How Y’all, Youse and You Guys Talk

[CTyankee]

What does the way you speak say about where you’re from? Answer all the questions below to see your personal dialect map.

According to my answers, my dialect is Yonkers, Paterson and New York City. I never lived in New Jersey at all, but lived in New York City then Westchester County (right above Yonkers) for 15 years as a young adult.

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2013/12/20/sunday-review/dialect-quiz-map.html?ref=opinion

[PCIntern]

1. Weird:

I have the same pattern as you do, but I'm a Philly boy thru and thru. OF course, I don't say "youse" so that probably threw things off a bit, but most nfolk here don't use that expression...

Innaresting (sic) tho'...

[CTyankee]

4. I was born and raised in northern Texas but I went away to college at age 17 in the NE.

Since I was in theatre, I had my accent "corrected" to conform to what was called Good American Speech. I never actually went back to Texas to live but moved to NYC after college. I don't have a recording of how I spoke growing up but my guess is that it would be close to Bill Moyers, whose accent most resembles my mother's.

[boston bean]

2. This one was right on....

Springfield, Worcester, Providence.....

[CTyankee]

5. "worcester" was a word I had to learn to pronounce.

Never having encountered it in my native Dallas, I originally pronounced it War sest stir. I was surprised to learn it is really pronounced "wuhster." Interestingly, here in New Haven we have a Wooster Square which is pronounced nearly the same way (only a little more "woo&quot .

[boston bean]

9. most leave the "r" off at the end... more like wuhsta.

[CTyankee]

10. My son in law is a native Bostonian and would pronounce it that way.

I think his daughters, my grandkids, would probably pronounce the "r" (they live in Sherborn). But I'll check at Christmas...

[boston bean]

13. Well, Sherban is hoity toity!! LOL

[CTyankee]

14. You know, you're right! Most of their friends are from out of the area or at least I don't hear

a lot of Boston accents among them. Nor do my son and dtr in law in NYC speak like Noo Yawkers. We've sort of ironed out any regional accents from our speech and that's kinda boring.

[boston bean]

16. people at work get a kick out of my accent...

It's rather heavy, with an influence of northern rhode island, which is extremely pronounced. But it's not as bad as the peeps in Northern Maine.

PS, I'm talking with people from all over the country.. not just my NE cohorts...

[CTyankee]

22. I love the Boston accent. My son in law's parents have thick Bostonian accents.

They call him "Richahd" and say "chowdah."

That Maine accent is a doozy. I remember buying ice cream there and being momentarily mystified when asked if I wanted "saft or haad".

[Warpy]

55. "Wuhster" still pegs you as a tourist.

WUH-stah is how natives pronounce it.

It's like shopping at "Fannel" Hall and "Kwinzee" Marketplace. You can sure as hell tell who all the tourists are.

[CTyankee]

58. I say "Fanyul" and "kwinzee" (not Kwinsee). Am I more Boston or less?

[Warpy]

61. The first one pegs you as a tourist

You might be from one of the burbs, but you're still a tourist.

I lived a ten minute walk from it.

[pinboy3niner]

3. Not bad. My dialect is Milwaukee - Long Beach (CA) - Modesto (CA).

I was born in Chicago and grew up in L.A.

The least similar dialect: Worcester, Pittsburgh, Boston.

[CTyankee]

6. My dtr lives in North Hollywood altho she is from the NE. Her husband is from Salt Lake.

Try as I may, I can't detect an L.A. accent in anybody there. I often wonder why that is...

[Orrex]

7. I'm offended by your exclusion of the yinzer accent.

[CTyankee]

8. How exactly is "yinzer" used? I don't think I have ever heard it.

what is its region?

[Orrex]

12. It's the proud accent of the greater Pittsburgh area

"Yinz" is analogous to "youse" or "y'all."

I'm an import, so it really knocked my socks off when I first heard it.

[pinboy3niner]

15. Wiki has a page on Pittsburgh English

This is the first I heard of it.

Pittsburgh English, popularly known by outsiders as Pittsburghese, is the traditional dialect of American English spoken by many residents of Pittsburgh and parts of surrounding Western Pennsylvania in the United States, a group referred to by locals and others as Yinzers.[1]

...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pittsburgh_English

[Orrex]

29. My very first exposure to it was at PSU Altoona in '89

I had never heard even a hint of the accent before then, and I honestly had trouble understanding some of it, at least at first. The part that really threw me is that the accent often drops "to be," so that "My car needs to be repaired" turns into "My car needs repaired."

Weird and wild stuff. I've lived here for more than a decade, so I hardly notice it any more, but people can still tell that I'm not a native local.

[CTyankee]

18. I went to college in Pittsburgh but that was many years ago when the city was down at the

heels and the air was awful. But I was insulated in the ivy covered walls of Carnegie Mellon (then Carnegie Institute of Technology, that's how long ago it was!).

[scheming daemons]

31. our favorite xmas song here has the line...

"He knows when yinz been jagoffs..."

[TwilightGardener]

39. Yup. Hey yinz guys.

[hootinholler]

44. It's yunz, not yinz

Damn north siders

[Orrex]

45. I hope you choke on some jumbo, you lahzy jag!

[hootinholler]

46. I heard your ma callin

She wants you to red up yer room an at. Better get home.

[Squinch]

11. I'm a Yonk, too, homegirl!

[Le Taz Hot]

17. I've done it twice now

and it doesn't show a map on the screen. I think I broke it.

[CTyankee]

20. I just copied from the NYT website, but since I have a paid subscription I must be getting

a fuller web page. You might try Googling the title of the article...

[pinboy3niner]

23. For me, it took a while for the map to load. nt

[IDemo]

24. Here too

Temporarily allowed all scripts, still nothing.

That said, Idaho has been chosen by call center operators partly because of our neutral accent (but mostly because people will work for peanuts here).

[LiberalEsto]

26. Same here nt

[kcr]

28. It didn't work for me either

[City Lights]

40. Same here. nt

[lpbk2713]

19. When I was a youngster I knew a family from NC that said you'ns.

That's probably not so common any more due to the homogenization effect of TV and movies.

[CTyankee]

21. I think you're right!

[IDemo]

25. Years ago I worked for an outfit out of Virginia

Everyone used "Y'all" and "You'ns". Many also pronounced home as "hewm" and on as "ohwahn".

[CTyankee]

27. I lived in No. Virginia for 9 years and found the Vriginia accent fascinating.

That "ow" sound for "oh". I note that some Canadians speak that way, too. I think I read somewhere that it is ethnically Scots-Irish...

[IDemo]

32. It was fascinating, indeed

Being in Virginia and hearing the dialect was a great break from the whitebread of Boise, Idaho.

[Laughing Mirror]

42. I think you're talking about the Tidewater accent

or versions of it, an example apparently being myself. This is the first quiz to hit it right on the nose: Washington Baltimore Richmond.

[CTyankee]

49. Baltimore becomes "Ballimer"...

[Laughing Mirror]

50. a lot of it is in not only the way certain words are pronounced

but also the intonations and even subtle mannerisms that tend to accompany them that describe the thick Baltimore accents that we know and love.

Early John Waters films are a good place to hear Baltimore accents the way they sounded years ago. I'd never heard those accents in any movie I'd ever seen before then. But then, not that many movies were made in Baltimore.

[Marrah_G]

30. apparently I am not from anywhere

It didn't work for me

I'm thinking it would have said Boston. I have a pretty strong Boston accent.

[cordelia]

34. Same here. (?)

[RebelOne]

43. Same here also. I guess we are all from Mars. n/t

[99Forever]

33. Interesting.

It gave me three cities, one was my place of birth, Lincoln, NE. One was where I grew up, Omaha NE. And the third was Wichita, KS, a place I don't recollect ever having visited. Fascinating.

[SummerSnow]

35. Cool test..

Im a native New Yorker and my results showed it.

[napkinz]

36. where are my results?

I see no map.

[Cirque du So-What]

37. I'm all over the map with those words & phrases

a direct consequence, I suppose, of having literally lived all over the map.

[SheilaT]

66. Same here.

I have multiple words that have equal weight, so to speak, inside my head. I did the first three questions and then stopped.

[Iggo]

38. No map for me.

But I'm SoCal born and bred, and I totally sound like it.

[ananda]

41. My problem is that I often had more than one word for a concept.

So that test didn't work for me.

But I know I have a Texas dialect to some extent.

[Warpy]

54. So do I since I've lived all over the country

I just picked the one I'm likeliest to use day to day and the test pegged me perfectly.

[CTyankee]

64. how do you peg "in the house, mopin' around..."? I think it's odd...

[Warpy]

69. Huh?

[CTyankee]

70. It is a saying...as in, "She's in the house, mopin' around..."

My 4 year old granddaughter said that about her 7 year old sister when the newest baby arrived...I figured her dad had said it to her because how else would she know it?

[treestar]

47. Northeast

What'd I like to find out is where do people use some of those words that were in the lists. And what is the grey bug?

[Turbineguy]

51. From Glasgow during WWII

"If youziuns will teach uzians Polish, weziuns will teach uziuns English!"

[CTyankee]

56. could you translate that into standard english?

[Turbineguy]

59. I don't think so...

[Jamastiene]

52. Winston-Salem, Greensboro, and Montgomery were

the three cities it said I matched closest. I've never been to Alabama, but was born, raised, and live just southeast of Greensboro in North Carolina. So, I talk like most people here, which is no surprise. I just say liberal things and a lot of the rest say conservative things.

[Warpy]

53. Still a New Englander

with some southern roots. I'd say this was a pretty good test, even though I've now lived out west for over 20 years. It was hard to stop saying "tonic" and start saying "soda," but I did it.

My "distinctive answers" were listed as Providence RI. I have no idea why they didn't say Boston because they're distinctive for both places.

[grasswire]

57. gee, I have a northern California accent!

And I lived there the least time of any place I have lived.

Apparently because I picked the word crawdad.

[Rex]

60. Strange results imo.

AUGUSTA-RICHMOND, LEXINGTON, TALLAHASSEE never been to any of those cities. Lived in south Texas most of my life.

[CTyankee]

63. Really? I have a Wisconsin friend who claims it and I thought he was just teasing...

altho I've never heard my husband (WI born, raised in Sheboygan and Kenosha) say it.

[CTyankee]

68. We visited Kohler a couple of years ago. A fabulous labor history story...

[MuseRider]

65. Hmmmm

Having been born and raised and still living in Kansas in spite of my constant attempt to educate myself and travel to other places I thought surely I would show up most like a Kansan. Modesto, Sant Rosa and Sacramento California were my 3 most similar places. LOL. I am OK with that although surprised!

[Phentex]

71. I'm a Texan?

Who knew? Never lived there but I have visited many times.

[MadrasT]

72. These things always peg me for exactly what I am...

...Philadelphian.