American English regional vocabulary

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Regional vocabulary within American English varies. Below is a list of lexical differences in vocabulary that are generally associated with a region. A term featured on a list may or may not be found throughout the region concerned, and may or may not be recognized by speakers outside that region. Some terms appear on more than one list.

Contents

Regionalisms

Coke, pop, soda, or tonic? Soft drink shelf 2.jpg
Coke, pop, soda, or tonic?

Historically, a number of everyday words and expressions used to be characteristic of different dialect areas of the United States, especially the North, the Midland, and the South; many of these terms spread from their area of origin and came to be used throughout the nation. Today many people use these different words for the same object interchangeably, or to distinguish between variations of an object. Such traditional lexical variables include: [a]

However many differences still hold and mark boundaries between different dialect areas, as shown below. From 2000 to 2005, for instance, The Dialect Survey queried North American English speakers' usage of a variety of linguistic items, including vocabulary items that vary by region. [2] These include:

Below are lists outlining regional vocabularies in the main dialect areas of the United States.

North

Breezeways connecting two buildings Mainstreetcomplex1.JPG
Breezeways connecting two buildings

Northeast

Bubbler, drinking fountain, or water fountain? Bubbler.jpg
Bubbler, drinking fountain, or water fountain?

New England

Rotary, roundabout, or traffic circle? MUTCD W2-6.svg
Rotary, roundabout, or traffic circle?
Eastern New England
Leaf peeping WalkAmidMaples2.jpg
Leaf peeping
  • bulkhead – cellar hatchway [b]
  • cabinet (Rhode Island) – milk shake [b]
  • frappemilkshake [b]
  • hosey – (rare, but esp. parts of Massachusetts & Maine) to stake a claim or choose sides, to claim ownership of something (sometimes, the front seat of a car) [b]
  • intervale – bottomland; mostly historical [b]
  • jimmiessprinkles (ice cream topping) [b] see also Mid-Atlantic, below
  • johnnycake (also Rhode Island jonnycake) – a type of cornmeal bread [b]
  • leaf peeper – a tourist who has come to see the area's vibrant autumn foliage [b]
  • necessary – outhouse, privy [b]
  • quahog – pronounced "koe-hog," it properly refers to a specific species of clam but is also applied to any clam [b]
  • tonic (eastern Massachusetts) – soft drink [b]
Northern New England
Muddy dirt road during Mud Season Mud season.jpg
Muddy dirt road during Mud Season

Mid-Atlantic

Jimmies or sprinkles? Pinkcupcakesprinkles2005.jpg
Jimmies or sprinkles?

Greater New York City

A bodega in the Bronx Bodega in the Castle Hill section of the Bronx.jpg
A bodega in the Bronx

Midland

mango, pepper, or chili? Green-Bell-Pepper.jpg
mango, pepper, or chili?

A soft drink is generally known in the American Midland as pop, except for being soda around Greater St. Louis in Missouri and Illinois, and coke in central Indiana and central and western Oklahoma [d]

South

West

'Hella' as used in Northern California I hella love the GSA.jpg
'Hella' as used in Northern California

Pacific Northwest

See also

Notes

  1. Dictionary of American Regional English. Vol. IV. 2002. Examples in this section are from this published lexicology from interviews carried out between 1965 and 1970, except where otherwise noted
  2. Frederic G. Cassidy; Frederic Gomes; Joan Houston Hall, eds. (2002). Dictionary of American Regional English. Vol. IV. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.
  3. Metcalf, Alan A. (2000). How we talk: American regional English today . New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
  4. Campbell, Matthew T. (2003). "Generic Names for Soft Drinks By County". Archived from the original on August 11, 2008. map

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Moxie</span> Carbonated beverage

Moxie is a brand of carbonated beverage that is among the first mass-produced soft drinks in the United States. It was created around 1876 by Augustin Thompson as a patent medicine called "Moxie Nerve Food" and was produced in Lowell, Massachusetts. The sweet soda is similar to root beer, but with a bitter aftertaste. It is flavored with gentian root extract, an extremely bitter substance commonly used in herbal medicine.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Soft drink</span> Sweetened non-alcoholic drink, often carbonated

A soft drink is any water-based flavored drink, usually but not necessarily carbonated, and typically including added sweetener. Flavors used can be natural or artificial. The sweetener may be a sugar, high-fructose corn syrup, fruit juice, a sugar substitute, or some combination of these. Soft drinks may also contain caffeine, colorings, preservatives and other ingredients.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Western Pennsylvania English</span> Dialect of American English

Western Pennsylvania English, known more narrowly as Pittsburgh English or popularly as Pittsburghese, is a dialect of American English native primarily to the western half of Pennsylvania, centered on the city of Pittsburgh, but potentially appearing in some speakers as far north as Erie County, as far west as Youngstown, Ohio, and as far south as Clarksburg, West Virginia. Commonly associated with the working class of Pittsburgh, users of the dialect are colloquially known as "Yinzers".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Milkshake</span> Cold dairy beverage

A milkshake is a sweet beverage made by blending milk, ice cream, and flavorings or sweeteners such as butterscotch, caramel sauce, chocolate syrup, or fruit syrup into a thick, sweet, cold mixture. It may also be made using a base made from non-dairy products, including plant milks such as almond milk, coconut milk, or soy milk. Dry ingredients such as whole fruit, nuts, seeds, candy, or cookies may be incorporated.

"Half and half" is the name of various beverages and foods made of an equal-parts mixture of two substances, including dairy products, alcoholic beverages, and soft drinks.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cream soda</span> Soft drink

Cream soda is a sweet soft drink. Generally flavored with vanilla and based on the taste of an ice cream float, a wide range of variations can be found worldwide.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Barq's</span> Root beer manufactured by The Coca-Cola Company

Barq's is an American brand of root beer created by Edward Barq and bottled since the beginning of the 20th century. It is owned by the Coca-Cola Company. It was known as "Barq's Famous Olde Tyme Root Beer" until 2012. Some of its formulations contain caffeine.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Soda fountain</span> Device dispensing carbonated soft drinks

A soda fountain is a device that dispenses carbonated soft drinks, called fountain drinks. They can be found in restaurants, concession stands and other locations such as convenience stores. The artifact combines flavored syrup or syrup concentrate and carbon dioxide with chilled and purified water to make soft drinks, either manually, or in a vending machine which is essentially an automated soda fountain that is operated using a soda gun. Today, the syrup often is pumped from a special container called a bag-in-box (BiB).

Eastern New England English, historically known as the Yankee dialect since at least the 19th century, is the traditional regional dialect of Maine, New Hampshire, and the eastern half of Massachusetts. Features of this variety once spanned an even larger dialect area of New England, for example, including the eastern halves of Vermont and Connecticut for those born as late as the early twentieth century. Studies vary as to whether the unique dialect of Rhode Island technically falls within the Eastern New England dialect region.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ice cream float</span> Soft drink with ice cream

An ice cream float or ice cream soda, also known as a spider in Australia and New Zealand, is a chilled beverage that consists of ice cream in either a soft drink or a mixture of flavored syrup and carbonated water.

North-Central American English is an American English dialect, or dialect in formation, native to the Upper Midwestern United States, an area that somewhat overlaps with speakers of the separate Inland Northern dialect situated more in the eastern Great Lakes region. In the United States, it is also known as the Upper Midwestern or North-Central dialect and stereotypically recognized as a Minnesota accent or sometimes Wisconsin accent. It is considered to have developed in a residual dialect region from the neighboring Western, Inland Northern, and Canadian dialect regions.

The A-Treat Bottling Company was a beverage company headquartered in Allentown, Pennsylvania, that manufactured and bottled the A-Treat brand of carbonated soft drinks. A-Treat stopped production on January 23, 2015, but the brand was purchased by Jaindl Companies and production resumed.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Midland American English</span> Variety of English spoken in the United States

Midland American English is a regional dialect or super-dialect of American English, geographically lying between the traditionally-defined Northern and Southern United States. The boundaries of Midland American English are not entirely clear, being revised and reduced by linguists due to definitional changes and several Midland sub-regions undergoing rapid and diverging pronunciation shifts since the early-middle 20th century onwards.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Northern American English</span> Class of historically related American English dialects

Northern American English or Northern U.S. English is a class of historically related American English dialects, spoken by predominantly white Americans, in much of the Great Lakes region and some of the Northeast region within the United States. The North as a super-dialect region is best documented by the 2006 Atlas of North American English (ANAE) in the greater metropolitan areas of Connecticut, Western Massachusetts, Western and Central New York, Northwestern New Jersey, Northeastern Pennsylvania, Northern Ohio, Northern Indiana, Northern Illinois, Northeastern Nebraska, and Eastern South Dakota, plus among certain demographics or areas within Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Vermont, and New York's Hudson Valley. The ANAE describes that the North, at its core, consists of the Inland Northern dialect and Southwestern New England dialect.

Names for soft drinks in the United States vary regionally. Soda and Pop are the most common terms for soft drinks nationally, although other terms are used, such as, in the South, Coke. Since individual names tend to dominate regionally, the use of a particular term can be an act of geographic identity. The choice of terminology is most closely associated with geographic origin, rather than other factors such as race, age, or income. The differences in naming have been the subject of scholarly studies. Cambridge linguist Bert Vaux, in particular, has studied the "pop vs. soda debate" in conjunction with other regional vocabularies of American English.

The United States has given the English lexicon thousands of words, meanings, and phrases. Several thousand are now used in English as spoken internationally. Some words are only used within North American English and American English.

References

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  2. 1 2 Vaux, Bert Scott A.; Golder; Starr, Rebecca; Bolen, Britt (2005). The Dialect Survey. Archived from the original on April 30, 2016. Retrieved April 30, 2016. Survey and maps
  3. Mohr, Howard. (1987) How to Talk Minnesotan: A Visitor's Guide. New York: Penguin.
  4. Binder, David. (14 September 1995). "Upper Peninsula Journal: Yes, They're Yoopers, and Proud of it." New York Times, section A, page 16.
  5. "'Ope, sorry!' Where did Midwesterners get this onomatopoeia? Let's ask linguists".
  6. "Dialect Survey-Level of a building that is partly or entirely underground". University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee. Archived from the original on September 6, 2008. Retrieved June 17, 2008.
  7. "Dialect Survey – General term for rubber-soled shoes worn for athletic activities, etc". University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee. Archived from the original on August 29, 2008. Retrieved June 17, 2008.
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  9. Collins, Jim (March 2008). "Mud season: New England's fifth season". Yankee. Retrieved September 4, 2013.
  10. Zielinski, Gregory A.; Keim, Barry D. (2005). New England Weather, New England Climate. UPNE. ISBN   978-1-58465-520-6 . Retrieved September 4, 2013.
  11. 1 2 3 Freeman, Amy (March 4, 2015). "Philly Slang: Philadelphia Sayings You Don't Hear Anywhere Else". Caldwell Banker. Retrieved February 12, 2017.
  12. "WHAT'S THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN SPRINKLES AND JIMMIES?". Archived from the original on 21 December 2016. Retrieved 12 December 2016.
  13. "How they Talk in Philadelphia". elliotsamazing.com. Retrieved February 13, 2017.[ permanent dead link ]
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  15. "Stoop | Define Stoop at Dictionary.com". Dictionary.reference.com. Retrieved February 1, 2011.
  16. Martha Barnette; Grant Barrett (January 30, 2015). "Getting Above Your Raisin'". A Way with Words . Wayword, Inc. Retrieved September 27, 2019.
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  18. "Definition of BARROW". www.merriam-webster.com. Retrieved November 9, 2020.
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