Yeah, Seattle

[A. Maberry]

Ok, this is my best guess. I think what Mr Crotty is referring to is a
matter of intonation. I thought about this off and on all day and, after
rereading the examples below, think that it is perfectly normal to hear in
Seattle and perhaps the PNW generally something like:
"She's a total fox." "YEAH-she-is"
"Man, that's a long commute!" "YEAH-t-is"
By which I mean a very quick response with a hard stress on "Yeah" and
then a sharp decrease in emphasis on the rest of the phrase.
The phrase does nothing more than to indicate agreement, usually strong
agreement with what has been said. It's equivalent to "Sure is!" or the
like.
I never thought of this as peculiar to Seattle, or to any place
else. Doesn't seem very tricky either, but maybe I've just been
doing it for so long ...

Perhaps Peter McGraw can help with the southern portion of the PNW
dialect.

Allen
maberry at u.washington.edu

On Mon, 22 Nov 1999 AAllan at AOL.COM wrote:

> According to Jim "the Mad Monk" Crotty's 1997 book, _How to Talk American_,
> "the most important and tricky piece of Seattle vernacular" is: "yeah."
> He adds: "It's almost _Fargo_-esque but different (not as dorky, almost
> surfer-like) and best understood by example. 'So you got mugged in New York?'
> 'Yeah I did.' 'She is a total fox.' 'Yeah she is.'"
>
> I have two questions: 1. Is this really a distinguishing feature of Seattle
> (youth?) vernacular? and
> 2. what exactly is it? A matter of intonation, of pronunciation, of placement
> in discourse, of frequency of use?
>
> A writer for the Seattle Times, Jean Godden, included this item in a column
> on Crotty's book without further comment, thereby implicitly agreeing with
> it, I suppose, but not helping the explanation.
>
> Thanks - Allan Metcalf
>