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Appalachian Dialect.. Vivid, Virrle and Elizabethan Mrs. Dial, ertension education area coordinator for West Virginia uni,uer- sity's Charleston center for Appalachain Stulies and Deuelopment,spokeon,'Ap- polachian Dialect" at a meeting of the SocietE on Sept. 23 and tltis article is an ertension of her talk. The datqhter of an Armg offi,cer, she holds degrees from Brenau College and Marshall UntuersitE and has liued in West Virginia since the end of World War ll. rhe diarect spokS'{ ffitnltililH,Jr.Ht has been given a va- riety of names, the majority of them somewhat less than complinren- tary. Educated people who look disfavor on this particular form of speech are perfectly honest in their belief that something called The English Language, which they conceive of as a completed work-un- changing and fixed for all time-has been taken and, through ignor- ance,shamefully distorted by the mountain folk. The fact is that this is completely untrue. The folk speech of Appalachia instead of being called corrupt ought to be classified as archaic. Many of the expressionsheard throughout the region today can be found in the centuries-oldworks of some of the greatest Eng- Iish authors: Alfred, Chaucer, Shakespeare, and the men who con- tributed to the King James version of the Bible, to cite but a few. Most editors who work with older materials have long assumed the role of officious busy bodies: never so happy, apparently, as when engaged in tidying up spelling, modernizing grammar, and generally rendering whatever was written by various Britons in ages past into a colorless conformity with today's Standard English. To this single characteristic of the editorial mind must be as- cribed the almost total lack of knowledge on the part of most Ameri. cans that the language they speak was ever any different than it is right now. How many people know, for example, that when the poet Gray composed his famous "Elegy" his tifle for it was "An Elegy Wrote in a Country Churchyard?" Southern mountain dialect ( as folk speechof Appalachia is called by linguists ) is certainly archaic, but the general historical period it represents can be narrowed down to the days of the first eueen Elizabeth, and can be further particularized by saying that what is Mrs. Wylene P. Dial
Transcript

Appalachian Dialect..Vivid, Virrle and Elizabethan

Mrs. Dial, ertension education areacoordinator for West Virginia uni,uer-sity's Charleston center for AppalachainStulies and Deuelopment, spoke on,'Ap-polachian Dialect" at a meeting of theSocietE on Sept. 23 and tltis article is anertension of her talk. The datqhter of anArmg offi,cer, she holds degrees fromBrenau College and Marshall UntuersitEand has liued in West Virginia since theend of World War ll.

rhe diarect spokS'{ ffitnltililH,Jr.Ht has been given a va-riety of names, the majority of them somewhat less than complinren-tary. Educated people who look disfavor on this particular form ofspeech are perfectly honest in their belief that something called TheEnglish Language, which they conceive of as a completed work-un-changing and fixed for all time-has been taken and, through ignor-ance, shamefully distorted by the mountain folk.

The fact is that this is completely untrue. The folk speech ofAppalachia instead of being called corrupt ought to be classified asarchaic. Many of the expressions heard throughout the region todaycan be found in the centuries-old works of some of the greatest Eng-Iish authors: Alfred, Chaucer, Shakespeare, and the men who con-tributed to the King James version of the Bible, to cite but a few.

Most editors who work with older materials have long assumedthe role of officious busy bodies: never so happy, apparently, as whenengaged in tidying up spelling, modernizing grammar, and generallyrendering whatever was written by various Britons in ages past intoa colorless conformity with today's Standard English.

To this single characteristic of the editorial mind must be as-cribed the almost total lack of knowledge on the part of most Ameri.cans that the language they speak was ever any different than it isright now. How many people know, for example, that when the poetGray composed his famous "Elegy" his tifle for it was "An ElegyWrote in a Country Churchyard?"

Southern mountain dialect ( as folk speech of Appalachia is calledby linguists ) is certainly archaic, but the general historical period itrepresents can be narrowed down to the days of the first eueenElizabeth, and can be further particularized by saying that what is

Mrs. Wylene P. Dial

heard today is actually a sort of Scottish flavored Etizabethan English.This is not to say that Chaucerian forms will not be heard in everydayuse, and even an occassional Anglo-Saxon one as well.

When we remember that the first white settlers in what is todayAppalachia were the so-called Scotch-Irish along with Germans fromthe Palatinate area along the Rhine. there is small wonder that thelanguage has a Scottish tinge: The remarkable thing is that the Ger'mans seem to have influenced it so little. About the only locally useddialect words that can be ascribed to them are wamus, for a woolenjacket, "hit wonders" me and briggity, for uppity. Otherwise theScots seem to have had it all their own way.

When I first came to Lincoln County as a bride it used to seem tome that everything that did not pooch out,ltoooed up.Pooch is a Scott-ish variant of the word pouch that rvas in use in the 1600's. Numerousobjects can pooch out including pregnant women and gentlemen withbay windows. Hoo oe is a very old past participle of the verb to h,eaoeand was apparently in use on both sides of the border by 1601. Thetop of an old-fashioned trunk may be said to hoove up. Another wordheard occasionally in the back country rs ingerns for oni,ons. In Scottishdialect the word is inguns; however if our people are permitted theintrusive "r" in potaters, tomaters, toba.ccer, and so on, there seemsto be no reason why they should not use it in ingerns as well.

It is possible to compile a very long list of these Scots words andphrases. I will give only a few more for illustration, and will waitto mention some points on Scottish pronunciation and grammar alitUe further on.

Fornenst is a word that has many variants. It can mean either"next to" or "opposite from." "Look at that big rattler quiled up

fornenst the fence post!"(Qui,Led, is an Elizabethan prounuciation of coil,ed.) "When I

woke up this morning there was a little ski.ft of snow on the ground."

"I was getting better, but now I've took a backset with this flu." "Hedropped the dish and busted it all to fli,nders." "Law, I hope how soonwe get some rain!" (How soon is supposed to be obsolete, but it en'joys excellent health in Lincoln County, ) "That trifling old fixin ain'tworth a lraet!" Haet means the smallest thing that can be conceivedof, and comes from Deilhae't (Devil have 1t.) Fiti,n is the Old Englirlor Anglo-Saxon word f.or she-yor as used in the northern dialect. Insouth of England you would have heard rsinen, the word used todalStandard English.

It is interesting to note that until very recently it has b-mari lythel inguist ichistorianswhohavepointedoutthepred{Scottish and Germanic heritage of the Southern slerrntlt IItPerhaps I may be allowed to digress for a moment to E bpeople back to their beginnings.

42

Early in his Engrish reign, James I decided to try to contror theIrish by putting a Protestant population into Ireland. To do this heconfiscated the lands of the earls of ulster and bestowed them uponscottish and English lords on the condition that they setge the ter-ritory with tenants from scoiland and England. This was known as,'lrru,[l.",

setilement" or the "King,s ptintation,,,--"n, was begun

Most of the scots who moved into ulster came from the lowlands,and thus they would have spoken the scots variety of the Northumb-rian or Northem English dialect. ( Most highland scots at that timestill spoke G-aeric. ) This particular diateci would have been keptintact if the scots had had no dearing, *itt the Irish, and this, ac-cording to records, was the case.while in urster the scots multiplied, but after roughly 100 yearsthey became dissatisfied with the^ trade and religious restrictionsimposed by Engrand, and numbers of them began emigrating to theEnglish colonies in America.Many of these scots who now caled themserves the ,,scotch-

Irish" came into pennsyrvania where, firdi;g the better rands alreadysettled by the Engrish, they began to move south and west. ,,Theirenterprise and. pioneering spirit made them the most important ere-ment in the vigorous frontiersmen- who opened up this part of thesouth and later other territories farther west into which they pushed.,,zBesides the scots who arrived from Irerand, more came direcilyfrom scotland to America, particularly after ,,the ,45,,, the final Ja.cobite uprising in support of "Bonnie p.ir,.. Charlie,, the young pre-tender, which ended disastrously for the Scottish clans that suportedhim' By the time of the Americin Revolution ttrere were about b0,000Scots in this country.

But to get back to the diarect, ret me quote two more ringuisticauthorities to _prove my point about the scottish infruence on thelocal speech. Raven I. McDavid notes, ',ihu speech of the hill peopreis quite different frcm both dialects of the southern lowlands for itis basically derived from the scotch-Irish of western pennsylvania.,,"

H' L. Mencken. said of Appalachia folk ,pu.ct, ,,The persons whospeak it undiluted are often _cared by the- southern pubricists, ,the

purest Anglo-saxons in the united siates, but less romantic ethno-rogists describe tlug as predominanry c.iti.ln;;;.o;,,;ousl, therehas be-en a large infittration of English una-.uun German strains.,,oThe reason our people still speak as ttrey do is that when theseearly scots and Engrish and Germans (and some Irish and welsh too)came into the Appalachian area and settled, they virtually isolatedthemselves from the mainstream of American life for generations tocome because of the hils and mountains, and so they- r..pt tt . oldspeech forms that have long since fallen out of fashion elsewhere.

Things inourareaare-nota lwaysYl . l theySeem' I ingu is t ica l lyspeaking. So*.ot ,*V tetl you*it ui-"CioOy ain't got sense enough

to come i' outu;ttu-rrinnlt Jl ,o* i. clever'" cleuer'you see' back

in the 1600,s ;il l'neigtrborty o' ttto**oiating'" AIio' if you ask

someone to* t.*ir, urrd-n..t'Jp*t tdl:. tt "very well"' you are

not necerru'ity't-o 'iititt qth'ii* ot the state of his health'

our people are- accustomed to use a tpJtttt to vividtv colorful

and virile that h;;";;t *u'llirrrv *"ur., ttnri-'ttr-is feeting "so-so'"

If you are intorriea it at ,,sevei#' people came to a meeting' your

informant oo"J'ooi-*.r" *il;;^;;u oo lbr'^ ;;; ra!-he is using it in

its older ,tn'""of *'*ot:", t'i'''J io to roo people' If you'n;T; !*.k

ixl ;,ffi'#;; itrfi"i:tt;l,t r,t f.:T:: ;:.r:il:i h. 1 300' s( Incidental ly,goodEnglr ,shusedsickto'etertol 'ohealthlong, longbefore our foiebearers eve*tl'i"O saying 1tl for the same connota'

tions. )Manyofourpeople'refertosourmi l \asbl tnked,mi lk.Thisusage

qoes back ,t r.urt to ttre ";r;

;60-01 *t"" ptopr" still- believed in

*it.he, and the power .t tt u .riir eye. one t;;h;deanings of the word

btinkback in those days *1, lito "gtunce.lt;; if you glanced at some'

thing, vou ai,niuJ,i ii, "'d

,n;; '"*' *irt ;; to be called blinked

:ffi%il 1t#,X;*l'1il#: ltialj:l!^,o" .u", reather into him!"

This used to carry a fairly murderot" to"io;;i;d having gotten its

start back i' it""days *n"ffii-;,gth long bow was the ultimate

word in destructive po*ur.--Back then, ir yft dtt* Yfur bow with

sufficient strength to .1ur" ;; arrgY to ienetrate your enemy up

to the reathers-on its 't"it' tillt

;;d l:ild;A into i'im' Nowadavs'

the .*prurri* has weat erred in meaninf until it merely indicates

r-iit oi fisticuffs. ns our people use (baffling

,,.,,m#,,1n ffi;;, ?JllttT5"i1l?;i ' ITo'outi'nours this seems

a definite ,,no,,, whereas t" iirtr' iiactua'y'^ttn-'':;ttttn5

vou so much'

I,d love to.,, One is forever*or. hearing- J ;ffi'mutual bewilderment

in which a gentlemg" d'i"il;;; 'i;tif'Ttate car sees' a young fellow

standing atongside ].19 T'.,;, lr,umning wn.n the gentleman stops ano

asks if he waits a lift, tne noy very nt.gttii ttn1i1 -'I don't keer to"'

using carein ttre nriraneiri# ,.n"'or trtt *ottt' ott'trearing this the

man drives off consid*.;i;;,1ti9a, r.uuing an equally baffled young

man behind' (Even ttre wor i f orergt"' id?f It utta httt in its Eliza-

bethan sense of someon. *t o is the ,urn.'ni;io""ritv as the speaker, but

not from the speaker's immediate home area' )

"reverend" whiskey

Reoerend is generally usedto address preachers, but it isa pretty versatile word andfull-strength whiskey, or eventhe full-strength scent ofskunk, are also called reuerend.In these latter instances, itsmeaning has nothing to do withreverence, but with the factthat their strength is as thestrength of ten because theYare undiluted.

In the dialect, the wordallow more often means "think,say, or suppose" than "Permit.""He'lotfied he'd git it done to'morrow."

A neighbor may take Youinto her confidence and an'nounce that she has heard thatthe preacher's daughter should

haue been running after the mailman. These are deep waters to theuninitiated. What she really means is that she has heard a juicy bitof gossip: The preacher's daughter is chasing the local mail carrierHowever, she takes the precaution of using the phrase sh'oul'd hauebeen to show that this statement is not vouched for by the speaker.The same phrase is used in the same way in the Paston letters in the1400's.

Almost all the so-called "bad English" used by natives of Appala-chia was once employed by the highest ranking nobles of the realmsof England and Scotland.

Few humans are really passionately interested in gtammar soI'll skim as lightly over this section as possible, but let's consider thefollowing bit of dialogue briefly: "I've been a-studying about howto say this, till I've nigh wearried myself to death. I reckon hit don'tnever do nobody no good to beat about the bush, so I'll just tell ye.Your man's hippoed. There's nothing ails !rim, but he spends more timeusing around the doctor's office than he does a-working."

The only criticism that even a linguistic purist might offeris that, in the eighteenth century, hippoed was considered byJonathan Swift among others, to be slang even though it wasby the English society of the day. (To say someone is hippoed

heresome,usedis to

say he is hypochondriac. )Words like a-studying and a-working are verbal nouns and go

back to Anglo'Saxon times: and from the 1300's on' people who studied

about something, deliberated or reflected on it. N?gh is the older word

for near, and ,ir*E was the pronunciation of worry in the 1300 and

1400's. The Scot, ,iro used this pronunciation ' Reckon was current in

Tudor England in the sense of. consi'der or suryose' I{it is the Old

English 3rd person singular neuter pronoun for it and has come ringing

Ooin through the centuries for over a thousand years.

All those multiple negatives were perfectly proper until some

English mathematician in the eighteenth- century decided that twcl

neg"atives make a positive instead of simply intensifyrng the negative

quality of some statement. Shakespeate lo"ed to use them' He used

quadruple negauves. Ye was once useo accusatively, and flutn has been

emproyla since early times to mean husband. And finally, to ?'se means

to frequent or loiter.

certain grammatical forms occuring in the dialect have caused

it to be regarded r,rith pious horror by school marms' Prominent among

the off enders, they would be almost sure to list these: "Bring them

books over here." in the 1500's this was good English. "I found three

bird,s nestes on the way to school." This dissyllabic ending for !h"plural goes back to the Middle Ages. "That pencil's n-ot mine' it's

her'n." Possessive fOrms like his'n , 6u,r'n, yOWrn eVOlved in the Midd1e

Ages on the model of. mr.ne and, thi,ne. In the revision of the wycliffe

Bible, which appeared shortly after 1380,_ we find phrases such as

restore tb'nir alle things that ben hern." and "some of oum

went in to the jrav e." "He doi't scare me none." In the sixteenth and

seventeentn centuries do was used with he, she, and it. Don't is simply

d,o not, of course. "Yolt u)asrft scared, was aou?" During-the seven-

teenth and eighteenth centuries many people were careful to distin-

guish between- singular Aou wo.s and plural Eou were' I-t became un-

iashionable in thJ early nineteenth century although Noah Webster

stouUy defended it.

,,My brother cotne in from the army last night." This usage goes

back to late Anglo-saxon times. You find it in the Paston letters and

in Scottisn poetiy. "l d,one frnished, my lessons," also has many echoes

in the Pastons' correspondence and the scots poets.

From the late Middle Ages on up, the Northern dialect of Eng-

lish used formations like'thil ,,guiltless persons is condemned," and

so do our people. And, finally, ln times past, participial forms like

these abound, h6 beat, was boie with it, has chose. Preterite forms were

as varied: blowed, growed, catched, and for climbed you can find clum'

clome, clim, all of which are locally used'

Pronunciation of many words has changed considerably too' Deef

one Proud grandPa'"'". "r'o".;* l-:"* T"",i.tT:l/ '-i 4-n patiente *ittt -ttt.

ptryd . des-'^\Y"ffie '#jtii'r'+*::.:j""jill;? | |

-.6:'r,)h\\ to be put orr with the rather

-€- X0;*$A\ insrpid"**r""Mlft:11:*;"::'1li;';'-il .ira out todaY?"

iln.v- *.ot to know just how

il;;t .;ld: "It's hotter 'n- lhe

ffig* J tt"rr or "Hit's blue

ffi o"t thar!" Other common

ffidive phrases ror :919;;;--iit.elYf .translated

"It's

eolder 'n a wttch's bosom" o:

i'ii;t .oraer 'n a well-digger'sbackside'"

SPeakers of Southern

*onniuio dialect are Past T1"ters of the art of coining vivid

;;;iotittt' Their everYdaY' r ' r v - - - - -

. ( E r l ^ ^ + m 6 Y r i s

tI

l

conversation is liberally sprinkled with such gems as: "That man rs

so contrary, if you thro*"4 ni* in a river ie'd float up stream!"

,,She walks ro rjo* they t"uu-to set st"klt to-t"" if she'J a'movin!"

,,That pore boy,s a1. awkwj ;r;-t"o big for a man and not big

enou8h for ;.tH: borlln:.:utta thar and hit it for the road quick as

double-geared lightenin!" ('she's so cross€vtJ ttttt she can stand in

the middle of rfr" *.uk and'i.. L"ttt sondavr. "That's as smooth as

a schoolmaT;"ff;d upon in Appalachia,^but for some reason there

are numerous ,,nekkid as . .'" "-'n'rrr.r.r. ely- t":Y."1,.sampling would

probably.oniri' ttese three, l'Ntitftid t! t it'litA"' "bare'nekkid as a

-nound dog's rump"' and "'tt'i--nlxrtia'" d;t; ;kkid comes direct-

l y f romtheAng to .Saxons ,so i t , sbeen" 'ouna fo rmore thana thou .sand years. originall{ j,.si?,;" was steort *ttittt meant "tall'" Hence'

if you were;tt?'t'ntkkid"' t:l y:;:Y*- to the tatt;' A similar

phrase, " ' t " t t 'o "ked" is -aJohnny-comelate ly 'notevenappear ing

1+lwTm:"|ltJ?:3;rnr, her rriends mav sav that,"her tongue's

a mile long"' or else 1tr1l ii"'iwags at-both tttdt';' Such ladies are a

great triar i" ;d; g;i11s :;l'pi;':

-ro.io""t"uv, there. is a formal

terminology to indicate ex-actly how 1".i*t ttte'intentions of these

coupres r,e: Iil#*m iki-J#"lFlili'1,*'il tr,ll,'# ;'ffil;

means the couple is seriousry_contemprating matrimony. shakespeareuses loUrng in this sense b- King t eii.If a man has imbibed too much of wlro;lhotJohn, his neighbormay describe him as "so drunk he couldn,t hit the ground with hishat," or, on the .morning-after, the suffer.o *.y admii that ..I was sodizzy I had to hold on to-*e grass afore I could rean ag,in the ground.,,one farmer was having a rot of troubre with I *""r"r kiuing

lffl#J' "He iest erabs 'em

"r; d; can git word to God,,, hesomeone wbo has a disheveled or bedraggred appearance maybe described in any oo. of ,everar ways: ,,you rook tite you,ve beenchewed up and qpii out," or "you tootr tit . you've been a-sortin wild-cats," or '!ou loot like the rrinoquarlJi-:l.haqd luck,,, or, simply"you look lte omsthin'tle cat d",ig in that the dog wouldn,t eat!,,"My belly,thinks my throat is iut,, simpty *rin, rtrrn hungry,,,and seems to have a venerable history lr ,*u.ral hundred years. Ifound a eitaEon for it dated in the early lb00,s.d rnan Dry be "bad to drink" ol ibicked to sryear,,, but thesedescriptiye .djectves ane never reversed.

Yor o.rybt Dot to be shocked if you rr"r. a saintly rooking grand_mother admit rhe Hlec to hear a coarse-talking man; she means a manwith a deep b.ss w&r- (rhis can arso refer to a singing voice, and inrhic sasq if gnuhe p""f,e", a tenor, sheld talk about someone whosings 'Shallor--) -Nor oght you leap to tn. concrusion that a ,,Hardgirl" is one rto r'eh t6roo feminine sensibilities. ,,Hard,, is thedialectal promchtbn oniarra;o;il; to stem from the samesounoe as do ifrp cngrnes that run-il;&r ,,tars.,,

This tt48ul8e i8 rd'tid -a rit'",-uul; was Elizabethan English.Howerer, so'e of .tle thi"gr you say may be shocking the folk asmuetr as their ombined leJcons mat ue shogning you. For instance,the strat'm of-society in wtricu J -*"J ,li,A it wis-consiaereo accep-table for a rady to iay eittrer ,,damn,, or r,h.u,, if strongry moved.Most Appalachian ladies *""r0 rather be caught dead thin utteringeither of these words, but they are pretty free with their use of afour-letter word for manu." *t i.r, r a-onii"use. some famiues employanother of these four-letter words for manur.

", a pet name for thechildren' and seem to have no idea that il i. considered indelicatein other areas of the .ou"try.

Along with l.tlgp.n.itv l9r calling a spade a spade, the dialecthas a strange pid:victorian" streak in "it, to"o. until recently, it wasconsidered brash to use either the word oiu-io stauion.If it was neces-sary to refer to a bu[, he was known urrlourty as a ,,father cow,, ora "genileman cow" or an "o*,, or a ,,arr-au-Iiner,,

while a stallionwas either a ttstablg horsgt' or erse rnthon ^rninnr,^r-- ..rn,^ -

bi

N

I

h e a r d o f a u ' & s p t h e r e , a n d l , v e n e v e r b e e n a b l e t o t r a c e t h e r e a s o nfor that usage' f,ut I do know ;liJ;welty.s are called cu'ckleburrs'

The first part oiit "

word cockieburr carried an objectionable con-

notat iontothefo lk .However, i f theyaregoingtobalkat that , i tseemsrather h'arious to me that ;h;iirJ

"notring objectionable about

cuckle.A f r i e n d o f m i n e u s e d t o h a v e a s m a l l s t o r e o n t h e b a n k s o f t h e

Guyan River. ilu tora r. .loui. uttr. old lady who trotted into the

store one day'*itt, a reques;;;; too,. of trtt strum'pet cand'y'" NIy

friend said she was veryo"y,-iutt qq"^t;;;t any' But' she added

gamely, wha] kind was it, ,oi rn. would try to order som-e' The little

Iady glanceo around to see if";;. could be overheard' lowered her

voice and said, ,,well, it's noreioii, iut t aon'i like to use that word!"

The dialect today i' "

*'i;; do'"o tniog compar:

was a generation ago, but -oui"p-"pf. -" ,UU

"the best talkers in the

world, and I ,ni'f.=i" sbould firi"nio them with more appreciation'

FOOTNOTES

l T t r o m a s F y l e s , n c ^ . o . r r { 1 1 r n d l ) e v c l o p - 9 o t - . . : l t h c E n 3 l t r h , . r T l T j " " . N e w Y o r * ' ,

*ii"""xtulir, jft #j5;;ffi"F;t''#ifr $iti5$tl*"iq:"ffi '"',il:'r'*'"T'rx"'

Iiiri-'ir" s* *tm; s"r#ltililT;;;"." ---r Trrrr ed.. New yorB, 1e5?, p. 40e

bY the c lassrcal c

:i':lhilijii:**ryrt:lilr+;;t::t#s"d;"#''#:''r#-'and the two suppte'#iis

-a6nagea' wlth annotations aDd nc

. . . , i ,q**ks,

*rYrf

I

I

Aig ficf $ore re'crealed


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