same old

[Jesse Sheidlower]

> Not so fast Jesse. Mine is not mock-pidgin and would sound exactly
> (to a nonsoutherner) like what is represented here. It is defintely a
> result of the processes of consonant cluster reduction (/old/-->/ol/)
> and /l/-vocalization (/ol/-->/o:/).

When I say "pidgin or mock-pidgin" I didn't mean that I made that
assumption just because of the pronunciation--the passages in
which it is found are spoken by or to Asians and show other signs
of pidgin, e.g. lack of articles, leveling of inflectional
morphology, etc. Oh, there are also (slightly later attested but
still ref. to the Korean War) examples of "same-same", no "oh"
at all, which seems quite pidginish.

I'd love to believe that it's originally "old" in Black E or Southern
E and the "same-oh" forms are later simplifications; I'm just going
with the evidence I have, which is that the "oh" forms were around
for at least fifteen years before the "old" forms.

Someone please prove me wrong!

Jesse Sheidlower
OED