"Y'all" redux

[Beverly Flanigan]

One more comment on the following comment:  I hesitate to call
"yinz/y'all/youse" use "lower register" or "working class" (as someone else
said with reference to "y'allses").  These may well be such ordinary and
widespread indicators of regional usage that they transcend both class and
register distinctions.  A former student of mine, from a wealthy urban
family, used "y'allses" with no self-consciousness at all.  Just a
cautionary note on labeling usage that's a marker to outsiders as marked
for register and class (or education or age) within a particular region.


>"Douglas G. Wilson" <douglas at NB.NET> wrote:
>---------------------- Information from the mail header
>-----------------------
>Sender: American Dialect Society
>Poster: "Douglas G. Wilson"
>Subject: Re: "Y'all" redux
>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> >Would somebody please post a reference to a seemingly intelligent printed
> >source - or any source - that confidently asserts that Southerners address
> >individuals as "y'all"? It would be nice if the source was more recent
> >than, say, 1930, but I'll take anything. It would be good to know exactly
> >what it is that is being defended against.
>
>Crystal's recent book does assert that Fort Worthers (or is it "Worthians"
>or "Forteans"?) do this. The first example he encountered (IIRC) was from
>the clerk or storekeeper where he went to buy a Stetson hat. I wasn't there
>and I've never seen Crystal or heard him speak, but one thing which tends
>to be near a Texas hotel in my limited experience is a store selling
>Stetsons, tooled boots, etc. to tourists from such places as London, Tokyo,
>and Chicago. With clerks necessarily quite conscious of their Texan-ness
>(or is that "Texianity"?). Crystal does recount other examples of singular
>"y'all", but again there is reason to suspect that some may put on this
>sort of thing for the furriners.
>
>What is the opposite of "hypercorrection" again? I live in Pittsburgh. Many
>Pittsburghers use "you-uns"/"yinz" as the plural of "you", some don't, but
>essentially everybody knows that the 'correct' or 'standard' version is
>"you" [pl.]. So "yinz" is either lower-register or explicitly-local. In
>order to sound even more homey/slangy/explicitly-local one might go one
>step further and put "yinz" for every instance of "you", singular or
>plural. I'm sure I've encountered this, although not often. The same might
>occur elsewhere, IMHO, with "y'all", for example, or "youse", in US or UK.
>
>-- Doug Wilson