[nagdu] A Voice of New York's Streets, Saying That It's Safe to Wawk

[Lyn Gwizdak]

Thanks for posting this article!  I grew up just outside NYC in Norwalk, CT 
and am very familiar with that accent!  My Mom's parents were from Brooklyn 
and my grandfather said to "put earl in the tank for the car that belongs to 
Oil."  Very funny! LOL!  My Dad still has a sort of New York accent - cawfee 
and chawcolate.  My Mom, just a hint of Brooklyn in her accent.  LOL!  I 
have some of that when people hear me say, "idear" instead of "idea" and 
then they make fun of my accent!  Califiornia doesn't seem to have much of 
an accent that I can tell.  Too many people from other regions of the 
country.

I like those audible signals that talk.  We have some here and when they 
replace the old ones - cuckoo, cuckoo, chirp, chirp - with the new ones with 
talking.  I'll have to really listen to see what accent ours have! LOL!

Lyn and Landon
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Ginger Kutsch" <GingerKutsch at yahoo.com>
To: "NAGDU Mailing List,the National Association of Guide Dog Users" 
<nagdu at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Saturday, July 07, 2012 10:21 AM
Subject: [nagdu] A Voice of New York's Streets, Saying That It's Safe to 
Wawk


>A Voice of New York's Streets, Saying That It's Safe to Wawk
>
> The Voice of the Crosswalks: Dennis Ferrara, the supervising electrician 
> at
> the Department of Transportation, is the voice of New York City's
> crosswalks, guiding visually impaired pedestrians.
>
> By MATT FLEGENHEIMER
>
> Published: July 6, 2012
>
>
>
>
>
> The voice wafts above the traffic, its cadences prodding but familiar,
> offering directions to a city that does not like to ask for them.
>
>
>
> At 23rd Street and Fifth Avenue, the pressing of a button activates
> recordings that guide pedestrians, especially blind ones.
>
>
>
> It is not a computer, listeners notice. It is certainly not an actor. A
> Dutch couple visiting for the week was able to narrow its origins to
> "American" and, eventually, "not Texas."
>
>
>
> But to the initiated ear, its roots are obvious: This is a New Yorker,
> hacking through the din of gridlock like a knife through cream cheese. Or,
> perhaps, "buttah."
>
>
>
> In a city increasingly conditioned to the automated droning of public
> address systems, GPS guides and disembodied cellphone sages, Dennis 
> Ferrara
> stands out, precisely because he seems to fit right in. Mr. Ferrara, 55, 
> the
> supervisor electrician for the city's Transportation Department, provides
> the audio recording at 15 intersections for the department's so-called
> accessible pedestrian signals, designed to help people with limited sight
> cross the street safely.
>
>
>
> And for pedestrians at some of New York's busiest crossings - in Downtown
> Brooklyn and the Flatiron district of Manhattan, along a main road in
> Astoria, Queens, and at an oddly shaped junction on Staten Island - he is
> the distinctly localized soundtrack of the streets.
>
>
>
> In Mr. Ferrara's New York, "Avenue" takes on an "h" or three. The "a" in
> "Jay Street" is drawn out. And at least one "w" is appended to the first
> syllable of "Broadway."
>
>
>
> "I grew up in Brooklyn," Mr. Ferrara said, in a bit of self-diagnosis. 
> "What
> can I tell ya?"
>
>
>
> It is an easy script to memorize. Mr. Ferrara announces the name of the
> street that pedestrians are standing on. He says which direction has the
> light. And this clip is repeated until the signal's orange hand begins to
> blink: "Broadway. 'Walk' sign is on to cross Broadway. Broadway. 'Walk' 
> sign
> is on ..."
>
>
>
> Mr. Ferrara, who has lived in Gerritsen Beach almost all his life, has had
> no professional voice training. Past pursuits have included deli ownership
> and, occasionally, scuba diving for jewels off Coney Island. He jokes that
> his vocational school did not have English classes. His qualifications, as
> it were, include pronouncing "ask" like "ax."
>
>
>
> The job came to him by luck and by trade, because he fits the bill and
> because if he did not do it, someone else would have to. When the city 
> first
> installed accessible signals in 2004, it used the automated recording
> supplied by the device's vendor in California.
>
>
>
> In recent years, though, as more shipments were ordered, the device has 
> come
> without the embedded recording. Mr. Ferrara, whose team at the 
> department's
> sign and maintenance facility in Maspeth, Queens, is charged with 
> installing
> the machines, recognized a niche. Why not fill it with a New Yorker's 
> voice?
>
>
>
>
> He had an employee fetch a microphone from home, to be hooked up to Mr.
> Ferrara's computer in what would become an impromptu in-office studio. He
> cursed the prospect of slipping into nonregional diction - "I've got too
> many other things to do besides trying to change my voice" - and rehearsed
> his lines.
>
>
>
> So far, Mr. Ferrara said, "nobody's asking for my autograph yet."
>
>
>
> Still, New Yorkers have become increasingly acquainted with his work,
> echoing above the streetscape like an omniscient narrator, or a favorite
> uncle. Some press the button to summon the voice, even when they do not
> require its instruction. Others do so in an ill-fated attempt to silence 
> it.
> Occasionally, in a rare affront to the city's rich history of pedestrian
> stoicism, passers-by simply stop to listen.
>
>
>
> "It's regional," Bob Mover, 60, a saxophone player from Gramercy Park, 
> said
> of the voice, pressing his ear against the device on 52nd Street and
> Lexington Avenue.
>
>
>
> "He did not go to Midwestern broadcasting school."
>
>
>
> The local fare was a welcome respite, Mr. Mover said, after a recent
> incident in which a subway announcer pronounced "Houston Street" like the
> city in Texas.
>
>
>
> Rose McShane, 56, from Alphabet City, offered a more precise assessment.
> "He's from Brooklyn," she surmised correctly, listening to the recording 
> at
> East 23rd Street and Broadway.
>
>
>
> How did she know?
>
>
>
> "Because he's from Brooklyn."
>
>
>
> She began a string of classically Brooklynized impressions for a small
> audience outside Madison Square Park. Aahhhvenue. New Yawk. Brawwwdway.
>
>
>
> Blind people say Mr. Ferrara's inflections have been a mixed blessing. 
> "I'm
> so New York it's pathetic," said Karen Gourgey, 64, who has been blind 
> since
> birth and is the chairwoman of the PASS Coalition, an advocacy group for
> pedestrians who are blind or have limited vision. But the clarity of an
> automated voice is often more "consistent," Ms. Gourgey said.
>
>
>
> Kara Becker, an assistant professor of linguistics at Reed College in
> Oregon, who studied the New York City accent as a Ph.D. student at New 
> York
> University, said Mr. Ferrara exhibited at least two of three features
> commonly associated with the accent, based on her analysis of four
> recordings sent to her.
>
>
>
> One marker was what Dr. Becker called the "coffee vowel" - pronounced
> "cawfee" and named, informally, for the recurring "Saturday Night Live"
> sketch "Coffee Talk" from the 1990s. (Mike Myers played the talk show's
> host, a woman named Linda Richman, who idolized Barbra Streisand and often
> became "verklempt.")
>
>
>
> The other is a raised pronunciation of the "a" in words like "avenue." A
> third signature feature, the dropping of "r" sounds - as in "Hello Muddah,
> Hello Fadduh," the Allan Sherman song from a half-century ago - is less
> detectable in Mr. Ferrara's recordings, Dr. Becker said.
>
>
>
> Despite popular opinion, there is no consistent evidence for differences 
> in
> accents among boroughs, Dr. Becker said. "What we think is going on is
> people are using borough as a proxy for some other social stratification 
> of
> the accent," she said. "Class, level of education, occupation, things like
> that."
>
>
>
> At least one relative of Mr. Ferrara's, previously unaware of his
> assignment, has reported being jolted by the booming voice following him
> down the block.
>
>
>
> "My son-in-law," Mr. Ferrara recalled, slipping into a fiendish grin. 
> "That
> was pretty funny."
>
>
>
> For those less accustomed to his timbre, there is hope that Mr. Ferrara's
> voice might become an audible welcome to the city, fit to join the grand
> attractions reserved for the other senses. Visitors see the buildings. 
> They
> feel the cool of a subway pole. They smell the other riders gripping it. 
> And
> now they hear Mr. Ferrara, telling pedestrians when to cross Fifth Avenue,
> and how to say it.
>
>
>
> "If you're from out of town," said Mr. Mover, the jazzman, "you like to 
> hear
> how the natives speak."
>
>
>
> Mr. Ferrara said he had indulged his ego only occasionally, pressing the
> button while passing the intersections at which he stars in Manhattan. It
> was odd, he thought, that an electrician sounded more like a prizefighter.
>
>
>
> "It sounds like I've been punched too much," Mr. Ferrara said. "I probably
> have."
>
>
>
> Source:
> http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/07/nyregion/a-new-york-voice-at-new-york-inte
> rsections.htm?_r=1&pagewanted=all
>
> A version of this article appeared in print on July 7, 2012, on page A1 of
> the New York edition with the headline: A Voice of New York's Streets,
> Saying That It's Safe to Wawk.
>
> .
>
>
>
>
>
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