Southern 2nd-person plural double genitive

[Nancy Elliott]

And then there's "your-guyses," which I hear all the time...

Nancy Elliott
Southern Oregon University

> From: Beverly Flanigan <flanigan at OAK.CATS.OHIOU.EDU>
> Reply-To: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Date: Tue, 17 Oct 2000 12:19:28 -0400
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> Subject: Re: Southern 2nd-person plural double genitive
>
> What I suspect happened is that the transcribers, unfamiliar with
> "your-all's," assumed they had heard "you-all's" (perceiving the word in
> terms of the only form familiar throughout the country).  In fact, I had
> not heard the form at all until very recently, when a student who had lived
> for a time in Alabama attested it; she claims to have heard it in SE Ohio
> too, but I haven't confirmed this.  I mentioned the Lehrer quote to my TAs
> a few days ago and got the usual horrified gasps--after which I gave them a
> lesson on the Southern genitive, of course.  (BTW, I fell asleep for a
> while too, and apparently missed the only substantive part of the "debate,"
> on health care in Texas.)
>
> At 08:39 AM 10/17/00 -0500, you wrote:
>> On Mon, 16 Oct 2000, Rudolph C Troike wrote:
>>
>>> Did you-all catch Jim Lehrer's double genitive at the end of the
>> presidential
>>> "debate" the other night: "your-all's"? I just thought it should be noted
>>> for the record.
>>
>> Shoot, so I did miss something, after all, when I fell asleep in the
>> middle of the 10/11 debate. It's also interesting to consider which
>> features are preserved in the transcripts and which are not, since at the
>> website we have both RealAudio and the transcripts. If this is the part
>> you're referring to, it seems to have been slightly sanitized:
>>
>> http://www.pbs.org/newshour/election2000/
>>
>> MR. LEHRER: I know. I know. (Laughter.) But about -- you're not -- under
>> you-all's rules, you are not allowed to ask each other a question. I let
>> you do it a moment ago --
>>
>> -Mai
>> _____________________________________________
>> Mai Kuha                  mkuha at bsuvc.bsu.edu
>> Department of English     (765) 285-8410
>> Ball State University
>
>
> _____________________________________________
> Beverly Olson Flanigan         Department of Linguistics
> Ohio University                     Athens, OH  45701
> Ph.: (740) 593-4568              Fax: (740) 593-2967
> http://www.cats.ohiou.edu/linguistics/dept/flanigan.htm
>
>