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Re: CHAT: Southernisms (was Re: Genitive relationships)

From:Nik Taylor <fortytwo@...>
Date:Thursday, March 11, 1999, 3:43
Tom Wier wrote:
> Do you know the settlement patterns for Florida? Was it mostly > by people from like South Carolina and Georgia? As for Texas, the > situation is kinda confused, for a couple reasons:
Well, Florida is really two states, from a cultural perspective - the Panhandle, and the Penninsula. The Panhandle was the first to be really settled. I don't know the pattern, tho, but rural areas are pretty "Southern", so I'd say it probably was Georgians and Alabamians, mostly. The Spanish seem not to have left a very big influence in the Panhandle. The Penninsula was opened up by railroads, and I think that it was settled by people all over the country. In addition, Florida, especially the southern part, is a popular retirement destination, so the southern part has a lot of elderly Yanks. The far south has had a *lot* of Hispanic immigration, so much so that it's said that Miami is more Hispanic than Caucasian. I've never been there, so I don't know how true that is, but Spanish is a big linguistic influence in the South.
> I have. I remember quite distinctly hearing some guy on the > elevator once saying something, and then "Oh, [mE:~]!" Note > of course that the [E] is still present. It kinda makes me wonder > if the Cajuns of East Texas had anything to do with that...
Now that I think about it, I think I do *sometimes* hear a loss of the nasal.
> (that's another thing, of course: use > of _y'all_ indexes the speaker's desired familiarity with the listeners).
Hmm, I've never noticed that before, but now that you mention it, I think that you're correct there. It also, of course, indexes the casualness, which is probably the reason for the familiarity issue.