Fun Living in the Mou’uns

I have always been slightly (ok, really) obsessed with accents. I don’t really know why I have this obsession. Accents are just so awesome. If I’m ever on campus and someone near me has an accent, I go into creepy mode and find some excuse to keep by them so I can continue hearing their accent. I’ve always wished I had an accent. Probably because that would mean I’ve actually been out of the United States and could be from somewhere exotic.

Now, don’t get me wrong—I love the United States. It’s a great place to live and there are really great people here. I guess we probably have accents here to the ears of outsiders, but it’s hard for me to pick that up sometimes (unless it’s the obvious Southern drawl) or appreciate because I’ve grown up hearing  American accents all my life, so now they just don’t sound as good as some of the other accents in the world.

However, there is one part of my speech (accent, if you will. I don’t think I have one, but I guess I kind of do) that I really like, and that is the Utah t drop. I don’t know if it has an official name, but oh well. Basically, this is when Utahns drop the t in words. The linguistic name for this is called a glottal stop which, according to the Internet,  is produced by obstructing airflow in the vocal tract or, more precisely, the glottis. Words like mountain, button, and Layton might sound a little different to people who are not from Utah. Other people across the country do this as well, but Utah gets a lot of attention for it.

Here at BYU, I’ve heard people talk about this part of the Utah accent and I’ve had classes where we’ve talked about it. When my sister was here, she convinced a bunch of non-Utahns that Utah children are taught the silent t rule: if a t comes between a consonant and a vowel, it is silent. People actually believed her! I guess having just a Utah accent can be fun too. Click here to read more about the funny way Utahns talk.