Query about slang "scootch"-- Why -ch?

Wed Feb 23 23:45:23 UTC 2005

The only person I've EVER heard use it is from British Columbia -- and she
uses "skosh."

Julia Niebuhr Eulenberg <eulenbrg at u.washington.edu>

On Wed, 23 Feb 2005, Douglas G. Wilson wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       "Douglas G. Wilson" <douglas at NB.NET>
> Subject:      Re: Query about slang "scootch"-- Why -ch?
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>> Related, maybe, to "skosh" (long o, I don't know how to write it in
>> ASCII), Wisconsinese for a small amount?
>
> I would suppose (I don't have evidence) that "skosh" is more West-Coastish
> if it's regional at all.
>
> I had the same notion but I don't know whether it holds any water or not:
>
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0408D&L=ads-l&P=R2
>
> -- Doug Wilson
>