Talk:Pacific Northwest English
Warshintun
I expected to find this here, unless I've missed it; the Washington State affectation which results in the state's name being "Warshintun"; other words also have this ah -> ar change (I don't know how to write it in IPA). It's the most distinctive marker of someone really from Washington, or older families thereof, and you don't hear it from Oregonians or BCers (a few miles away in some cases). Also a lot of people in WA and OR have a real "Okie" accent, which apparently came to the region in the Depression. Comments?Skookum1 08:02, 5 July 2006 (UTC)
- I'm from Washington and have never heard this pronunciation used before, but I have heard that people from the South do use this pronunciation sometimes. My guess is that the children of people from the South that moved to Washington during the Depression probably lost this pronunciation and acquired the current pronunciation [wɑʃiŋtən]. Redtitan 22:18, 26 August 2006 (UTC)
- I've heard 'Warshingtun' said a few times, but only when it's used to make fun of East Coast accents. Much like 'Idear' instead of 'Idea'. I have lived in Western Washington almost all of my life, and if someone says 'Warshingtun', then I wouldn't believe they were from Washington. --209.166.75.105 08:50, 13 September 2006 (UTC)
- I have a friend, born in Portland, who has always said "Warshington" & "warsh" -- but he's the only native northwesterner I know who uses this pronunication. I remember seeing an article published in the late 1940s, which documents this uncommon practice; I'll try to see if I have the cite at home. (IIRC, this pronunication is documented for at most 25% of all speakers in the area with no clear locus where it is the majority practice.) Along the same lines is the faint but unmistakable drawl of some upper-Willamette valley speakers reminiscent of southern American English: these speakers tend to be descendants of Southerners who came to settle in the area. -- llywrch 19:06, 9 October 2006 (UTC)
I grew up in Seattle & spent many many years in the Northwest, & I have literally hundreds of friends and family members from all over the Northwest, and this page is the biggest load of crap I've ever seen in my entire life. Nobody uses any of those words.
I don't think this page is the biggest load of crap, I too am from Seattle, and I've tended to associate 'Warshingtun' with Eastern Wash and/or Washingtonians of mid-western origins; it may be a historical artifact, but I assure you it's quite authentic. Less so (and here I agree with the comment above) is the list of chinook words, maybe this is rampant in B.C., but other than in the rituals of the Univ of Wash booster clubs, these words just arent in use.
I'm wondering if anyone has noticed the peculiar local pronunciation of the word 'Buoy'? Elsewhere (Australia and Maine, I've noticed) is pronounced something like 'Bwoy' but in the Puget Sound is more like 'Bew' ee'.
- Well, I grew up in Portland & the only problem I see with this page is that most of the Chinook words here have fallen out of common usage. Years ago, when I was more interested in the local dialect, I learned from my mother's mother (who had been born & lived her entire life in Portland) that "skookum" was fairly common in colloquial usage in the city, but fell out of use by WWII. The other Chinook words that are still in use tend to belong to the general US vocabulary, for example "high muckimuck" (=hyas muckamuck) or Siwash (in "Siwash college", to describe a small, provincial college). I'd say that the likelihood for any NW resident hearing many of these words is directly proportional to the number of loggers who are friends or relatives, who learned these words from their family or co-workers in the deep woods. -- llywrch 19:06, 9 October 2006 (UTC)
I was born and raised in the Jet City (Seattle's nickname before someone needed it changed to The Emerald City), as was my father. I believe it was in the 50s that somebody somewhere worked really hard to eradicate the R from Warshingtun, as well as the extra syllable from Snoqualamie so that Washingtonians wouldn't sounds so provincial; born in the late 50s, I grew up hearing older people using these problematic pronunciations. And it's different from the east coast accents; I had neighbors who had relocated from Boston.
As for the Chinook words, the Chinook Trade Jargon was used by Native Peoples before the European traders ever made the west coast scene. Place names like the Pilchuck (red water) and Skookumchuck (strong water) Rivers come from the Chinook Trade Jargon. Tillicum Village on Blake Island is another, as are some of the names of the Washington state Ferries. Whether one hears these "odd" words regularly, or at all, depends greatly upon the age of the people to whom one talks. One of my great grandfathers moved between Idaho, California, and north-western Washington in the late 1800s and he spoke fluent Chinook Trade Jargon. The earliest non-Native people in the area were Fur Trappers, whose first language was French; one of my great great grandfathers came west from Quebec in the 1820s. The French influence can be seen in place name like La Push, which drifted just a tad, phonetically, from French for "the mouth"; La Push in located, oddly enough, at the mouth of the Hoh River. And for what it's worth, not too very long ago, a variation of the Chinook Trade Jargon was elevated to language status by some folks down on the Grand Ronde Reservation in Oregon.
Honestly, it all depends upon who you associate with, the age of your associates, and how long their families have been in the Great Pacific North-wet. Of course, if one knows people in the Historic Re-enactment community, one hears words like skookum, kloshe, klahowya, muckamuck on a regular basis.
Just my two cents worth. Lisapeppan 01:23, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
- My family's been here since the 1880s and I'm familiar with all the Chinook words cited in the article, particularly potlatch (and of course high muckamuck is part of General American now). However, I agree that those words are rapidly disappearing -- I'm willing to bet my nieces and nephews don't know them at all, and of course there are so many immigrants (from elsewhere in the US or the world) to the PNW these days who don't know them. So I think they belong in the article, but a note could be made that in Western Washington, at least, they are rapidly becoming merely ferry and housing development names, with the real meanings dying out. As the previous post mentioned, it's the older folks who remember this stuff. I'm not that old but I know a lot of older folks. :)
- Regarding "Warshintun", that's not Seattle speech in my experience. It marked one as a hick, probably from back east, maybe just from Eastern Washington. When I hear it I know someone's not from "around here", but since around here is one very specific place, that doesn't mean it doesn't exist elsewhere in the PNW. My grandparents didn't use it... but they did say "crick" for "creek". :) Speaking of interesting things, I'm hearing a lot more Canadian raising in this area among younger people, but don't have any data to back it up yet. ManekiNeko | Talk 14:06, 12 February 2007 (UTC)