Mission Statement

After learning about Goffman’s theories of impression management and Charles Horton Cooley’s idea of the “looking-glass self”, we thought it would be really interesting to study the way a person’s manner of speech, or accent, factors into the way they view themselves and the way those around them view their presentation of self. Speech is one of the most identifiable characteristics of a person and often is a determining factor of a person’s first impression. Since we live in Texas we thought it might be best to narrow our study to focus on people who speak with strong Texan sounds. In order to see how Texans view their own accents in comparison to how people from outside of Texas perceive the southern twang, we will be conducting short interviews with students who are from Texas and also with students who are from different states and countries. We will be focusing on the messages given and given off by the accent and how that relates to the pervading stereotypes about southerners; we are expecting to find that a Texan accent conveys to the listener a message of lower intelligence, lower class level, higher measures of friendliness, as well as increased state pride – though as with any study, our hypotheses are subject to being proven wrong! You can expect to see detailed analyses of what we find through our study, how our interview subject's responses correspond to sociological theories of impression management, and what this tells us about the culture of Texas.