"soda" in Minneapolis

[Millie Webb]

I still "slip up" and say "string beans" a lot.  I usually say green beans
though, because I assume no one will understand me.  To us growing up,
string beans were usually green beans cut differently, I guess.  Do they
call it "French cut green beans", maybe?  The long, stringy way...

I lived in St Paul, Minnesota exclusively for over twenty years (not
counting a year in Germany!).  After that, I moved to SE Michigan, where I
swear the soda/pop distinction depended on which part of the Detroit Metro
area you were originally from! (Bloomfield Hills, Mount Pleasant, and most
of the other expensive areas that I noticed said "soda"; most others said
"pop")  The more rural parts were all "pop", no question.  And St Paul and
Minneapolis in Minnesota are VERY different in terms of socio-economics, and
dialectology, in my humble opinion.  People from Mpls still said "pop" when
I was growing up, but also tended to be more aware of how they sounded to
others, and therefore, more likely to switch to "soda" as more outsiders (as
in, from out-of-state) moved into the Cities.  St Paul has many more native
Minnesotans in my experience, and even a lot of stability in terms of which
neighborhood people lived in most of their lives.  I tell people that
overall, Mpls feels more white collar and upper middle class, while St Paul
feels more blue collar, working-to-middle class.  Not that all the residents
of both fit into those two categories, mind you!  They both have their ritzy
areas and their poorer areas.  But I think Mpls has more of the upper-crusty
areas with less economic variety.  All based on my experiences and opinions,
obviously.  I do not have a census report in front of me. Maybe I will have
to look it up now for the 2000 census, and see if it is still much the same
as it was in the 1980 and 1990 census, uh, "censes"?

And SA started in Kentucky, to the best of my knowledge. Leastaways, that's
where the headquarters with Ashland Oil was when I worked there for several
years....  -- Millie

----- Original Message -----
From: "Dan Goodman" <dsgood at VISI.COM>
To: <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
Sent: Thursday, August 08, 2002 11:49 PM
Subject: Re: "soda" in Minneapolis


> Perhaps you're in a part of the Twin Cities metro area with a higher
> percentage of native Minnesotans?  The difference in usage might be
> the linguistic equivalent of microclimates.
>
> The signs at SuperAmerica stores say "soda".  I suspect that "soda"
> was the usual term where SuperAmerica's original headquarters were.
>
> Here's something I find strange:  when I slip up and say
> "stringbeans" rather than "green beans," I'm understood.
>