Singular y'all?

[Beverly Flanigan]

Once again, the South is a large and nebulous area.  But when you said
Tuscaloosa, I gotcha.    The same goes for the writer from Dallas, which is
probably close to "the fringe"? (I think Natalie Maynor used to make this
distinction between Mississippi and "the South.")


At 02:41 PM 2/22/2005, you wrote:
>I grew up in the South. Y'all is definitely plural.
>
>That's not to say you won't hear it used in a singular way, but perhaps
>that is due to a slight mental lapse rather than dialect variation.
>
>In the example mentioned below, the tired server at Waffle House may have
>said, "Y'all" all day long. When she served the person sitting alone at
>the table, it could have simply been a slip. It has happened to me before
>-- just like that (not at Waffle House, though).
>
>If y'all (or yall, as some spell it) is ever used consistently in a
>singular fashion, I've never heard it. Or it could be that's just how we
>talk in Tuscaloosa, Alabama.
>
>Roll Tide, Y'all.
>
>Jason
>
>
>
>Alice Faber <faber at HASKINS.YALE.EDU> wrote:
>---------------------- Information from the mail header
>-----------------------
>Sender: American Dialect Society
>Poster: Alice Faber
>Organization: Haskins Laboratories
>Subject: Singular y'all?
>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> From a blog I regularly read, by a native Torontonian
>..
>Note the first paragraph:
>
>"Welcome back y'all. (Or is that "y'alls" I can never figure that
>out. I was in a "Waffle House" in Tennessee once and the lady who poured
>my coffee said "Y'all want cream in that?" which confused me, since I
>was alone. Clearly, "Y'all" must be the singular, which perplexingly
>must mean that "y'alls" is the plural...right? Maybe this is something
>else Laurie can tell us, since she's an English professor.)"
>
>--
>Alice Faber
>Haskins Labs
>
>
>If we knew what we were doing,
>it wouldn't be called research,
>would it?
>
>  -- Albert Einstein