Re: y'all

--- On Wed, 3/18/09, tgpedersen <tgpedersen@...> wrote:

> Rick might appreciate this (noting his young'ns = Du.
> jongens proposal):
>
> y'all = Du. jullie /yöli/
>
> Dutch has promoted the polite 'vous' form nom. je,
> obl. jou, (corresponding to ME nom. ye, obl. you) to be the
> standard 2sg pronoun.
>
> English seems to have taken the step further (under French
> influence?) to use the obl. form also in the nom. (cf.
> French vous; Afrikaans has 1pl 'ons' for Dutch
> 'wij'/'ons', also French influence?). Thus
> Dutch is/was in the same predicament as English of having no
> separate 2pl, which was remediated by constructing 'je
> lie' "you people" = 'jullie', which
> form now alternates with je/jou for 2pl. Tempting to think
> that's where the Americans got 'y'all'.
>
> Torsten
>

Interesting idea except for 2 things
1. Y'all is used in the "Deep South" i.e. south of Appalachia, with intervening forms based on "You ones" in Appalachia and the Mid Atlanic, e.g. Appalachian "you'uns" /yu@.../
Burghese (Pittsburgh) yenz
Balmerese )Baltimore) yiz /yIz/ --which could be from "you'uns" or "you'se"

New York is famous for "you's", "you guys", "you's guys" and in upstate New York, I've heard youses /yu:z@.../

2. There are analogous forms in Scotland and Ireland