Probably pure cussed dislike of the arrogant types sent to teach them to speak the "right" way. Also, I'll bet that if they have to, the stiffness of their dialect melts away so that you can understand them quite well. Normally, though, they don't have any need to talk to you (and if you go as a tourist, you probably patronize the "quaint" shops with more money as well as with attitude), and keeping their accent stiff reminds them and you who is the native and who is the stranger.
You get the same thing, here, with Italian-Americans. Even though, at the third or fourth generation, they can often barely get by in the language themselves, they still will switch to it among themselves for a sentence or two, just to remind themselves that they are special (at least in their own eyes).
And I doubt that the regionalisms have been lost, except for the oddest features like the Quadruple Negative of North Carolina and Tennessee. If you get Internet mail, though, you are probably associating with the High Tech Nomad tribes more than the locals, so you won't realize it unless you travel sixty miles from the city centers and try to ask directions from the gas station attendant.
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