Word: inmanned
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1980-1989
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...properly placed tongues, Brooks sits in front of a mirror. He puts a button-size plastic ring on the tip of his tongue, draws it into his mouth, and presses it up against the ridge behind the front teeth. It is an exercise against the tongue-lolling tendency that Inman-Ebel says characterizes 70% of Southern speakers. She says many Southerners suffer not just from forward tongue carry but also from unwanted "nasal emissions" (or twang), "restricted mandibles" ("a big phrase for talking with your mouth closed") and "oral-facial muscular imbalance...
...Inman-Ebel's clinical tone enrages some people. "What's wrong with forward tongue carry?" says John Tinkler, who teaches history of the English language at the University of Tennessee. "It doesn't sound like Indy-goddam-ana." Tinkler is a vast, round man with silver hair, dark skin and flashing, protuberant eyes. He describes his accent as "educated rural Southern," the language college graduates in his family have spoken for generations. He wishes Inman-Ebel would attack the stereotypes and the attitudes, instead of the accent. "She's teaching people how not to talk like folks," he says. "That...
...Inman-Ebel's view, people who talk like folks put stress in the wrong place (cre-ate for cre-ate), mispronounce vowels (rine for rain), draw monosyllables out into diphthongs (hay-ul for hell), and let their pitch glide, usually upward, as in "Y'all come back now, ya hear?" Some of them talk so slowly "you want to get inside and move the tongue yourself to get it over with." It does not add up to standard American speech...
...There is no standard American pronunciation," asserts Tinkler. But Inman- Ebel will not be dissuaded by her critics. She says what she and her clients do is nobody's business: "Why are some people concerned that other people change their accents or their hair or the way they dress? You would think someone were pounding on their door, saying, 'Hey, you sound funny, I can help you.' That's not what's happening." Some of Inman-Ebel's clients are nonetheless uneasy about wanting her help. One man, fretful that people would think he was betraying his heritage, forbid...
...conversation with a client, Inman-Ebel picks out target sounds to change: "We identify every single word that labels you as Southern, and you're going to practice them inside out and upside down till you correct them...