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the purest philly accents that i remember hearing were proudly bourne by folk from northeast philly. it was warter warter everywhere, particularly along bal-TI-moah avenue, up near the ak-a-mee. i used to think that if you were from boston and wanted to make fun of old-school brooklyn-ese (like you'd have heard on the honeymooners) you'd sound like you were from north east philly. but these folk i remember mostly from my first sentence to the philly region, in the early 1980s. the second tour i did in philly was strange in this respect--i know the city much better for the past 6 years of living in west philly, but i hear fewer of the old-school accents.
but i could just be "being ignorant", as the odious little saying goes.
or i just know alot of expats and only a few locals.
but my sense is that philly has changed alot between the early 1980s and last year (when i left), that its older neighborhoods are dissolving one after the other (except maybe the northeast, which is still as it has always been to me, a mystery, the void that begins with yard's brewery and extends north well past the extent of my ability to care)...and that the accent is dissolving along with it. which is good, i think: it was truly awful. worst and more annoying (even) than my family's militantly north shore massachusetts accents.
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a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear
it make you sick.
-kamau brathwaite
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