Singular y'all (and yuz)?

[Prof. R. Sussex]

Yous(e) is also common in colloquial speech in Australia and New
Zealand; with increasing Americanization, so is "yous guys".
Originally plural, it is now singular as well, though that usage is
marked.

It is common as a vocative (plural especially):
        Hey yous, what ya doin'?
It seems to be found especially in questions:
        What do yous think yer doin'?
It's less common as a subject or object in declaratives, mostly after verbs:
        ??yous don't look too great
        I didn't see yous in the pub Sat'dy
It is marginal after prepositions:
        ??I didn't send it to yous ...

Do these oddities match "youse" in NYC, or "y'all" in the rest of the
US? We don't have "y'all" at all ... so far.

Roly Sussex


--

Roly Sussex
Professor of Applied Language Studies
Department of French, German, Russian, Spanish and Applied Linguistics
School of Languages and Comparative Cultural Studies
The University of Queensland
Brisbane
Queensland 4072
AUSTRALIA

Office: Greenwood 434 (Building 32)
Phone:  +61 7 3365 6896
Fax:    +61 7 3365 6799
Email:  sussex at uq.edu.au
Web:    http://www.arts.uq.edu.au/slccs/profiles/sussex.html
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Applied linguistics website:
        http://www.uq.edu.au/slccs/AppliedLing/

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Audio:  from    http://www.abc.net.au/hobart/stories/s782293.htm

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