My spouse did this as well. She is from Appalachian Tennessee and noticed at a young age that people who sounded like her on TV were portrayed as dumb.
This is why Michio Kaku refers to English (which, for those who don't know, he speaks perfectly - without the name and maybe the face, you'd never guess he was Japanese) as a "type 1 language", and an instrument of modern Earth's potential transformation into a "type 1 civilization" - globally united, rather than fractious and tribalized, with the further ability to eventually become a "type 2" interplanetary empire, and thus "indestructible". Something to think about…
in 1514, it would have been quite understandable* for someone to say "You is plural and unnatural to use when talking about one singular entity", but by now, most English speakers will think you are weird if you use "thee" and "thou" (except for Silverleaf's relatives
)
I would go so far as to say that by now, it's almost becoming standard for "you" to be singular, and for the plural to be something like "y'all". (Of course, according to I-think-it-was Jeff Foxworthy, "y'all" is singular, with the plural being "all y'all".)
Not in British English. We never say y'all, and most definitely use the hell out of the plural you.
"y'all" is sterotypically portrayed as bumpkinish over here, it's only really said by Americans who 'live in the sticks', never other countries.
Philadelphian here. Pittsburg PA is notorious for Y'all. But then again, wetern PA is fondly refered to here as "Pensyltuckey"
Well, they are both in Appalachia after all…
Yous guys are all wrong.
Am I entirely imagining this, or do they use "yourn" in some places?
I love this thread!
In fact, for one of my grad seminars this semester I am probably going to being doing my research paper on this. I am particularly interested in "they" as a nongendered singular, but I am also really interested in other nongender pronouns that people have experimented with, like xe and xis, ne/nis. I think it has some really interesting implications in terms of genderqueer and transgender people, where traditional he/she doesn't always fit. I read an article about a support group where when the person introduced themself they also had to say which pronoun they prefered. (Of course, that also puts a strong emphasis on gender and labels, which is another dicussion in and of itself.)
Also, I thought it would be a fun excesize for my creative writing students to have them reverse all the pronouns in a story and see how that effects what we think of the characters and their behaviors, looking at how language builds gender/sexual stereotypes.
/language nerding
I'm told Kansas typically provides a "default" American English dialect. I often "try out" accents when I get the chance. My coworkers were quite surprised to hear that I've lived in Kansas my entire life. I pronounce tomorrow like my Canadian assistant manager at my first job, for instance. It's just something I picked up from working with him five days a week for a couple of years!
It’s not so much that it’s a default as American media forces people to adopt it because our twang (the name for our accent) is really easy to edit and as a result the verbiage that gets used is changed accordingly. We chose to have a heavily media dominated culture. The result being that it causes other very normal or some cases factually more prevalent accents to be viewed as intellectually inferior. An example of this would be when I saw the horrible movie “Gamer.” The bloke I saw it with on the ride home argued to me that the main villian couldn’t be taken seriously as genius because he had a Texas accent and that that was a waste of an actor. The only reason for that perception and arguement is that our media has unwittly trained us to believe it to be so. It’s a dumb arguement but among Americans not an uncommon one.
Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.
I grew up in Pittsburgh. It's "Yinz". As in, Yinz guys better go dahntahn and pick me up a chipp-chopped ham sammich.
Definitely not "y'all.".
I really try and forget that Yinz is a thing. It should never be thing. You guys and your ski shots and your primanti brothers and your stainless steels. Ugh.
I've heard 'yous' used a bit here, but it's definitely a country thing, and is generally associated with laziness or a lack of education.
(Yes guys, there are certain word combinations that even Australians consider to be lazy!)
Kentuckian here--we do use "y'all" around here, but no one I know has a southern accent. We all just have east coast accents.
Or not.
It's Y'inz. That's why people that still speak the old Pittsburgh accent are called Yinzers.
Here is a good example of a Pittsburgh accent (it's a comedy sketch from a local station, they nail the accent though)
But that's alraight, we don't 'spect much from yinz Jag-offs in Filthadelphia.
Also "Yez", but that can be singular or plural I think. (I have no idea where it's from, I'm not part of this seething inter-Pennsylanite rivalry. Dear me, what would the Quakers have thought?)
I'm actually Quaker by heritage, my ancestors came over in 1640, we even have a black sheep who fought in the civil war.
The Quakers of old wouldn't even recognize the Philly Quakers of today (probably call them heretics and kick them out of the church), and Pittsburgh was never a Quaker town.
The Quakers who settled central PA and west of there tended to move on when other people moved into town. I have relatives on founding charters of towns all over Ohio, Michigan, Iowa and out to Oregon and Washington.
On my Mother's side my grandparents were both Quaker ministers, while running a farm and my Grandfather was also a Tin Smith. On my Dad's side we are related to some of the most prominent names in US Quaker history, both my Grandparents on that side were missionaries in India. My Grandmother worked with Mother Theresa and knew Princess Diana, My Grandfather worked in translation and creating written versions of tribal languages.
Not that this has relevance outside of my Grandparents were awesome people and I know a lot about U.S. Quaker History.
Phantaskippy, have you encountered anyone actually using "thou"? I was raised Quaker in New Jersey, and the "plain speech" pronouns were thought of as rather silly. But New Jersey is not New England. (Neither is Pennsylvania, of course.) My family didn't have the long history of Quakerism that yours seems to have had.
Some of the Wilburites in Ohio still use it, but mostly just the older people, and that's just a connection with the past.
What is funny is a lot of protestant churches (Quakers aren't protestant) will use Thee and Thou (mostly in songs) referring to God, which I find hilarious since You was the formal, but now they have swapped roles in common thought.
Do you know the branch of your Quaker Background?