We is

[Jonathan Lighter]

No news from here  both are still common among blue-collar whites wherever I've been in the South.  In fact, pretty universal for working folks who didn't go on to college.

JL

Wilson Gray <wilson.gray at RCN.COM> wrote:
---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: Wilson Gray
Subject: Re: We is
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that's a good point. I have a friend, originally from Vermont, who
*always* uses "ize" for "I was" and occasionally uses "weze" for "we
were."

-Wilson Gray

On Jan 22, 2005, at 4:51 AM, Margaret Lee wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender: American Dialect Society
> Poster: Margaret Lee
> Subject: Re: We is
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------
> --------
>
> I think "We was" is much more typical. What is the context of the
> African American woman's use of "we is"? Does it replace the
> traditional zero copula construction? Any example sentences?
>
> Wilson Gray wrote:On Jan 21, 2005, at 4:36 PM,
> James A. Landau wrote:
>
>> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>> -----------------------
>> Sender: American Dialect Society
>> Poster: "James A. Landau"
>> Subject: We is
>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>> -
>> --------
>>
>> For the last two weeks I have been in a class with an African-American
>> woman
>> who habitually says "We is". Her speech is at most
>> lightly-AAVE-flavored
>> which makes this particular usage stand out (she also says "he don't"
>> but so do a
>> lot of Anglos).
>>
>> Is "we is" a typical feature of AAVE or a personal idiosyncracy of
>> this
>> particular speaker?
>>
>> - Jim Landau
>>
>
> For me, it's hard to say. I personally don't use "we is" under any
> circumstances. Rather, I'm not conscious of using it, in any case.
> However, its use by other speakers is so common that hearing "we is"
> wouldn't get my attention. So, if I had to make a decision, I'd say
> that it was typical, at least of some registers/subdialects. It's not a
> speech defect that would be peculiar to a particular speaker.
>
> BTW, why is it that an Anglo can be only of the white race, whereas a
> Latino "can be of any race?" Doesn't that strike anyone else as a
> little strange, given that its original meaning in American Spanish was
> something like, "anyone whose first language is English"?
>
> -Wilson Gray
>
>
>
> Margaret G. Lee, Ph.D.
> Professor of English & Linguistics
> and University Editor
> Department of English
> Hampton University, Hampton, VA 23668
> 757-727-5769(voice);757-727-5084(fax);757-851-5773(home)
> margaret.lee at hamptonu.edu or mlee303 at yahoo.com
>
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