Paula Deen shocked to learn her family owned slaves, Y'all"

[faithanne]

I'm Australian and even I have slave owners in my ancestry. As if it wasn't bad enough that my first Aussie ancestor (other than the convicts) totally fucked over the Aborigines, but then I discovered my one American ancestor came from a family that owned slaves for generations. I've got a lot of bad karma to put right in my lifetime.

[NickiDrea]

I always that it's interesting that the majority of American-born black people that I know (myself included) have ancestors who were slaves (in my case, I have written documentation), yet I have NEVER met anyone- in person- who would admit that their family owned slaves. There is always an excuse about why it's not possible that their families would own slaves. I grew up in the South and once questioned this issue at school. I got branded a "racist," go figure. I'm now 30 and still have never come across anyone who will admit to it.

People are in denial about this issue. I think it's a combination of families covering it up, shame, denial and/or pure ignorance (ignorance meaning they have no clue it happened). But sticking one's head in the sand does not change what happened in the past. Acknowledge it and move on.

[MrsDark]

I not only acknowledge it, I wonder who I might be related to. (Oprah was from here wasn't she?)

[ConstanceSpry]

Sorry, I couldn't resist.

[sweetness]

She does the same thing with the word "man". She pronounces it "Mayuhn".

But she's from JAAAWWWWJA! Don't they all talk like thayuht?

Ye kin betcher britches we do. We'uns AWLLLL tawlk jus lahk thayuht.

[NoNoRehab]

always that it's interesting that the majority of American-born black people that I know (myself included) have ancestors who were slaves (in my case, I have written documentation), yet I have NEVER met anyone- in person- who would admit that their family owned slaves. There is always an excuse about why it's not possible that their families would own slaves. I grew up in the South and once questioned this issue at school. I got branded a "racist," go figure. I'm now 30 and still have never come across anyone who will admit to it.

Well, don't forget though the statistical reality that slaves outnumbered whites in the South. So just going by numbers, there will more African-Americans descended from slaves than there will be white people descended from slave owners.

Only about 30% of white Southerners owned slaves, and most of those only 2-4 slaves. (Just as today) the planter class ala Thomas Jefferson/Ashley Wilkes who were rich and owned tons of land and dozens of slaves were not the norm. OTOH, something like 95% of black Southerners, pre-Civil War, were slaves. So yeah, there probably is an element of denial but there's also statistics at work: even if you're a white person who can trace your ancestry to the antebellum South, there's still a statistically good chance your ancestors didn't slaves. But if you're a black person who can trace your ancestors to the pre-Civil War U.S., there's almost no chance you won't find slavery in your family tree.

I think overall, too, there's much more of a probability that a black person will trace their ancestors to the Southern U.S. for those reasons, but a large portion of white Americans today have no connection to the southern U.S. For example, the black side of my family I can trace to Georgia, but all of my white ancestors came over from Europe at the turn of the 20th century.

[hustle4alivin]

Paula Deen exaggerates her accent for tv. Although I know people from the backwoods of the south who talk with a twang, it's nowhere near as pronounced.

Be that as it may, a lot of people outsode of the Southern US don't realize there are different accents in the south. If a Bostonian and New Yorker can a different accent in different regions of the Northeast, it shouldn't be a surprise to find out not all southerners talk the same, but it is to many. Hell, even the Northern Cities Vowel shift in the Upper midwest/Great Lakes region has some variations (My boss is from Minnesota and his accent is more pronounced than someone from say, Chicago).

I've noticed the further north and inland you go, the accent is more "twangy" and people talk faster. Upland South accents are different from coastal south accents to my ear. People from coastal areas tend to talk with a slower drawl than upland southerners. I've noticed a different accent here in the Atlanta area than in Mississippi...(Atlantans talk fast for southerners) then there are all those subregion accents - Gullah/Geechee, Tidewater Virginian ("I'm from Naw-fick, not Nor-folk!"), and don't get me started on the fascinating mish-mash known as New Orleans. The 'y'at accent' of working-class white New Orleanians is like Brooklynese on codeine, which is different from the slower-paced accent that the more uppercrust, aristocratic crowd affect there. A lot of people don't realize that a lot of Italian and Irish immigrants (similar immigrant stock that settled in NYC or Philly) settled in New Orleans back in the day, so that affected the accents down there among a lot of their descendants. And then the black population of NO has an accent that has a sort of caribbean lilt to it. I knew a girl from the Lower 9th ward who was always mistaken for being Jamaican. And all those accents are totally different from the rest of Louisiana because of New Orleans isolation from the rest of the state for a number of years (being surrounded by swamps and all). Savannah wasnt as isolated as NOLA, but isolated enough that a distinctive accent formed there too.

Sorry for the tangent, but accents have always fascinated me.

[OrangeSlice]

I'll vouch for that. In NC, you can almost tell what county someone is from. And DEFINITELY state by state (roughly) at the very least.

[hustle4alivin]

I'll vouch for that. In NC, you can almost tell what county someone is from. And DEFINITELY state by state (roughly) at the very least.

I can usually tell a Virginian from a North Carolinan. Native Virginians tend to talk slower. Well, the ones from Richmond/Central VA and Hampton Roads/Tidewater do. I once worked with a lady from Lynchburg or Bristol and she had a classic twangy, Upland accent.

I once figured out a Dallasite from a Houstonian based on their accent too. It's a gift I guess!

[MrsDark]

Speaking of, I can't stand most southern accents in movies. They're always horribly off base.

[shedevilang]

Yep that's true about Louisiana for damn sure, New Orleans people all talk different and the rest of us talk nothing like them lol. People always expect me to have a cajun accent and I just don't. I also sound nothing like brittney fucking spears (queen of the fake accent)

[OrangeSlice]

Speaking of, I can't stand most southern accents in movies. They're always horribly off base.

Think Maggie Smith and Fionnula Flanigan in Ya-Ya Sisterhood. I normally like them both, but their Southern accents in that movie STILL make me want to punch them both in the face. It's almost impossible to do a decent Southern accent if the actor doesn't already have a Southern accent of some sort.

[hustle4alivin]

Yep that's true about Louisiana for damn sure, New Orleans people all talk different and the rest of us talk nothing like them lol. People always expect me to have a cajun accent and I just don't. I also sound nothing like brittney fucking spears (queen of the fake accent)

Kentwood is right by the Mississippi border, so Britney's accent wasn't all that unusual to me, but yeah, she did exaggerate her accent quite a bit as part of her image. She sounds nothing like a New Orleanian.

Louisiana just has so many regions - People in Shreveport sound like Texans to me, but hell, Shreveport may as well be in East Texas. But someone from Lake Charles or Lafayette sound different from Shreveport or Baton Rouge.

What part of Loozey-Anna are you from again?

[Laurent]

It's almost impossible to do a decent Southern accent if the actor doesn't already have a Southern accent of some sort.

That's true, but I also feel like directors must tell actors to lay it on thicker, because the stupid accent always sounds like molasses. Real southerners don't usually sound like that. There is an older, upper class brand of southerner that has that mint julep accent, but you can spot when it's real and when it's bullshit.

[WhateverLolaWants]

Recently did the family tree for my family and it caused a physical reaction with me, true nausea, when I read a few old wills from the 1700s and read my *ancestors* willing people to other people. It is so disturbing to have to face that and realize on that level that yes, this is real and yes, people I am directly related to thought it was okay.

Very upsetting