A fascinating post over at The Crux, Votes and Vowels: A Changing Accent Shows How Language Parallels Politics. Here’s the section which I might quibble with though:
Labov points out that the residents of the Inland North have long-standing differences with their neighbors to the south, who speak what’s known as the Midland dialect. The two groups originated from distinct groups of settlers; the Inland Northerners migrated west from New England, while the Midlanders originated in Pennsylvania via the Appalachian region. Historically, the two settlement streams typically found themselves with sharply diverging political views and voting habits, with the northerners aligning much more closely with agenerally being more liberal ideology.
But first, here is a map of the dialects in question:
Now compare to a map of Yankee settlement in the mid-19th century:
I do not object to the argument that old historical patterns in the USA redound down to the present in surprising and often cryptic ways. I refer to this as the “dark matter” of American history; deep structural patterns which shape the cultural geography of the …