Yesterday, the Badger women's ice hockey team crushed the University of Minnesota – Duluth 4-1 to win their second national title in a row. Over the whole season, as defending national champs, they lost only one game (to Duluth, as it happens).I appreciate hockey on a number of levels, but I'd rank this way up there: the dialect and sociolinguistic aspects of hearing serious players and coaches talk. Like stock car announcers or rodeo people, they really exemplify the region where their sport is rooted.
Mark Johnson, a hero of the Miracle on Ice and a god around here (you should see people stop cold when he walks through the rink on campus), exemplified this beautifully at the ceremony welcoming the team home today. (Hey, I'm retired — I get to do stuff like that.) He had some Northern Cities fronting in his low vowels for sure, but retains the very back and very rounded long /o:/ (both) and /u:/ (opportunity) and pretty monophthongal long vowels generally.
On Wisconsin!
2 comments:
I'm sorry to hear this guy thinks your potential is "quiescent"! I hope you don't develop it, I enjoy you as you are - lively and engaging.
You know, when that first comment went up last night, I thought I'd take it down this morning. But it's got this kind of unhinged poetic thing going on, so maybe I'll leave it up. (Is the man who's a poached egg part of the C.S. Lewis quote or what?)
I'm under strict doctor's orders to go to the emergency room if I start to develop any quiescent potential. (Happily, my family history is utterly devoid of quiescence AND potential, so the odds are low.)
I am curious as to what 'is amalgamated with' him ... .
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