After reading Michael Jacobs' post about "Whatever" and other overused words, it got me to thinking about all the other colloquialisms that we use. Having been fortunate enough to be in "The Valley" during my teens, a lot of Valley Girl talk was engrained in my speech.
I've gotten rid of a lot of it, but I would say there are still several that hang on like stubborn leeches. Unfortunately, "like" is one of them. As much as I try to circumvent it, replace it and omit it, it still creeps in. Other ones that are layovers from my Valley Girl days are "totally," "seriously," and "OMG."
Having spent virtually my whole life in Los Angeles until moving to Lexington, Kentucky four years ago, I've realized that there are regional colloquialisms, too, that I was not aware of until I moved. The other day I used the word "Dude" in a sentence (for probably the first time in a very long time) and the person I was talking to commented that they had a relative in L.A. who used "Dude" all the time. I hadn't realized until that time how much of a localized word it might be. A real testament to pop surfer culture infiltrating the local language.
When I moved to Lexington, Kentucky, there were a few phrases that were new to me. I noticed that people here say "I know it" instead of just "I know." They also tend to say "If you don't care to..." or "I don't care to..." instead of "I don't mind..." or "If you don't mind..." Also, believe it or not, I had never heard the phrase "throw him under the bus" until I moved here. This may not be regional, but I had just never heard it before.
A word that seems to be uniquely southern is the word "Puny." As in "He's feeling puny today." Whaaaa? I had no idea what that was. Apparently it means feeling under the weather, sick, not well, etc.
Many years ago, I heard a woman from the east coast (I think it was one of the Carolinas) use the phrase "It just make you want to run with your hair on fire!" When I first heard it, it took about 15 minutes of explanation for me to start to understand what it meant.
Just the other day I was told that the local terminology is "interstate" when I used the word "freeway."
Another thing that differs regionally is the pronunciation of words. My grandmother and a friend and I were comparing regional pronunciations one day. I pronounce "Tomato," "Potato" and "Mosquito" with the word "toe" at the end. My grandmother, who is originally from Cleveland, Ohio, says (and I'm trying to write this the way it sounds), "Tamayta," "Patayta" and "Maskeeta." My friend, who is from Alabama, says, "Mayter," "Tayter" and "Skeeter."
I'm sure that a whole book could be (and probably has been) written on this subject. But I would love to hear from people about their unique regional words, phrases and pronunciations.
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