gwine

Wed Mar 8 17:49:10 UTC 2006

----- Original Message -----
From: "Salikoko S. Mufwene" <s-mufwene at UCHICAGO.EDU>
Date: Tuesday, March 7, 2006 11:34 pm
Subject: Re: gwine

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       "Salikoko S. Mufwene" <s-mufwene at UCHICAGO.EDU>
> Organization: University of Chicago
> Subject:      Re: gwine
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>
> In the mid-1980s, when I started my field work on Gullah and was
> checking all sorts of sources to determine which particular forms or
> constructions identified as "creole" could still have their origins in
> colonial English, I think I saw "gwine" in /Tarheel Talk/, Norman
> Ellsworth Eliason. The form may have been "guine." Since I have not
> worked yet on time reference in Gullah, I have not bothered to check
> whether it is not attested in some nonstandard British diale
ct.
>
> Sali.
>
> Jonathan Lighter wrote:
>
> >Sali, we are on the same linguistic wavelength here. I feel rather
> the same about the literary analysis as well.
> >
> >  The discussion began when Wilson raised the question of whether
> "gwine" could have been merely the invention of tin-eared, wise-
> assed white fellows.
> >
> >  JL
> >
> >"Salikoko S. Mufwene" <s-mufwene at UCHICAGO.EDU> wrote:
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> >Sender: American Dialect Society
> >Poster: "Salikoko S. Mufwene"
> >Subject: Re: gwine
> >-------------------------------------------------------------------
> ------------
> >
> >I have missed part/most of this discussion, but I can't help
> expressing my
> >shock at the contents of this posting.
> >
> >At 08:34 AM 3/7/2006 -0800, you wrote:
> >
> >
> >>From Henry Louis Gates, Jr., _Figures in Black_ (1987; rpt. N.Y.:
> Oxford>>U. P., 1989), p. 191 ( The author is considering the
> appe
arance of
> >>"gwine" in an old spiritual :
> >>
> >>"Gwine to sit down at the welcome table,
> >>Gwine to feast off milk and honey." ) :
> >>
> >>"Gwine," for instance, is still commonly found in Black speech.
> >>
> >>
> >
> >SSM: Where? in North America? as part of African American vernacular
> >speech? not even in Gullah, I think. Well, I heard "gwine" a
> couple of
> >times during my field work (second half of the 1980s) but it is
> far less
> >common than the alternative "go" (pronounced with a schwa) that is
> the>dominant way of expressing FUTURE.
> >
> >
> >
> >>It is basically untranslatable, yet, with a little reflection, we
> must see
> >>that the full import of the word goes far beyond its referent 'I
> am going
> >>to,' and implies far more. "Gwine" implies a filial devotion to a
> moral>>order but also the completion, the restoration, of harmony
> in a universe
> >>out of step somehow. "Gwine" asserts a reordering, again this
> restoration>>rhythmic, it
s diphthong heightening its force on the
> heels on the
> >>breathily spoken "gw" sound, the "w" tempering the hard "g." "Gwine"
> >>connotes unshakeable determination, the act to come made certain
> to come
> >>by the act of speech. "Gwine" leaves no room for doubt, for
> question, for
> >>vacillation...."Gwine" contains a concept, a way of looking at
> the world,
> >>not fully translated by "I am going to." With "gwine," people
> accept their
> >>primal place in the bosom of God.
> >>
> >>
> >
> >SSM: This is beyond everything I have been able to detect and
> understand>after years of studying Caribbean English creoles,
> Gullah, and AAVE... but
> >then one must be prepared to learn something new every day.
> >
> >Sali.
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >>JL
> >>
> >>
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> >
> >**********************************************************
> >Salikoko S. Mufwene s-mufwene at uchicago.edu
> >Frank J. McLoraine Distinguished Service Professor
> >University of Chicago 773-702-8531; FAX 773-834-0924
> >Department of Linguistics
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> >Chicago, IL 60637
> >http://humanities.uchicago.edu/faculty/mufwene
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>
> --
> **********************************************************
> Salikoko S. Mufwene                    s-mufwene at uchicago.edu

> Frank J. McLoraine Distinguished Service Professor
> University of Chicago                  773-702-8531; FAX 773-834-0924
> Department of Linguistics
> 1010 East 59th Street
> Chicago, IL 60637, USA
> http://humanities.uchicago.edu/faculty/mufwene
> **********************************************************
>
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> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> Gwine (and gwoin) is attested in British English, as I have said to this list before--you'll see it in Ellis (1889) and in the SED (Orton & Wakelin, 1966)--- in the Southwest of England.  Its source appears to be a monosyllabic "goin", with dissimilation of the /OI/ to /wai/ after grave consonants, the same process that gives "bwoy/bwye" from "boy", which happens in the same SW dialects.  The only difference from American instances is that the /ai/ here is often the same vowel as occurs in words with ME /ai/ like rain, day, so that "gwain"
would be a reasonable spelling.  Reportedly, it occurs in both LAMSAS and LAGS records too, including some from some white speakers.  "Gwoin" is found further up the Severn from "gwine", more Worcestershire than Gloucestershire, Somerset, Wiltshire, Hampshire.  All the "gwine" counties furnished the Carolinas--and a lot of other colonies too, as far north as the Popham and Pemaquid, Maine settlements, with settlers, and provided the crews for a lot of slave ships too, so any occurence in early Southern American vernaculars, Caribbean Creoles, or early AAVE, or even american dialects farther afield in heavily Southwestern-settled areas (Central Mass.?  Plymouth Plantations?  New Hampshire?) would not surprise me.  What does is actually what vowel occurs in it (the /ai/ rather than */ei/); to me, this says that the word was taken into any early Colonial koine as a one-off lexical item, rather than as part of a larger vowel-class.

Paul Johnston

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