Photographed by Michael Frazier
Scholars at Murray GSP heard their first convocation on the first Monday evening from John Kinkade, a professor at Centre College and a lifelong friend of the GSP, and were intrigued on how language constantly changing reveals how what we believe is right changes too.
The overarching theme for Professor Kinkade’s speech is that our sound reveals our identity and we can use that to be kind, be brave, and be here. This phrase comes from Dr. Jen Price, the executive director of GSP, who used this in her opening ceremony speech to encourage scholars to embrace the program. It was fascinating how, throughout Professor Kinkade’s speech on the spelling evolution of words, he shared a life lesson for the scholars to apply for the next five weeks.
Professor Kinkade opened his speech with a poem from Tom Wayman called “Did I Miss Anything” about a teacher replying with satire to a student who was absent and asking what work he missed. The teacher goes back and forth sarcastically about how the student missed everything that day or nothing. At the end of the poem, the teacher says the student missed the opportunity to query, ponder, and examine. Kinkade circled back at the end of his speech and shared that for the next five weeks, the scholars have the same opportunity the subject of the poem missed.
The speech grabbed the scholars’ attention and even struck some giggles as the differences on pronunciation of different words were displayed on the screen and described by Kinkade. Is it “but-ter” or “budder”? The scholars were tongue tied saying this word out loud over and over again, which is the phenomenon of the American flap/tap. In Kentucky, this sparks an argument over regional differences in pronunciation of KY city, Louisville. Almost every region of the state pronounces this city differently, anywhere from “Loo-vul” to “Loo-ee-vil”. Questions were brought up by scholars about the word “ain’t” not being a word. Kinkade follows by acknowledging its stereotypical connotation of unintelligence, but stresses that we should not use our pet peeves about how we believe words should be pronounced or used to judge others and their backgrounds. He encourages us to embrace our accents, be proud of where we come from, and “use our intelligence to be brave, be kind, and be here”.
Kaelie Jo Jackson and Bridget Butler
