Lady Mondragon and Other NW Pa Matters

Arnold Zwicky zwicky at STANFORD.EDU
Sat Jan 24 16:11:51 UTC 2009


On Jan 24, 2009, at 7:23 AM, Joanna Taylor wrote:

>
> My mother's family has been in Venango County for generations-- she
> was born
> in Oil City in 1930, but I've never heard her use 'red up'! When I
> asked her
> about it this morning, it took her a moment, and then she said, "Oh,
> yes, my
> mother used to say that!".

"redd (up)" is a famous dialect item in the U.S. (and Scotland and the
north of England, which is where it came to the U.S. from).  there's a
long entry in DARE, and a short one in AHD.

western Pennsylvania is the center of "redd up" country.

arnold

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org



More information about the Ads-l mailing list