Eye dialect

Most authors are likely to use eye dialect with restraint, sprinkling nonstandard misspelling here and there to serve as a cue to the reader about all of a character's speech, rather than as an accurate phonetic representation.

While mostly used in dialogue, eye dialect may appear in the narrative depiction of altered spelling made by a character (such as in a letter or diary entry), generally used to more overtly depict characters who are poorly educated or semi-literate.{{Harvcoltxt|Nuessel|1982|p=349}}

The term eye dialect was first used by George Philip Krapp in 1925. "The convention violated", he wrote, "is one of the eyes, not of the ear." According to Krapp, it was not used to indicate a real difference in pronunciation but {{Quote |text=the spelling is merely a friendly nudge to the reader, a knowing look which establishes a sympathetic sense of superiority between the author and reader as contrasted with the humble speaker of dialect.|author= George P. Krapp |source= The English language in America (1925){{Cite book |title= The English language in America |last= Krapp |first=G.P. |date= 1925 |publisher= The Century Co., for the Modern Language Association of America}} quoted in {{Cite encyclopedia| title =Eye dialect |encyclopedia= The Concise Oxford Companion to the English Language |last= Mcarthur |first=Tom |date= 1998 |publisher= Oxford University Press }}}}

The term is less commonly used to refer to pronunciation spellings, that is, spellings of words that indicate that they are pronounced in a nonstandard way.{{Harvcoltxt|Wilson|1993|p=186}} For example, an author might write dat as an attempt at accurate transcription of a nonstandard pronunciation of that.

In an article on written representations of speech in a non-literary context, such as transcription by sociolinguists, Denis R. Preston argued that such spellings serve mainly to "denigrate the speaker so represented by making him or her appear boorish, uneducated, rustic, gangsterish, and so on".{{Cite journal |first=Denis R. |last=Preston |date=1985 |title=The Li'l Abner Syndrome: Written Representations of Speech |journal=American Speech |volume=60 |issue=4 |pages=328–336 |doi=10.2307/454910|jstor=454910 }}

Jane Raymond Walpole points out that there are other ways to indicate speech variation such as altered syntax, punctuation, and colloquial or regional word choices. She observes that a reader must be prompted to access their memory of a given speech pattern and that non-orthographic signals that accomplish this may be more effective than eye dialect.{{Harvcoltxt|Walpole|1974|p=195}} Frank Nuessel points out that use of eye dialect closely interacts with stereotypes about various groups, both relying on and reinforcing them in an attempt to efficiently characterize speech.

In The Lie That Tells a Truth: A Guide to Writing Fiction, John Dufresne cites The Columbia Guide to Standard American English in suggesting that writers avoid eye dialect; he argues that it is frequently pejorative, making a character seem stupid rather than regional, and is more distracting than helpful. Like Walpole, Dufresne suggests that dialect should be rendered by "rhythm of the prose, by the syntax, the diction, idioms and figures of speech, by the vocabulary indigenous to the locale".{{Harvcoltxt|Dufresne|2003|p=200}} Other writers have noted that eye dialect has sometimes been used in derisive fashion toward ethnic or regional pronunciation, in particular by contrasting standard spelling with non-standard spelling to emphasize differences.{{Cite book| last= Hornback| first= Robert |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=dMRlDwAAQBAJ&q=%22eye+dialect%22+racism+OR+racist&pg=PA239|title=Racism and Early Blackface Comic Traditions: From the Old World to the New|date=2018-07-19|publisher= Springer|isbn=978-3-319-78048-1|pages=239|language=en}}{{Cite book|last1=Feagin|first1=Joe R.| url= https://books.google.com/books?id=rh_vCgAAQBAJ&q=%22eye+dialect%22+racism+OR+racist&pg=PA58|title=Latinos Facing Racism: Discrimination, Resistance, and Endurance|last2=Cobas|first2=José A.|date=2015|publisher= Routledge|isbn=978-1-317-25695-3|pages=58|language=en}}{{Cite book|last=Rush|first=Sharon|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oP8WBlIrlUIC&q=%22eye+dialect%22+racist&pg=PR13|title=Huck Finn's "hidden" Lessons: Teaching and Learning Across the Color Line|date=2006|publisher= Rowman & Littlefield|isbn=978-0-7425-4520-5|page= xiii|language= en}}

Eye dialect, when consistently applied, may render a character's speech indecipherable.{{Harvcoltxt|Walpole|1974|p=194}} An attempt to accurately render nonstandard speech may also prove difficult to readers unfamiliar with a particular accent.{{Harvcoltxt|Nuessel|1982|p=346}}

Some authors who use eye dialect include Maya Angelou, Charles Dickens,{{Harvcoltxt|Levenston|1992|p=56}} William Faulkner, Greer Gilman, Alex Haley, Joel Chandler Harris, Russell Hoban, H. P. Lovecraft, Terry Pratchett, James Whitcomb Riley, J. K. Rowling, Robert Ruark,{{Harvcoltxt|Malin|1965|p=230}} John Steinbeck, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Mark Twain, Maxine Beneba Clarke, Paul Howard,{{Cite book| url= https://books.google.com/books?id=eZTWCgAAQBAJ|title=The Undecidable: Jacques Derrida and Paul Howard|first=Clare|last=Gorman|date=June 1, 2015| publisher=Cambridge Scholars Publishing|isbn=9781443883597|via=Google Books}} Finley Peter Dunne,{{cite journal

|last1=Thogmartin

|first1=Clyde

|date=Spring 1982

|title=Mr. Dooley's Brogue: The Literary Dialect of Finley Peter Dunne

|journal=Visible Language

|volume=16

|issue=2

|pages=184

|doi=

|url=https://www.proquest.com/openview/3146ab83fbdf388501040766fb07ab97/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=1821103

|access-date=June 7, 2021

}} and Irvine Welsh.

Charles Dickens combined eye dialect with pronunciation spelling and nonstandard grammar in the speech of his uneducated characters. An example in Bleak House is the following dialogue spoken by Jo, the miserable boy who sweeps a path across a street:

{{quote|...there wos other genlmen come down Tom-all-Alone's a-prayin, but they all mostly sed as the t'other wuns prayed wrong, and all mostly sounded as to be a-talking to theirselves, or a-passing blame on the t'others, and not a-talkin to us.}}

In the above, wos, sed, and wuns indicate standard pronunciations.

In his Discworld series of books, Terry Pratchett makes extensive use of eye dialect to extend the caricature of his characters, besides other visual devices such as changing the font used for certain dialogue. Death, for example, speaks in small capitals, while the dialogue of a golem, who can communicate only by writing, resembles Hebrew script in reference to the origins of the golem legend. Eye dialect is also used to establish a medieval setting, wherein many characters' grasp of spelling is heavily based on phonetics.{{citation needed|date=January 2022|reason=Find a reference that argues how use of fonts is a kind of eye dialect instead of just an alternative literal device}}

In his 1937 poem "The Arrest of Oscar Wilde at the Cadogan Hotel", John Betjeman deploys eye dialect on a handful of words for satirical effect; in this case the folly of the arresting police officers, who are made to seem like comic caricatures of themselves:

Mr. Woilde, we 'ave come for tew take yew

Where felons and criminals dwell:

We must ask yew tew leave with us quoietly

For this is the Cadogan Hotel.

An extreme example of a poem written entirely in (visually barely decipherable) eye dialect is "YgUDuh" by E. E. Cummings, which, as several commentators have noted, makes sense only when read aloud.Reef, Catherine (2006) E.E. Cummings, New York: Clarion Books, {{ISBN|9780618568499}}, p. 104 In this case, Cummings's target was the attitudes of certain Americans to Japanese people following World War II.

American cartoonist Al Capp frequently combined eye dialect with pronunciation spelling in his comic strip Li'l Abner. Examples include l{{not a typo|issen, aristocratick, mountin}} [mountain], {{not a typo|correkt, feends, hed, introduckshun, leppard}}, and perhaps the most common, {{not a typo|enuff}}. Only his rustic characters are given these spellings; for instance, the "overcivilized" Bounder J. Roundheels's dialogue contains gourmets, while Li'l Abner's contains {{not a typo|goormays}}.

Cartoonist Walt Kelly made extensive use of eye dialect in Pogo. Like Pratchett, he used unique fonts for many of his supporting characters.{{citation needed|date=January 2022|reason=Find a reference that argues how use of fonts is a kind of eye dialect instead of just an alternative literal device}}

Some cartoonists and comic book creators eschew phonetic eye dialects in favor of font changes or distinctive speech balloons. Swamp Thing, for example, has traditionally been depicted using "crusty" yellow speech balloons and dialogue heavily laced with ellipses, suggesting a gravelly voice that only speaks with great effort. Robotic and computer characters often use square speech balloons and angular fonts reminiscent of OCR-A, suggesting a stilted, emotionless cadence. Thor's dialogue has routinely been written in an elegant font, implying his archaic vocabulary and pronunciation as a millennia-old god. After Thor passed the mantle to Jane Foster, her dialogue was written in the same font whenever she transformed into Thor, before reverting to normal when she did as well.

American film director Quentin Tarantino used eye dialect for the title of his movie Inglourious Basterds.

The novel Zazie dans le Métro is written in French that disregards almost all French spelling conventions, as the main viewpoint character is a young child.{{cite book|last=Marnette|first=Sophie|title=Speech and Thought Presentation in French: Concepts and Strategies|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lyCufkCSi-IC&pg=PA264|year=2005|publisher=John Benjamins|isbn=9789027253767|pages=264–65}}

• Apologetic apostrophe
• Eye rhyme
• Hypercorrection
• Inventive spelling
• Mondegreen
• Preved
• Satiric misspelling
• Sensational spelling
• Spelling pronunciation
• SMS language

{{Reflist}}

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• Bowdre, Paul H., Jr. (1971). Eye dialect as a literary device. In J. V. Williamson & V. M. Burke (Eds.), A various language (pp. 178–179). New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston.
• Fine, Elizabeth. (1983). In defense of literary dialect: A response to Dennis R. Preston. The Journal of American Folklore, 96 (381), 323–330.
• Ives, Sumner. (1950). A theory of literary dialect. Tulane Studies in English, 2, 137–182.
• Ives, Sumner. (1971). A theory of literary dialect. In J. V. Williamson & V. M. Burke (Eds.), A various language (pp. 145–177). New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston.
• Krapp, George P. (1926). The psychology of dialect writing. The Bookman, 63, 522–527.
• Macaulay, Ronald K. S. (1991). Coz It Izny Spelt When Then Say It: Displaying Dialect in Writing. American Speech, 66 (3), 280–291.
• Preston, Dennis R. (1982). Ritin' fowklower daun 'rong: Folklorists' failures in phonology. The Journal of American Folklore, 95 (377), 304–326.
• Preston, Dennis R. (1983). Mowr bayud spellin': A reply to Fine. The Journal of American Folklore, 96 (381), 330–339.
• Preston, Dennis R. (1985). The Li'l Abner syndrome: Written representations of speech. American Speech, 60 (4), 328–336.

• {{Wiktionary-inline}}

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Category:Orthography

Category:Nonstandard spelling

Category:Linguistic error

Category:Narrative techniques