What don't you like about Pittsburgh? (Erie, York: law, shop, doctorate)

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by Katiana

This is different than me trying to communicate in Chinese. We are talking about both people speaking English . . . .

Well, I think therein lies your conceptual mistake. There is no hard distinction between different dialects and different languages.

A problem with "yinz" is that most English speakers do not know what it means. When my DD was in 8th grade, she had a teacher from N. Carolina. The teacher asked the class if anyone had ever heard the word "yinz" before. My daughter was the only one who had ever heard the word, b/c she was the only one who had ever been to Pittsburgh. The teacher went on to explain that it is used in the Appalachians as well.

But the fact that relatively few people speak a given language doesn't mean using that language is somehow "bad". It just means using that language outside that relatively small linguistic community is impractical, and to speak reliably in other communities one will need to learn another language. Again, the same thing is true of dialects ... the fact that relatively few people speak a particular dialect may create a practical reason for people who move out of that community (or regularly speak outside that community) to learn to speak in a different way as well, but that doesn't make their original dialect "bad".

Edit: By the way, I saw a lot of this in college. People from, say, the South (where this college was not located) would pretty quickly modify their use of language to conform more closely with the standard patterns in this community. But when talking to friends and family at home, they would talk in their original dialect. Again, that is just like learning a new language when one moves to a new community, but with dialects instead of languages (understanding there is no hard distinction between the two).

It is usually considered a word used by the uneducated.

And as I have noted, this sort of thing creates an independent practical incentive to modify one's use of language. Again, whether or not this view is justified, if enough people share this view it may be necessary to comply.

[Copanut]

Originally Posted by Katiana

It is usually considered a word used by the uneducated.

Bingo!

[supersoulty]

Originally Posted by COPANUT

Bingo!

And yet, many things that are considered standard today were once considered the speech of the uneducated, as I pointed out earlier in this thread.

Language change is eternal, and it is very rarely initiated by the upper-classes.

[supersoulty]

Actually, English is rather rare in that many of the changes in our languages, centuries were initiated by upper-class... conquering classes, who half-assed the way they learned the language. Which is why English is rather odd, in that it is the only Indo-European language where there are no dialects that have grammatical gender.

[Katarina Witt]

Originally Posted by supersoulty

And yet, many things that are considered standard today were once considered the speech of the uneducated, as I pointed out earlier in this thread.

Language change is eternal, and it is very rarely initiated by the upper-classes.

Perhaps you could give us some examples. "Yinz" seems to have died out, save for Pittsburgh and parts of Appalachia.

And as I have noted, this sort of thing creates an independent practical incentive to modify one's use of language. Again, whether or not this view is justified, if enough people share this view it may be necessary to comply.

Not all of us have to "modify" because not all of us use it in the first place. And I do disagree that there is no difference between two people trying to speak English together, and one trying to communicate in English and one in Chinese! It is assumed that the English speakers are speaking the same language.

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by Katiana

Not all of us have to "modify" because not all of us use it in the first place.

But your example was of someone moving from Pittsburgh to Colorado, so of course the Pittsburgh person had to modify how he or she spoke in order to reliably convey meaning in Colorado. But now imagine someone from Colorado moving to, say, London. Now that person from Colorado will have to modify how he or she speaks.

And I do disagree that there is no difference between two people trying to speak English together, and one trying to communicate in English and one in Chinese! It is assumed that the English speakers are speaking the same language.

Well, I don't know who is assuming that, but those people are making an invalid assumption if by that you mean they are assuming all users of "English" speak in an identical fashion. Again, different "English" speakers use different dialects, and there is no objective standard by which to say one dialect is "good" and another "bad", just as there is no objective standard by which to say one language is "good" and another "bad" (again with the understanding there is no hard distinction between dialects and languages).

But I don't see the point in arguing about this further. Basically, linguistics as a science is descriptive (e.g., here is how people in location X at time Y conveyed meaning Z), but I know that some people insist on treating linguistics as normative (e.g., conveying meaning Z in fashion A is good, but conveying meaning Z in fashion B is bad). And in my experience it is very hard to get people to stop viewing linguistics as normative if they are going to insist on doing so.

[Katarina Witt]

But your example was of someone moving from Pittsburgh to Colorado, so of course the Pittsburgh person had to modify how he or she spoke in order to reliably convey meaning in Colorado. But now imagine someone from Colorado moving to, say, London. Now that person from Colorado will have to modify how he or she speaks.

Not if they weren't using words like "yinz", "gumbands", "red up the house", etc in the first place. I don't have a problem with gumband and red up, but no one knows what it is outside of the Pittsburgh area.

Yes, we'd all have trouble communicating in London, but not as much as in Bejing!

[supersoulty]

Originally Posted by Katiana

Perhaps you could give us some examples. "Yinz" seems to have died out, save for Pittsburgh and parts of Appalachia.

Well, in the South, and urban areas all over the country you have "y'all" which serves the same exact function, which is to provide for the missing second person plural in the English language. What is the difference between "yinz" and "y'all"? It seems to be that "you'ns" was favored by the Celtic English speakers who came to populate this region and much of Appalachia, where as "you all" was favored by the English, who settled much of the plains of the South. The people who populated the North, most of whom were from Southern England, particularly Essex, Wessex and Kent, probably came with the distinct "thou" and "you" but soon dropped it, just as everyone did (the upper-class near London held out longest on the "thou" question), and started using "you" for both. Of course, we are now taught that “All of you” is the only proper way to say it.

As I already mentioned, the end of the usage of the letter “Thorn” was one such change. To “make love” once meant just kissing and flirting, as late as the 1950’s. This acquired a more “vulgar” meaning.

Here is a list of other fairly recent changes that have occurred, that I posted earlier.

Originally Posted by supersoulty

"Educated" people are also speaking with an accent. At one time, the standard, in any language, was just another dialect that so happened to be chosen. There is nothing that makes it "better". And in fact, as recently as 100 years ago, the educated classes said things that we would just find odd and sometimes incorrect today. For instance:

"A house is building on Federal Street."

"So you are come at last."

"It would be odd. Would not it?"

It was recommended that "cement" be pronounced "sea-ment" in educated company.

You weren't "shot", you were "shoten".

I could do this all day. And in fact, those people harshly criticized the way that the under-classes spoke, but guess who carried the day? So, what you speak was "vile and vulgar" not even 100 years ago. Do you see the irony here?

Also, I just noticed that earlier you commented that a Northern Cities Vowel Shift only effects pronunciation, and not the way people talk. However, so much of language change is driven by the way that sounds fit into people's mouths that any vowel shift that seems small now can have long lasting and drastic effects. English was a totally different language before the Great Vowel Shift. Often times, sound changes lead to something called "rebracketing" which is when speakers become confused about where one word begins and another ends, because the sylabols are no longer as easily distinguishable as they once were, and this often leads to the formation of new words.

A good example of this is that, "lone" is not a "real word". It traces back to nothing. The word we now have "alone" used to be "all one"... the idea being that out of all people, only one was up to or doing something. Now, sound change effected how the words "all" and "one" were pronounced, and people also soon became lazy and started just saying "alone". Now, because there are other words that have "a" as a prefix and that "a" sometimes modifies the root word to mean "in the state of," that "lone" must be the actual word, and "a" is just a prefix. Well, if "a" is the prefix, and sticking it on means that you are in the state of being, then if you are talking about some one, or something being just one, then it must be "lone"... so "He was the lone Asian on the team."

PS... sorry about the small type, I switch to Word, so I could retrieve my past post, and the font stayed.

[supersoulty]

Originally Posted by IAmAngieBowie

My father forbade me to speak that way also. We were middle-class.

I always speak the way I speak - a first impression is called that for a reason.

Again, I'm not really interested in Pittsburghese from a linguistic perspective; so you could have saved yourself a lot of essay typing.

You mentioned earlier that you are often told that you "must be from New York" because of the way you speak.

I don't know about here, but when I was living up in Erie, saying someone "must be from New York" was generally code for "the person comes off as extremely arrogant."

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by Katiana

Not if they weren't using words like "yinz", "gumbands", "red up the house", etc in the first place.

Yes, if for some reason a person growing up in Pittsburgh already spoke like people in Colorado, he or she wouldn't need to change the way he or she spoke if he or she happened to move to Colorado.

But I don't get what that is supposed to show. Again, the parallel point would be that if someone in Colorado already spoke like people in London, he or she wouldn't need to change the way he or she spoke if he or she moved to London. So are you advocating everyone in Colorado should start speaking like Londoners in anticipation of a possible move to London?

And as you note, people from Colorado would really have to change the way they spoke if they wanted to be understood in Beijing. So are you advocating that everyone in Colorado start speaking in the Beijing dialect of Mandarin instead, just in case they move to Beijing? But then which is it ... should they speak like Londoners, or in the Beijing dialect? And what if they move to Paris?

I think a little perspective should tell you the "people in place X are speaking the wrong way because they wouldn't be understood if they moved to where I live" argument doesn't make much sense, and indeed most of the people in the world could say the exact same thing about you (you wouldn't be understood if you moved where they live). Rather, we live in a linguistically diverse world, meaning people in different communities use language in different ways. So, people who move from one linguistic community to another will have to learn a new way of speaking. And that is just as true of people in Colorado as people in Pittsburgh.