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The evolution of Southern American English
SAE also modifies the English auxiliary system by allowing for the use of more than one modal in a verb phrase. For instance, for most Southerners “I might could leave work early today” is a grammatically acceptable sentence. It translates roughly as “I might be able to leave work early,” but might could conveys a greater sense of tentativeness than might be able does. The use of multiple modals provides Southerners with a politeness strategy not available in other regional dialects. Although no generally agreed upon list of acceptable multiple modals exists, the first modal in the sequence must be might or may, while the second is usually could, can, would, will,should, or oughta. In addition, SAE allows at least one triple modal option (might shouldoughta) and permits useta to precede a modal as well (e.g., “I useta could do that”).
Read more here, and thanks to the ever-excellent www.geekpress.com for the pointer. The comments are open for other good examples.
Posted by Tyler Cowen on July 12, 2005 at 06:03 AM in Education | Permalink
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Comments
An example of how double modals are a politeness strategy is in the difference between should and might should. There are situations where "You should do that," is rude, because it's too definite, like an order, but "You might should do that," is acceptable as a suggestions. Tentativeness essentially always adds politeness. (A similar structure is seen in Japanese.)
Another feature of Southern English is preserving the "y"-sound before "u" in more words, similar to British pronunciation. The biggest difference is in "tu" and "du," hence "tyune" and "Tyuesday" instead of "toon" and "Toosday." (The name Looney Tunes always confused me as a child, because I didn't think that they really rhymed.)
Several other differences are in politeness. "Sir" and "ma'am" persist much more. Also, you're much more likely to hear "Dr." used for those with a Ph.D., whether in academia or in public. A very difficult thing for me, coming to Cornell for graduate school, was dealing with all the professors who would like to be called by their first name. It offends me. I know that many of them want to do it in order to treat graduate students as colleagues, but I still can't help being offended. We simply don't have equal relationships; not only are they further ahead in their studies, compensation, and various status symbols and benefits, but as a graduate student I'm am completely dependent on them and their approval in a variety of ways. Disguising such an unequal relationship by calling them by their first names seems useless, ignoring of reality, and doesn't make me feel any more equal.
Posted by: John Thacker at Jul 12, 2005 7:53:35 AM
Not long after moving to Oregon from Texas as a small child, my second grade teacher sent me to the principle's office for calling her "ma'am", she thought I was being a smartass or something. To this day that memory sort of shocks me. Although I can say that when I moved back to Texas after living in Oregon until I was 23, the whole double modal thing really bothers me. "useta could"? Phrases like that are why so many northerners think of southerners and Texans as dumb, eventhough most of them certainly aren't.
Posted by: Timothy at Jul 12, 2005 9:43:50 AM
A favored Southern/Texan coinage of mine is "all y'all", which encompasses a larger group than the smaller "y'all." But I wish we used words coined in the Simpsons, like cromulent and embiggens.
Posted by: Scipio at Jul 12, 2005 10:32:37 AM
One used with frequency in rural Tennessee is "might oughta" which, in line with the above takes, was a polite suggestion.
I also heard similar constructions used sarcastically, when "talking back".
Adult: "You might oughta do that outside, if you don't want to get the rug dirty."
Child: "You might oughta get the vaccum out, then!"
Posted by: Jamie at Jul 12, 2005 12:27:36 PM
Scipio, you beat me to the all y'all. It's pretty rare for a Southerner to use "you" to address more than one person. Y'all is used for general, plural "you," but the point of all y'all is that no one (present, at least) is being left out.
John, at least in biological fields, I would say it's almost universal for grad students to be on a first name basis with professors, even in the South. This was true at Vanderbilt, my (undergrad) alma mater.
Posted by: Neema at Jul 12, 2005 12:58:05 PM
Neema:
That's generally true, yes, but it happens with undergraduate students as well.
"Used to could" is perfectly understandable, no stranger than "used to be able to." (I refuse to spell it the other way when writing; that's as pointless as writing "gonna" even though most speakers of English substitute that for "going to" in conversation. Similiarly, I'd spell it "fixing to.") It's a perfectly natural way of indicating aspect.
There are pronounciation, grammatical, and vocabulary differences in Southern speech. Some words like "yonder" are perfectly acceptable English words, not innovations, but have faded from use elsewhere.
Another phrase you'll hear more often in the South is "I reckon," where others might use "I think" or "I suppose." Also "I swear," and the rarer "I swanny." (The last derived apparently from "I shall warrant," and in a way related to the old New England "I vum.")
Southerners also are traditionally noted for using lots colorful expressions, including many ways to avoid cursing in public.
Posted by: John Thacker at Jul 12, 2005 3:44:48 PM
Another pronunciation difference is that most Southerners still pronounce "cot" and "caught" differently, and distinguish in general between the two vowels, though in some of the larger cities this is going away.
Posted by: John Thacker at Jul 12, 2005 3:47:00 PM
Another difference is that in some accents, certain words are stressed on the first syllable instead of the second-- "police," "cement," and "behind" are three examples.
There are parts of Southern accents that are stereotyped as particularly uneducated, even in the South. OTOH, there are aspects of Southern accents that are prized or at least tolerated even by educated Southern speakers, some of which have spread beyond the South.
Posted by: John Thacker at Jul 12, 2005 3:53:02 PM
Also in some dialects there's additional use of the reflexive "me," as in "I'm going to get me a sandwich" or "I'm going to paint me a picture."
Posted by: John Thaker at Jul 12, 2005 4:02:06 PM
I love y'all and use it even though I am not a southerner. After studying a little Russian and Spanish I couldn't live without a plural second person.
Posted by: Jacqueline at Jul 12, 2005 4:20:48 PM
"y'all" is one of the very few things I kept from being a small child. I also sound Texan when I'm angry and/or yelling at the damn dogs (which in that circumstance is often pronounced in the neighborhood of "doe-gs") to shut up. I also still pronounce "caught" and "cot" differently; the former being "c-AW-t" and the latter being "c-AH-t". I mean, really, they're different damn words, why should they be pronounced the same way?
The only other major thing is that I speak slowly and tend to draw out my words a little bit. Drove the upper-midwesterners I dated nuts, but those folks talk so damn fast you'll never understand a word coming out of their fool mouths.
And, John, while I agree that "used to could" is understandable once one figures out what it's supposed to indicate, it still sounds just plain...wrong to those of us who didn't grow up hearing it. I tend to say "I once was able" or "Formerly, I could" or other things of a similar nature instead of "used to be able to", but that may just be because I'm pretentious.
Posted by: Timothy at Jul 12, 2005 9:25:20 PM
After moving to the South some years ago, I've noticed a common usage that I wasn't aware of in the Northeast (this is not a grammatical or pronunciation issue, but related to usage and politeness): In restaurants in the South, I hear many people order something from the menu by saying, "Give me X," (actually, "Gimme X") where I'd always thought it more polite (in the Northeast, at least) to say, "I'd like X" or even "I'll have X." It's clearly not meant to be peremptory or impolite, but it still sounds that way to my ears.
Posted by: RSA at Jul 12, 2005 9:58:29 PM
I wasn't aware that some dialects of SAE had "might" as a politeness modifier.
There are some other linguistic quirks in southern dialects of English. Oddly enough, most of those quirks are older than the "proper" rules of English speaking. "Ain't" is no longer considered acceptable, but it was perfectly acceptable in English 300 years ago. Ditto for a phrase like "I can't get no satisfaction" instead of "I can't get any satisfaction".
After all, the "no" and the "any" are just particles. The contraction did all the negating work.
- Josh
Posted by: Wild Pegasus at Jul 13, 2005 12:26:28 AM
I grew up in rural/suburban Tennessee, but don't have much of an accent. After teaching English grammar in the Czech Republic for a school year, I came back and noticed "might should" and "might could" and so on. It doesn't strike me as mainly used for politeness (though that explanation doesn't sound wrong exactly), but more along the lines of "perhaps"--tentativeness and suggestion, like an epistemic modal operator.
"What you might should do is call them tomorrow morning" = "Perhaps you should call them tomorrow morning"
Also, I didn't realize that "fixin' to" was a Southern idiom until very recently. I thought it was just a colloquial Americanism.
But I'll never understand the pronunciation of "McDonald's" as "MAC-Donald's".
Posted by: Cole at Jul 14, 2005 10:18:29 PM
I work with a guy from Alabama who uses the word "onliest", as in "the onliest thing is, ...". It allows for the sorting of contingencies, so that the most important of which is the "onliest".
Posted by: William McBride at Jul 15, 2005 12:40:49 PM
I've heard it said that Boston is so snobbish and elite that in Boston no one ever says "y'all" because "we never actually do mean all of you. Some of you are just never going to be included."
just my two cents...
Posted by: Diana at Jul 15, 2005 10:50:01 PM
I keep hearing people on television saying "samidge" for sandwitch and "furtography" for photography. Where does that come from?
My grandmother is from West Virginia and she and my other appalachian relatives pronounce words ending with "ia" as ending with "ee". As in,"Putin is the president of Rushee." Also interesting is that "tire" and "tar" sound the same.
The best thing about southern speech is that Southerners listen until you are finished speaking instead of interrupting.
John Thacker,
Will you be more specific about where people pronounce caught and cot the same?
I live in Michigan and have been many places this side of the Mississippi and have never heard that.
Is the vowel pronounced the way Northern-Floridians pronounce the word "on" as "awn"?
Posted by: Brian at Jul 18, 2005 1:19:38 AM
"For instance, for most Southerners “I might could leave work early today” is a grammatically acceptable sentence."
The original author is confusing what is grammatically acceptable with common usage. Most southerners would make assumptions about the education and experience about someone using double or triple modals, which they wouldn't make about someone using more universal SAE markers like "y'all."
Posted by: Renee at Jul 19, 2005 12:56:03 PM
Whoops, that should be "of someone using double or triple modals..."
Posted by: Renee at Jul 19, 2005 2:15:52 PM
Another difference in accent I noticed:
I am from Arkansas, and my fiancee is Japanese. The other day he caught me saying FriDEE instead of FriDAY. My Grandparents also say DEE for any DAY off the week [ex. MonDEE, TuesDEE, etc.]. The accent goes on the first syllable, so DEE sounds a bit short.
We have a lot of expressions PERIOD. Not just to avoid cursing. Whenever I stay out too late, my Grandmother reminds me that "I'm burning the candle at both ends."
Posted by: Amelia at Jul 30, 2005 4:26:02 AM
In response to:
"""For instance, for most Southerners “I might could leave work early today” is a grammatically acceptable sentence."
The original author is confusing what is grammatically acceptable with common usage. Most southerners would make assumptions about the education and experience about someone using double or triple modals, which they wouldn't make about someone using more universal SAE markers like "y'all."""
I'm not trying to be argumentative here... but I feel it necessarily to mention that the problem here probably lies in saying "most southerners" b/c as you pick apart singled out characteristics (of the many there are) of southern speech, it will probably be found that there is a lot of variation. My main point is that I'm from Alabama, and I have always used double modals, and I'm pretty educated (I mean, my natural speech reflects the fact that I'm from rural Alabama, where more prescriptive speech affects the colloquial speech much less than in say the cities... but as a Ph.D. student in linguistics, I feel I can consider myself fairly educated, relatively speaking)... and even still, I did not know that the rest of the country didn't use double modals until about 2 years ago when a linguist from California heard me say "I might would say... blah blah" and he stopped me because he was so excited, because he said he had read that southerners do that, but he'd never really heard it. And of course, I was like "what are you talkin' about? What in the hell is wrong with might would? How would you say it?" I'm sure someone would respond to what I'm saying with "well we can't help it you're uneducated and don't know how to speak English" but... my point is, claiming that most southerns would recognize double modals as uneducated speech while accepting "yall" may be pushing it... b/c I know I don't fit into that... I accept both.
And, Renee made a comment about the original author confusing grammatical acceptability with common usage... but as a linguist, I feel the need to make aware to those that think otherwise, that the original author does not use "grammatically acceptable sentence" to refer to prescriptive grammar... grammar that grammarians of power have decided over the years should be correct or incorrect... but rather to the fact that within the mentioned speech community, that sentence passes as accepted. Not many people from my area (Alabama gulf coast) will probably give a confused look and make a big deal or ask for clarification if someone says "You might can get one in Walmart if you go look"... whereas in other regions, they probably would. So, from a linguistic perspective, it's grammatically accepted in that speech community. That is regardless of correct or incorrect grammar from the perspective of a prescriptivist.
Another example would be the fact that in Western Pennsylvania (I'm a PHD student at Penn State) the following sentence is perfectly acceptable amongst the community "my hair needs cut" or "my car needs washed". Or someone recently asked "Is it snowing up there yet?" and "yet" here means "still"... as in "I know it was snowing last week, but is it snowing yet?" In this part of the country, that's perfectly fine for these people.. it fits the mental grammars these speakers of English have... whereas for me, and my dialect... we would either have no clue what that sentence means, or we'd misinterpret it. And if you don't know what a sentence said in your native language means, you can assume it's not grammatically acceptable... whereas if it sounds normal, with respect to whether you hear it, have you heard it, do you understand it immediately b/c you hear it frequently and maybe even say it, then in that case, it's grammatical within your community, whether it is in another community or not, and no matter if it matches prescriptive rules that English speakers are supposedly supposed to (to be taken non-literally) aspire to adhere to.
Posted by: David at Jan 21, 2006 8:24:58 PM
I was born in the Netherlands and migrated with my parents to Australia in 1960. I had, by then, only completed two years in primary education. Therefore, my dutch was limited to that of an eight year old.
I tuned into this website by chance endeavouring to find an answer to a question that has been on my mind for a considerable amount of time. "Why do Americans sound so different from us". I am ofcourse refering to Australian english by contrast. It has been a topic at many barside and BBQ chats.
Most componential suggestions were such as ...the U.S. had diverse cultures at a much earlier time in history, ...The U.S. were not united by a singularly regulated education cirriculum,... education was not compulsory....was not paid for by the state. If you could not pay for your child to be educated, they missed out,...colloquial dialects were accepted in local schools since their early teachers were from the local church community,....A mixture of english, scotish and irish settlers started it all, etc. etc. We are discussing linguistical expressions here with various dialects and flirtations with phonetic spelling to make it a bit easier. It has nothing to do with intelligence or being dumb. anyone who adopts that kind of thinking is either badly informed or totally ignorant.
Here in Australia, we may sound and speak a little different between states but we mostly pronounce, spell and phrase much the same. Local jargon is nearly always present among familiar socials but our formal english is nationally agreed. Our english has changed dramatically since that which was spoken in the colonial period. there is a distinct difference between us and the New Zealander in our pronunciation. It could be that the Maori people had an influence on this.
The evolution of languages have always intreaged me and I feel certain that our multicultural community has a lot to do with why english is now so diverse. But we should keep in mind that it is not a root language. However, as television and cinema is dominated by America we are seeing yet another evolution taking place in particular, our young people who are mesmerised by this powerful media. Even our Aboriginal community is starting to dress and look like American Africans.
Posted by: Pieter Kaan at Feb 12, 2007 10:05:41 AM
Have any other Southerners out there been chastised for saying, for example, "cut the light on" (rather than "turn") or "the washing machine is tore up" ("tore up" being the operative words here, as if that needed clarification). I also say "wudder" for water rather than "wah-ter" and have gotten so much grief from all these things from fellow Southerners, no less. I realize I have a rather Southern accent but am confident in my own intelligence and have never felt the need to change my dialect to appease people. It's frustrating though to see that so much urbanization has made my peers feel ashamed to speak the way their parents or grandparents do and the way in which they were brought up to speak. It saddens me really, and I find it hard sometimes to even stay true to my own Alabamian dialect when others constantly mock me.
I reckon (that word usage was not intentional) I would sound like a complete idiot if I ever ventured out of the South. As I read through the pervious comments, it didn’t even occur to me that a lot of what I said was distinctively Southern, such as the double modals. I'm well aware of correct grammar and actually am somewhat of a grammar nerd (especially when writing), but there's a difference between using just blatantly bad English and grammar due to ignorance and speaking in a manner which parallels one's culture by using certain colloquialisms.
All that to say that I'm not embarrassed of my accent and refuse to change it, even when my boss suggests that I should, not might should, mind you (which has happened...of course, I was working at an international conference calling place...but don't have one in Alabama if you don't like the way we talk, dad gum it!).
Posted by: Joni at Mar 7, 2008 1:06:59 PM
"Tore up" doesn't have anything to do with being southern. It's just poor grammar!! I've lived in Alabama and Georgia most of my 61 years, and no one in my family says "tore up" when what they mean is "broken."
Bad grammar is not the same thing as a Southern accent! Too many people don't understand the big difference!
Posted by: Frans at Mar 16, 2008 1:12:06 AM
Well, thanks for the enlightenment, Frans, and the insinuation that I’m stupid…I'm well aware of the difference between poor grammar and a Southern accent. I don't think “tore up” is poor grammar but rather an expression. I was under the impression that we were having an open-minded discussion.
Hmm, for a Southerner, one would have thought that you would practice better manners for which we are known...but I guess all Southerners are not polite after all. From your attitude, I can tell that you probably come from old money made off the slave labor of others who look down their noses at we lower, working class Southerners, huh? I'm sure you also have a Jesus and "W" sticker on your car too.
Posted by: Joni at Mar 16, 2008 1:29:45 PM
