Lol. She's not speaking Gullah. She's speaking the king's

Oculus Spirit [97676]

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Jul 16, 2018, 10:49 PM

English with a relatively mild Gullah accent.

I've scoured the internet and can't find much in the way of authentic Gullah. I literally watched the language die as I grew up. Mary Frazier used to cook breakfast for us at our hunting club in Jacksonboro when I was little. She was probably 70 or older when I was about 6 years old. She and her daughter Bernice, who was older than I was (18-20yo) would cook for 80 of us every Saturday morning. Grits, Eggs, Bacon, Sausage, toast for breakfast with coffee and OJ. For lunch we'd have cubed steak, collard greens, corn bread, and rice and gravy and sweet tea.

Anyway, when Mary would talk to her daughter, or to her husband who sometimes came and helped, I could absolutely not understand a single word. She would speak to me and when she talked to me I could understand her, barely. She would slow down and you could see she would change her pronunciation with words. Eventually Mary passed away and her daughter Bernice did the cooking with her daughter, Madeline. Bernice spoke with a fairly strong Gullah accent, but I could understand her perfectly. Then Madeline had the accent from your video.

Today only very old people even retain a strong Gullah accent and you have to go way down to Jacksonboro and areas south to find it.

Funny story. Mom, dad, and I went one time to The Sanctuary on Kiawah. It was probably the nicest hotel I've stayed in in South Carolina. Most of the people staying there were from up north. Very few people from SC were staying there. Anyway, almost all of the staff spoke with an accent. Dad and I both thought it sounded a lot like a Gullah accent, but it wasn't. We could tell. We finally asked a staff member at breakfast one morning and he explained (in literally a whisper) that over half of the staff were from Jamaica. Then the accent made perfect sense. It was very obvious the hotel imported their staff from Jamaica to make unsuspecting guests from out of state think they were local and speaking with a Gullah accent. The diluted Gullah accent today is very similar to a Jamaican accent.

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It was the story of the Gullah that was the point. Not her specifically speaking the language. She mentions her talking with elderly, and some of their deeper dialect. Just a good story.

But, your story was cool. I too had relatives from Pawley's and Edisto, and many of them grew up around the language themselves. They had about as much accent as she has.

I also do recall spending many childhood spring times down there. We had help from a few natives, and many of them were not understandable at all either! 2 guys especially were around often doing chores and things for my great uncle. Melvin and "Sharkey". Those two would carry on to things you may catch one word a sentence. Great guys, minus their alcoholism(s). Taught many things about fishing and crabbing I still use today. First low-country crab I ever ate, was shown how to me by those guys.

Miss those days.

I've been around St Helena island recently, and did hear quite the accent on a few folks there. It is definitely a dying language. Seems like the Charleston contingent don't speak it all anymore. I recall Charleston having the most thick of all accents back when.

Gullah / Geechie stow ree tullin

Lol. She's not speaking Gullah. She's speaking the king's

Here's an example

Re: yeah! This is cool to hear!

Geechie accent is dying as well.

You need to hang out in d'town CHS

Re: Here's an example

There's still a fair amount of it spoken in CHS***

Re: Yeah, I know. It's labeled as such.

The Ohioans barley speak english***

lady sounds like my grandmother

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