Calling Matt H

[Bob S]

Being a Geordie I concur with Mat that there are differences within a dialect between towns only a few miles apart. These were obvious to the natives.
Not so obvious nowadays. TV has an influence on language.
I still consider English my second language.

Oh - and Dutch isn't a language, it's a throat disease.

[matt h]

Bob!! A new marra from tha toon! We divvinar mickle Geordie, but get us right propa mahrtul an' giz us up a tale of you as a wee bairn.

[matt h]

I feel like I bring the IQ down a lot in this bunch yalls some smart fellars hell I can barely read much less read other languages

I feel the same way you do a lot of the time. That's what's kinda great about this place. There's a lot of, for lack of a better phrase, mixed-talent. We've all got different stuff to contribute and I love reading all of the random (and notsorandom) crap that comes out on the forum. I learn a ton. I love learning.

I definitely don't have your woodworking/carpentry chops and remember you having great insight into a few others threads (I think David Root's planing potential-fiasco comes to mind)... didn't impact my life directly, but I got to learn! yay! Also reminded me how much I miss woodworking and construction-ish stuff. (My grandfather used the GI bill to fund his study of carpentry, particularly cabinet making. I used to build stuff with him when I was a kid. He became disabled and had to stop... later, in high school, I got pulled into set construction for drama performances. Since I had some background, I got a lot of the big projects. But it's been 15 years since I've touched a table saw. AND THAT IS JUST NOT RIGHT.) Your thread a while back got me to listen to the Drive-by Truckers. I never would've known about that band were it not for your post on it. Turns out I really, really like them.

We all got different backstories--the trick is to just keep learning and love doing it.

[Bob S]

Hallow Matt, wat cheer bonnie lad. Ah belang Blyth.
Ye fra the toon?
Ye knaa wat they say-war like dogshite - aall ower the shop.

[matt h]

Nee, divvin be up a height, but ahm jus a Yank, like. Tha dialect dunched us right ta gob, canny like.

My aforementioned background in linguistics meant that one day, later in life when I encountered Geordie I sorta fell in love with it. I met some people from "tha nahrt" and had to know more. They were incredibly surprised how well I understood a lot of the local "flavor" of their dialects (I say plural here, as there were Geordie, Mackem, Yorkshire, and some Scousers in the mix--first and more important was "some posh bint from Durham" which got me headed down the path that led to geordie). My academic background involved Old English, Old Norse, and some Middle Scots. When someone asked me "what exactly is Geordie?" I responded, "It's one third a descendent of northern dialects of Old English, one third Old Norse, One third Scots-English (with additional scots-gaelic borrowings), one third drunk, pissed-off coalminer. Yes, the fractions are accurate."

[Bob S]

I figured as much Matt - it's very surprising to find anyone, not born there, to understand how the geordie dialect came about.
I learned a lot from my grandad 50 years ago. He sometimes constructed sentences in the northern european fashion. Five & twenty instead of twenty five. Moving the verb to the end etc.
At 13 I had to decide between studying languages or technical subjects.
I went in the tech direction but the progression & development of language always fascinated me.

[matt h]

Bob, it's fantastic you've got those memories, though. With the role broadcast media has leveled so much dialectal flair, it's really a gift to have those sorts of personal connections and experiences.

When did you come stateside? and how did you get where you are now? Many stops along the way? or a straight shot from Newc to Michigan? I had to chuckle when you said English was a second language (and American English a third?)

Through most of high school, most people thought I was going to go into something math/sci related (most likely chemistry) I did too. I'd also been doing Latin and Greek (the gateway dead languages... *sigh*)--they were my fun. In college, I was going to be out of sequence a semester in chem because of some advanced coursework. During that first semester (intending to start up the second), I discovered how the first three years of the program were awful. Not "hard"--but actually AWFUL. By the end of my freshman year, I had 3/4 of the Classics major finished, so started branching out into other dead-language-related stuff. Linguistics (mostly historical/comparative), Egyptology, and vernacular european stuff. I've had, uh... an extremely unusual biography subsequently (I've kinda considered posting a thread about some of it. grab your popcorn and watch the horror unfold--would also need mod pre-approval to delete the thread to keep it from search engines and the like)... and can guarantee it never would've happened if I'd gone into the sciences. I... kinda regret that a lot of the time.

[cbass]

You should hear me and Bob's conversations .Pumpkin Center meets well I'm not sure
I'm pretty sure no one else could understand

[gktamps]

Outstanding discussion and information! Just read the entire thread to my wife over breakfast.

I love the diversity of folks on this forum.

Cheers,

Greg

[C Moore]

I took a class learning Cherokee I don't remeber none of it.
I feel like I bring the IQ down a lot in this bunch yalls some smart fellars hell I can barely read much less read other languages

You and me both.
I barely graduated High School.
I did 24 years in The Painters Union and got a Fed Disability (11 surgeries in the last 9 years). I was fortunate to get my full 25 year pension, under the disability umbrella. Thank God for that.
Anyway.......I picked up on electronics by default. None of the guitar players I was in bands with could work on their gear...so I started. 10 years later, I know A Lot more than when I started, but I will never have the grasp of it that many of these guys do.
I do not have the education background, and God help me, I just Do Not have the intellectual horse-power that some of these guys have.
JUST for example.....Matt H seems to have a great knowledge of tube amps...far greater than my "hobbyist" abilities, but then this whole linguistics thing emerges. THAT is a big deal.
All these guys that have multi skills are impressive. Who is the guy building that Les Paul.? HOW can you guys be so good at so many things.?
Seriously....maybe because I do not have any...a formal education really means something to me.
I tip my hat to all you "smart guys" (no need to be modest...we are not all equal) and to all you guys with multi skills.
I help A LOT of local musicians with Free-Cheap repairs. I have gutted and rebuilt a few amps for strangers that have come to me for help.....because they bought an amp from Craigslist that turned out to be a piece of junk...but they spent 800 bux on it. So I have rebuilt them for cost of parts.
I do not go looking for that situation, but if the right person comes to me.......
I think we ALL need to help...to OUR ability to do so. A lot of you guys have helped me with different amp repairs. Many times, it was because I was helping a player with NO repair ability. I try to (in some way) repay the help I get from TAG.
Chirst...I have Really Rambled here.
Let me just (finally) end by saying.....I appreciate the education and ability levels of TAG members.
Thanks For Your Time

[matt h]

Dude, "ramble on!"-- I totally second that we should all help (or participate, or whatever) to the best of our abilities. It goes hand in hand with being a life-long learner. Never stop learning. This doesn't mean sit and study things and make a chore out of it--but whenever you encounter something that's interesting or cool--pursue it til you get bored. You'll be surprised how not-bored with stuff you get... and how the big picture of life starts to fill in.

Formal education (schoolin') isn't for everyone, but it's hardly the only kind of education there is... there are so many different types of intelligence. Curiosity, about anything, is the best thing us humans have going for us.

Stay hungry, friends.

[cbass]

MattH comparing your skills to a construction workers is crazy anyone with half a brain could do what I do . don't sell yourself short

[C Moore]

cbass -
I was born in 1960.
When I think back to Grade School.....there was ALWAYS One Kid in every class Like You.
BUT...back then we did not have a handle on all the different types of people that "God" made.
If you were a Top to Bottom, Left to Right kid like me...all was fine. And most kids were like me.
Kids that were Autistic, Dyslexic, Bi-Polar, and a dozen other descriptives, were often viewed as trouble makers, or worse yet.....Dumb.
It is a shame that happened..... but one day people will look back in horror, and think how awful it must have been to be alive when The Cancer Cure was not known.
My sons diagnosis is Schizo-Effective-Disorder. He is doomed (if he is still alive) for a life of misery and regret. And it is My Fault he was born.
We all have our crosses to bare.
I am Not criticizing You in any way.
Hang in there My Friend

[matt h]

CBass, I don't see it so much as selling myself short, so much as just not comparing people to others (unless forced), and instead trying to see each person on their own terms.

And at the end of the day, society doesn't have much, if any, use for me. The state's already tried to take my life.

[TUBEDUDE]

C Moore, though the script was the issue, there are still communication issues in Germany.
I spent 5 years in Bavaria, and was having dinner one evening with my landlord in a local gasthaus, when a man stopped in to get directions, I assume. Try as I might I couldn't fathom what he was saying. I asked the landlord what he was asking. His reply was "I don't know, all I can say is that he is from the north." I was stunned to find a country smaller than the U.S. had regional dialects that were not comprehensible to all, when I can understand a Texan, Bostonian, Hillbilly or what have you.
I am also a fan of Noam Chomsky.