Talk:Pacific Northwest English

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This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 9 January 2020 and 22 April 2020. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Lmshaw00.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 06:00, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Issues

A couple issues with this page:

• The linguistic traits that flourish throughout the Pacific Northwest attest to a culture that transcends national boundaries in the region. I added a "cite needed" tag. Following this first sentence, the notion of a culture that transcends the international boundary is apparently explained by saying, Historically, this hearkens back to the early years of colonial expansion by the British and Americans, when the entire region was considered to be a single, unified area. Indeed, until the Oregon Treaty of 1846, it was identified as being either Oregon Country (by the Americans) or Columbia (by the British). There is a reference for this, but the source is pointing out that in the early 1800s the Pacific Northwest was called Oregon Country by Americans and Columbia District by British, and that both considered it a unified region, that is all (I have a copy of this book). It does not say that the Americans and British agreed that the American Oregon Country and the British Columbia District were identical concepts. On the contrary, the two visions were in conflict with one another. Yes the region was not yet divided by an international boundary and the Americans claimed it was wholly American, while the British claimed it was wholly British. Dispute lay at the heart of the matter from the start. Further, whatever shared culture did exist has grown weaker over time. This book makes that case in many places, such as pp. 203-213, linked here: Abbott, Carl (2002). "That Long Western Border: Canada, the United States, and a Century of Economic Change". In Findlay, John M.; Coates, Ken S. (eds.). Parallel Destinies: Canadian-American Relations West of the Rockies. University of Washington Press. pp. 203–213. ISBN 9780295982526. (one quote: "Despite a degree of shared cross-border history and cooperation, however, national connections are much more powerful than international ties within Cascadia.")
• Although referenced, I added a "dubious" tag to this bit: As a result of the 1897 Klondike Gold Rush, the culture of the Pacific Northwest expanded northward into Yukon and Alaska, carried along by the thousands of people who were attracted to the gold fields in the north. Today, the dialect common to this shared culture can be heard by people from Eugene, Oregon to Fairbanks, Alaska. The reference is to the book Making Wawa, "especially pp. 127-128". Here are those pages on Google Books: http://books.google.com/books?id=oTYXs35aTFkC&pg=PA127 ...seems to me these pages are clearly about the use of Chinook Jargon ("Wawa"), not a dialect of English. Further, the pages say nothing about this "shared culture" with a "common dialect" heard "from Eugene, Oregon to Fairbanks, Alaska". Any "shared culture" and "common dialect" described on these pages dates to the 1800s and the Chinook Jargon--not about either present-day cultures and English dialects.

In short, I'm requesting a strong source about the PNW culture "transcending national boundaries". I mentioned above a strong source that says exactly the opposite. Also the Making Wawa reference does not seem to back up what is being claimed. And The Great Columbia Plain backs up only a small point of a much broader claim. Either better sources should be added, or the claims should be weakened to match what the sources say. Pfly (talk) 11:39, 17 July 2011 (UTC)

Do Alaskans speak Northwest English?

@Pfly: Somewhat along the same vein as your previous doubts, Pfly, at least about the Fairbanks, Alaska connection, I am now trying to find out whether the distinctive Alaskan accent -- at least the presumed one that the U.S. was famously exposed to via Sarah Palin -- really falls under Pacific Northwest English. Linguistic giant Prof. Labov says in an NPR interview that when comparing Palin with "the two speakers from her area in our Atlas of North American English, she measures up pretty good," which is odd of him to say, since Alaska is actually one of the most poorly defined regions in the whole Atlas. The entire 300-page Atlas, in fact, only mentions Alaska in one pitiful sentence and with nothing particularly defining: "The two Alaskan speakers studied by Telsur do not resemble the West strongly enough to be included in that region, but there is not enough data on Alaska to assign it separate status" (p. 141). This seems to suggest that Alaska may well have its own dialect and so I'm now seeking any studies related to that. But in the meantime, how is the normally precise Labov so sure in his interview that Alaska is home to "a northwestern dialect," as he says? The strongest features he can give as evidence (at least, on the fly during the interview) are pretty lame. First, he suggests that her /oʊ/ is neither monophthongal (like in Minnesota) nor fronted (like in the South). But this can also be said about the same vowel in all of the West, the Inland North, and the Northeast (ranging from Maine all the way down to New York City). Second, she has a (presumably continuous) nasal short-a system. But so does most of the U.S. (In fact, the only U.S. speaker I've ever personally known without some variation of the nasal system was a Hawaiian, who very noticeably to my ears pronounced "mainland" as [ˈmeɪnlænd], rather than the more common [ˈmeɪnlɛənd].) Anyone else know of any info about Alaskan English? Wolfdog (talk) 18:32, 27 September 2015 (UTC)

Phonetics

While the phonetic alphabet is useful for guitar who've studied linguistics, it would be nice if the article could use examples with each specific characteristic of the region so non linguists can actually understand without looking up the phonetic alphabet chart. --Kraftlos (Talk | Contrib) 19:27, 17 July 2016 (UTC)

• @Kraftlos: I know you might well be referring to the entire "Phonology" section, but are there particular sentences where I can make the sounds clearer for laypeople? I'd be happy to do a little bit of that clarifying. Wolfdog (talk) 00:25, 25 July 2016 (UTC)

Canadian English?

• Can anyone find any sources that differentiate Pacific Northwest English from (Standard) Canadian English? Their phonologies, at least, seem virtually the same. Wolfdog (talk) 00:14, 25 July 2016 (UTC)

I don't think there are any absolute differences, just several variations that individual speakers have throughout the Northwest, Canada, California, Midwest, General American, and General Canadian. The differences are more in the percent of speakers in each area rather than all the speakers in each area. Every feature is continuously advancing and receding across the western dialect boundaries. One feature I hear widely in Canada but never in the US is words like "Java" rhyming with "cat" /æ/ rather than "father" /a/ to my Northwest ears. That drives me up the wall. There's also the famous Canadian "about/a boot", which sounds to me like "a boat". It's stronger in some speakers than others. Sluggoster (talk) 06:48, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

Words and Phrases

The "Words and Phrases" section has gotten better. Earlier it overstated the current use of Chinook Jargon words: the only ones I've heard and say are "potlatch" and "muckamuck" (although I thought it was "mucky-muck"). The current list surprised me because I thought "sunbreak" and "black ice" were standard American words, "spendy" has a somewhere-else feel about it, and "rig" is specifically a mobile home/trailer or a freight truck, not a regular car or SUV. "Black ice" may be peculiar to this region because we have more of it, because of night/day temperatures spanning the freezing point. I have never heard of "duff". Sluggoster (talk) 05:17, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

@Sluggoster: Just for a reference to you, I'm going to respond to you without looking over the article first, so I can give my most natural reply. I'm a professional English educator who's lived my whole life in the Northeast, and I've never even heard the words potlatch (unless this is the same as "potluck"), muckamuck, sunbreak, spendy, or duff. The only one whose meaning I could guess is sunbreak, though, again, I've never heard it used. Black ice, however, is a quite common word where I live, as you suspected. A rig is occasionally used to mean something on wheels you attach to a vehicle, though it more commonly just means any technical apparatus or equipment. Hope that's helpful. Wolfdog (talk) 13:00, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

A Potlatch is a Native American festival in which the chief gives away his possessions to the other tribal members. It's indigenous to Northwest tribes, and functions as a periodic equalizer that prevents perpetual concentrations of wealth and status, similar to the biblical Jubilee. Some other dialects may use it generically for potluck, but here it's used only for the Native festival, and I would consider it disrespectful to call my event a potlatch unless it closely followed the Indian principles. Sluggoster (talk) 05:53, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

Spodie? Salt Chuck?? I've lived in the PNW for two decades and never heard either of those. I question the validity of both. Retswerb (talk) 08:05, 15 September 2020 (UTC)

@Retswerb: I grew up in the PNW. Spodie is familiar to me, especially from high school. Although, I've never heard salt chuck.

@Wolfdog: Spendy is common in southwest Washington. I don't believe I've heard it much in Seattle. Sunbreak seems like a common word. I didn't realize that it's particular to the PNW.

Tolo should be added to the list of regionalisms

"Tolo" should be added to the list of regionalisms. Two pages that mention this as a PNW thing:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sadie_Hawkins_dance

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinook_Jargon#Chinook_Jargon_words_used_by_English-language_speakers — Preceding unsigned comment added by 140.160.182.113 (talk) 00:38, 28 January 2019 (UTC)

Muckedy Muck

Lifelong Washingtonian I’ve never heard muck a muck. It was always muckedy muck. One other word we use is crick instead of creek. Outside of Washington crick isn’t usually recognized. 2601:603:80:4200:29A4:2350:3422:5262 (talk) 12:10, 2 December 2022 (UTC)