-body vs. -one

[RonButters at AOL.COM]

I grew up in east-central Iowa (first 27 years of my life) and I don't agree 
that the natives there prefer the -one form. For the rest of my life, I have 
lived in cental North Carolina, and I don't agree that the natives here prefer 
the -body form.

I guess it is possible that I have never noticed a geographical split in 
preference here. (I was in my 30s before I realized that I used a glottal stop 
instead of /n/ in uttering "a" + "apple".) So if mclee has any actual statistical 
data and is not just flying on intuitions (as I am), that would be helpful to 
me. 

Ditto data for England.

In a message dated 1/3/09 12:41:48 PM, mclee at MURRAH.COM writes:


> I saw an old Sherlock Holmes movie, "Terror by Night," last night, and
> one of the characters-- Inspector LaStrade, I think--said that
> "Somebody (did something)" rather than "Someone (did something)".  I
> grew up in East Texas in the 1950s, and we always used the -body
> form.  However, I have lived in Iowa and Michigan as an adult, and
> there they generally use the -one form.  I assume that Southerners
> tend to use -body and Northerners -one. I wonder if someone can give
> insight into the cultural origins of the use of -body (as in somebody)
> vs. -one (as in someone).  I suspect it reflects that the South was
> influenced more by southern and southwestern England while New England
> and the Midwest by eastern England.
> 




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