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Perhaps, I am a NC-born and bred Yankee surrounded by other NC Yankees, but I don't know about this "drink" thing some of you guys speak of. However, I hear people say "drink" to mean "alcohol."
Recip, funny you say that because I have still never heard anyone ask for a non-cola by asking for a "Coke." It sounds utterly confusing and imprecise.
Tarheelhombre, what part of NC did you grow up in and when-abouts? It may have morphed over the years as well as being a regional thing. I do hear "soda" more in the triangle now and occasionally "pop", but "pop" is definitely from transplants or kids of transplants.
"Drink" was definitely not a specific reference to alcoholic drinks. The grown-ups (not MY parents) might have a "cocktail" (think MadMen) or perhaps a glass of beer or wine, but "drink" was something to drink and not alcoholic.
Cold drink, cokie cola, dopesy cola, co cola all equal an unspecified soft drink or whatever kind of soft drink you have, further clarified by subsequent question. Which would you like? pepsi, orange crush, or tea.
You even hear 'cold drink' in Jason Aldean song referring his "kind of party"
RC Cola equals RC Cola Mountain Dew, Cheerwine, Pepsi Cola also specific. for example.
And if someone offered you a drink it would be one of the above or water. Not alcohol. If they were offering alcohol it would be specific to the type of alcohol or cocktail. Have a beer? Something like that.
My family and I are all natives of NC and I've only heard it referred to "soda". I was born and raised in Raleigh, so maybe I'm not country enough. My grandparents and great grandparents were from Yancey county and I'm pretty sure they called it soda. However, I've heard of the "coke" thing, but I always thought that was deep south talk.
Now that I live in the midwest, I often hear it called "pop" and a grocery bag is called a "sack". Weird...
I grew up in Fayetteville in the 90s. Soda or soft drinks were commonly used as a generic terms for carbonated beverages. Now "pop" was a very foreign (more Midwestern than Northern). But Fayetteville is a very diverse place in terms of people from different regions so I imagine the more precise usage caught on earlier there.
Anyone who asked for a "Coke" for a different type of soda (except a generic Coke-like soda) would have been thought kind of slow. I heard it, but mostly from uneducated older folks.
If you notice the map from 2002 shows more 'Coke' usage in the South, so that is definitely dying out. If you go to the 2002 map, it has county-level results. "Soda" usage and "Coke" usage were neck-and-neck in most urban counties in 2002. My home county of Cumberland was the only county with a big enough sample in which "soda" was more popular than "Coke."
Cold drink, cokie cola, dopesy cola, co cola all equal an unspecified soft drink or whatever kind of soft drink you have, further clarified by subsequent question. Which would you like? pepsi, orange crush, or tea.
You even hear 'cold drink' in Jason Aldean song referring his "kind of party"
RC Cola equals RC Cola Mountain Dew, Cheerwine, Pepsi Cola also specific. for example.
And if someone offered you a drink it would be one of the above or water. Not alcohol. If they were offering alcohol it would be specific to the type of alcohol or cocktail. Have a beer? Something like that.
Wonder who these survey takers talked to...
It's a compilation of tweets from accounts based in these various places. It probably skews younger and more urban because that is who is on Twitter. Still, using "coke" to refer to generic soft drinks seems really old-fashioned and strange to me. I am a 30-something native NCer and have always said soda. I have never heard "dopsey cola" or "cokie cola" just "Coke" or "Co-cola" And I've heard people from most every part of the English-speaking world say "cold drink," but never to specifically refer to soft drinks.
Last edited by coped; 07-11-2012 at 01:58 AM..
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