you pronounced dude like [duːd]). In modern General American, it is usually transcribed as [ʉ] or [ʉw], and usually doesn't have full rounding.

Being from California, I noticed some /u/ fronting, but it's not on all of my /u/ sounds. Some like spooky is far back. I don't know if that's from the infrequencies of hearing that outside of tv shows which drew the word out for emphasis or what, but it's definitely much further back than in other words I say. Also, in some words like soon it's pretty much /y/.

This is so funny because I didn’t even realize I talked like this but I checked all of them I definitely have the California dialect. I don’t do uptalk tho. Also filler like is def not just California

Love your videos, but I can't exactly say the execution of those /u/ /ʉ/ /y/ vowels were very accurate lol

"How california is built different" (including 30 other states!)

Like is the audible comma

03:32 sounds like mordecai

Don’t give up on videos for only shorts :)

idk if i'm just twitter brained or from california or both but I use "like" alone sometimes, for example if my boyfriend said something mean and I was telling a friend, I could say "isnt that so messed up? like..,"

Where did these characteristic vowel sounds come from?

I’m from socal and I say dude all the damn time

Uptalk is a sociolect and it is despised by every other social class that doesn't use it. By contrast, "like" as a dialogue-marker has real linguistic value. But uptalk is more 'metalinguistic', signalling the speaker's relationship to what they are saying, and that type of cue-ing is unique to specific social classes.

I'm from the bay. Yeah pin and pen arent even similar. but i dont so the thing where i make a or i long before ing. maybe a little more than some people, but definitely not that exaggerated. your videos are cool though. also i speak french and english and can definitely see it (though i dont talk with a lot of foreigners) and yeah we do do the like thing

i thought the quotative use of like was standard.

at like I was kinda like shocked (This is like actually like how I speak)

I wonder what dialect i speak

so basically Mordecai & Rigby

I may not do the uptalk, but I do basically everything else. I'm from Florida and I only went to California last month, but I've always spoken like this. Why??

I guess I shouldn't be surprised that Western Canadians also frequently use this dialect. I myself make use of many of these traits without thinking about it despite being from British Columbia. The Stereotypical Canadian accent is extremely mild here compared to the Californian one.

The uptalk sounds so much like Mordecai omg. We don't really do that in the Central Coast. Or maybe we do and I just don't notice it.

Bro forgot the dropping of the T sound.