Pittsburghese that you use....? (vs, best, Dutch)

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by ditchdigger

Slavery, or cannibalisim, for instance, have had their place as conventional practices in some communities, and were it not for outside influences, those communities would probably have never questioned their morality. Some probably still don't.

Do you really think whether or not a society allows slavery is the same thing as which side of the road they drive on, or which language they speak?

Anyway...

If that's the case, I'll go Katiana one better and suggest that bad grammar is just bad grammar, in any dialect

You just made the exact opposite case--that to the extent it makes sense to talk about "standard English" at all, these are pretty standard variants.

Whether you call something a "gumband" or a "rubberband", and whether you use "I saw" or "I seen", are exactly the same sort of issue. Saying the first is a harmless variation but the latter is BAD LANGUAGE is completely arbitrary.

What I meant by that is not that various dialects are mutually exclusive, but that to recognize every single variation in usage as its own dialect, as opposed to being outside of some greater convention, would inevitably lead to the condition that there exists no greater convention.

That is a slippery slope argument, and it makes no sense. People who talk to each other regularly will automatically converge on a common language. Whether or not you recognize other dialects won't stop that from happening.

I could string words and letters together in any combination of my choosing, as long as I could claim that somebody else does it the same way, and as long as you could still understand what I was trying to say, that would make it ok. Hey, that's just the dialect I speak.

That's nonsensical. If you randomly string together words, your claim that somebody else does it the same way would be FALSE, and no one could understand you.

These are really pointless hypotheticals. In the real world, people who talk to each other actually do adopt common ways of speaking, and as soon as you admit that a certain way of talking is common among a group of people, you have given up the hypothetical accusation that this person is just making it up for themselves.

I'll take it as a given that terms like "right" and "wrong" would also include a term like "proper".

I'd suggest using words like "same" and "different", as in "Those people are speaking the same dialect/language" and "Those people are speaking different dialects/languages".

My God! What a monumental waste of authors' and readers' time all those books must be...

You know, they pretty much are. Language skills are actually acquired through immersion, imitation, and practice. Reading books about language rules is about as useful as reading an article about hitting a curve ball.

[Katarina Witt]

Originally Posted by Johnny C

Why - are 'dem roads gettin' bad?

Maybe slippy!

[ditchdigger]

Do you really think whether or not a society allows slavery is the same thing as which side of the road they drive on, or which language they speak?

It doesn't matter what I think, does it? I'm not a member of any society but this one.

Do you have an opinion on the morality of slavery in the antebellum south, or cannibalism of US POWs by the Japanese Army in WWII? If so, why?

Anyway...

You win.

I've see'd the light and it was you what showed me it. Grammar don't really matter, except to them elitists, and I sure don't want to be mistook for one of them.

Posting here is going to be so much more simplier now, since I won't have to pay attention to grammar no more. As long as I'm understanded, that's the onliest thing that matters.

Hey does that mean I dont have to worry about punctuation any more to

And also too, its going to be nice to not worry about the kids no more. My wife and me was worried every time we brang them to that school that them teachers wouldn't learn them their proper english good. Now, maybe they can learn them there numbers more better so that when they grow up they can be a doctor or a scientist!

Thanks.
__________________________________________________ ____

But, uh, back to something more in line with the OP...

I've seen it here frequently, and indeed, heard it spoken. When referring to some place, or perhaps a recurring event, a person will ask, "Have you ever been?", as oppoosed to "Have you ever been to (whatever)?"

Is that a nationwide thing, or is it Pittsburghese?

[chielgirl]

"Kennywood's Open" for a guy with his zipper down.
"Gumbands" aka rubber bands. I currently live in Germany and am quite comfortable with "gummy band".

[Jay_F]

Even dolls speak it:

Yappin Yinzers

[jay5835]

Originally Posted by chielgirl

"Kennywood's Open" for a guy with his zipper down.

That's pretty funny. I've never heard it before.

[chielgirl]

Originally Posted by jay5835

That's pretty funny. I've never heard it before.

Some of us never escape our 8-year old selves.

[Copanut]

Originally Posted by chielgirl

"Kennywood's Open" for a guy with his zipper down.
"Gumbands" aka rubber bands. I currently live in Germany and am quite comfortable with "gummy band".

Originally Posted by jay5835

That's pretty funny. I've never heard it before.

Originally Posted by chielgirl

Some of us never escape our 8-year old selves.

I love that expression, along with "Do you have a license to sell hotdogs?"

[Mrs. Skeffington]

Originally Posted by ditchdigger

Yeah, it is, but since we're talking about it, I think Greg and I are on the same page.

Human history is full of examples of behavior that, while it's the convention for a particular community, we'd find morally abhorent. Slavery, or cannibalisim, for instance, have had their place as conventional practices in some communities, and were it not for outside influences, those communities would probably have never questioned their morality. Some probably still don't.

Anyway...

I think we need to remember, at this time, that the particlar phrase that was the genesis of this extended discussion was "I seen". As mentioned somewhere above, that particular phrase isn't exclusive to the dialect "Pittsburghese", or "Yinzer". It appears in the speech of people who speak many different dialects, just as the double negatives and the word "ain't" that I used somewhere above do. It may be that those examples appear more frequently in some dialects than they do in others, but I don't believe they're necessarily markers of any specific dialect or dialects. If that's the case, I'll go Katiana one better and suggest that bad grammar is just bad grammar, in any dialect.




What I meant by that is not that various dialects are mutually exclusive, but that to recognize every single variation in usage as its own dialect, as opposed to being outside of some greater convention, would inevitably lead to the condition that there exists no greater convention. I could string words and letters together in any combination of my choosing, as long as I could claim that somebody else does it the same way, and as long as you could still understand what I was trying to say, that would make it ok. Hey, that's just the dialect I speak.

I have a feeling that you're saying "Gee, Ditchdigger finally gets it!"

I'm sorry, but I don't think that's how it ought to be.


I'll take it as a given that terms like "right" and "wrong" would also include a term like "proper".


Let me google that for you

My God! What a monumental waste of authors' and readers' time all those books must be...

I have some friends who moved here from the Pittsburgh/lower western PA vicinity, and talking to them is fun. We have conversations peppered with their "Yinzer" (I always thought they were saying "You'nz") and the Pa. Dutch phrases I always use, like "rutch" (wiggle), "knoatch" (handle), "daupich" (clumsy)...maybe we'll create our own language!

Edit: Why do they put french fries on their salad? Does everybody from Pittsburgh do this?

[raubre]

Pop, gumbands, Mt. Worshington, Souside