y'all redux

[James C Stalker]

I stand corrected.  In thinking about the data problem, Mike Montgomery's
article in Am Speech on multiple modals comes to mind.  He has a relatively
limited range of data, all painstakingly collected from reported data over
quite a span of time, but the data make a convincing case for mms being
polite forms. Following on from there, mm speakers will also be non--mm
speakers, when the politeness needs are not relevant.  Sg/pl yall, if sg is
polite, would follow the same pattern, making the collection of data more
complex.  No one would ever be a consistent sg or pl yall person.  They
would always be both, but in different contexts.  Could this be a
Northern/Southern shiboleth?

Jim Stalker

James C. Stalker
Department of English
Michigan State University