"Yay long"

[Jonathan Lighter]

>  like a misspelling of "yeah"!

Which is how I would expect to hear it pronounced at this point if it were
from OE.


JL


On Sun, Sep 29, 2013 at 9:10 AM, Charles C Doyle <cdoyle at uga.edu> wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Charles C Doyle <cdoyle at UGA.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: "Yay long"
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> My students seem largely unaware that a word exists whose spelling is
> "yea" (you know, when we have the "steak"/"great"/"break" discussion).  I
> suppose it seems reasonable that the counterpart of "nay" should be "yay."
>  And "yea" does look like a misspelling of "yeah"!
>
> --Charlie
>
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