Talk:California English/Archive 1

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Thanks for everyone who's edited this page...this was my first wikipedia article and your additions and changes have helped a lot--your changes look great...I plan on adding more text soon and will follow precedence with your format changes, which have contributed to a more esthetically pleasing and informative article. Svenska84 21:59, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)

San Francisco naming

The article says "Similarly, Northern California outsiders are likely to mark themselves as such by referring to San Francisco as anything other than San Francisco or the City." Is a 'not' missing, or ? -R. S. Shaw 3 July 2005 23:35 (UTC)

(I wrote this). There's no 'not' missing, but it is a bit confusing. Maybe something like "People not from Northern California are likely to mark themselves as such by calling San Francisco a name that is not San Francisco or the City, like San Fran or Frisco." Nohat 4 July 2005 00:32 (UTC)

How about "People from Northern California have only two names for San Francisco, San Francisco and the City; people from outside the region are likely to mark themselves as such by using other names like San Fran or Frisco."? --Angr/_{tɔk tə mi} 4 July 2005 05:19 (UTC)

Ooo, great minds think alike...I've just updated the text along these lines. -- Beland 4 July 2005 22:03 (UTC)

I'm liable to hurt someone if they refer to the city as "Frisco." Frisco is the name of any of four towns in Texas, Colorado, North Carolina, and Alabama. -- Anonymous Californian

Anyone who was born and raised in the city (San Francisco) knows that it is almost an unspoken rule that you do not call the city "frisco". calling the city frisco is a dead giveaway that you're not from the area. And it really makes you sound ghetto.- S.F. Native

It's actually been my experience that nobody from "the city" calls it San Francisco. It is merely, "the city". Also "the city" is the originating point for new lexicon such as "cutty", and skrilla(actually i believe thats east bay)

Trippy

Being from Massachusetts, I've only heard "trippy" used here in California, after I've moved here, so I added mention of it. - Beland 4 July 2005 21:55 (UTC)

I think it's died off now... I really shouldn't be responding to this as it's exactly a year old now and should probably be in an archive. Theshibboleth 14:04, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

Expansion request: Examples

After reading this article, I'm still not quite sure what the distinguishing features of this dialect sound like. I have taken linguistics, so I suppose I could plow through the phonological descriptions in detail, but a spoken or even written example of some typical speech patterns (both in phonology and grammar) would be quite helpful. -- Beland 4 July 2005 22:06 (UTC)

Sounds good. There are indeed many ways this article could be expanded, as there's research and information out there to find and report on. I think I could at least look for some audio clips to link to, and maybe find some transcriptions of Californian speech. Svenska84 10:10, 23 August 2005 (UTC)

Tweeker

It's tweeker, dude, not tweaker, and lots of people use "trippy". Maybe not in YOUR exalted neighborhood, but plenty of other places qualify as California, ya know? Cbdorsett 8 July 2005 06:26 (UTC)

Hella and Bro

One thing that might be worth adding is the predominant use of the word "Hella" by Northern Californians to substitute for the words "A lot," or "Extremely." For example, at a crowded restaurant, one might say, "There are hella people here." Its root seems to be a contracton of "A hell of a lot of," although it is also used as a quantifier, often in the phrase "That hella sucks," or, "That's hella awesome, dude." Younger folks who don't want to get in trouble with their parents for swearing will often substitute "Hecka." The word is not used at all in Southern California and is looked down upon as a sign of a NorCal foreigner trying to invade Southern California. About the only time a Southern Californian will utter "Hella" is to deride Northern Californians with a statement along the lines of, "Nor Cal Hella Sucks." Some Southern Californians will use the words "Mass," or "A Mass" instead, words which are not used in Northern California. An example statement would be, "Sorry I'm late brah, but there were mass cars on the 405," though "Mass" does not work as a quantifier in the same way as "Hella" and does not seem to be a crucial part of the Southern California lexicon in the same way that "Hella" is for Northern Californians.

Also, Southern Californians prefer using the word "Bro" (Oftentimes pronounced "Brah") to refer to their friends, wheras Northern Californians will more often use "Dude." Both of these terms are gender neutral, and can be used to refer to either man or woman friends. For example, Southern Californians will greet friends with, "What's up brah?" And Northern Californians will state, "What's up, dude?" Also, potentially worth noting is that "Bro" and "Dude" can be used in a challenging sort of way. If someone somewhat-accidentally pushes you, or somesuch, a common response might be, "What was that about brah?" Or just simply, "Dude?" Both Northern and Southern Californians will also make use of the word "Man" to substitute for "Dude" and "Bro," but Man seems to be slightly more used in Northern California than in Southern California.

I dunno, I just feel that if you are going to be talking about the Californian dialect, it just seems fitting to include these terms which are so strongly entrenched in the vernacular, and seemingly unique to the state. —the preceding unsigned comment is by 208.29.250.2 (talk • contribs) 00:14, July 13, 2005 (UTC)

Bro and dude are definitely not unique to the state. Hella and mass might be (I only know "hella" from South Park, which of course takes place in Colorado, but is hardly realistic), but adding them on the basis of personal experience rather than verifiable published sources amounts to original research. --Angr/_{tɔk tə mi} 06:11, 13 July 2005 (UTC)

Hence why I didn't add it to the main page without first mentioning it here. I'd be willing to let the Bro and Dude part slide, though I felt that this information would add to the distinction between Northern and Southern California speech patterns, which would be a seemingly worthy addition to the article. However, I believe that the usage of Hella is at least as valuable to the article as the discussion of the different manners of describing freeways (The 5 vs. 5). It is true, there is no verifiable, documented research regarding the use of "Hella," but is there any documented research on the highway description, or the use of "Bucket" and "Trippy?" I pretty rarely hear "Trippy" used by anyone who is not still living in the 60s, and I cannot recall ever hearing "Bucket." And based on the comment in the discussion page it was just added by a user who finds the words in common use. If you are adamantly opposed to adding the discussion of hella, I will accept that as I am just a guest, but in reading the article I felt as though I had something to add which would clarify the California lexicon. Hella is a NorCal word, through and through, and is used to an excess by its residents. People in So Cal do not understand it. This may amount to "Original Research," but if this is the case then I would argue that portions of the "Lexical Characteristics" section appear to be the same. —the preceding unsigned comment is by 208.29.250.2 (talk • contribs) 16:52, July 13, 2005 (UTC)

I think South Park indeed ruined "Hella". Like most fad words, its use is waning. I can, however, verify that anon's analysis is correct: it was mainly restricted to Northern California, and "Hecka" was a distinctly Southern Californian variant. Curiously, it was used without inflection as both an adverb (That food is hella good) and as an adjective (There are hella people here), although the adjective use is definitely more marked. Many people (such as myself) only use(d) it in the adverb form. I don't know if there has been any scholarly research into "hella", but I imagine someone has. Nohat 18:01, 13 July 2005 (UTC)

I believe, my friend, that you are straight tripping if you think "hella" is a fad word. (Please see my post below)

Dude, hella is like all about the East Bay. I'll hear it from my homies in Oaktown, or those down in Freakmont, but if you pay to cross the bay or cruise down 880 past Dixon Landing, it's, like, gone. </span="language:californian;"> Gentgeen 18:33, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

Hella is used here in the South Bay too. I think this word is generally restricted to NorCal as Nohat mentioned. It may be further restricted to the Bay Area, and areas in the Central Valley including Sac-town where a lot of Bay Area people have moved to. My friend in Santa Cruz tells he rarely hears the word used there. — J3ff 20:30, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

The funny thing about "bucket" is, I've definitely heard and have even used it myself, but I'm not exactly from California. Both of my parents grew up in L.A., and I was born in Santa Barbara, but we moved away when I was 2, so if there's any California influence in my speech patterns it must have come from my parents. I don't think either of them ever called an old broken-down car a bucket, though. I honestly don't remember where I heard it. I've always thought of it as a clipped form of "rustbucket". --Angr/_{tɔk tə mi} 20:05, 13 July 2005 (UTC)

I've never heard "bucket" here to refer to a beaten-down car. As for the "bro" and "dude" thing--I don't think either one is necessarily confined to either nor or so-cal. I've heard both in both parts of the state. I go to UC San Diego and I hear "dude" all the time from so-cal natives who have never lived in nor-cal or any other place for that matter. Svenska84 10:08, 23 August 2005 (UTC)

I lived in Napa (North Bay) and I don't know many who would say "Dude" is Northern Californian word, because I remember on numerouse ocassion capping on people who used it and not based on geography. I heard "fool" much more often, but it definently seemed more prominent than either dude, or man (which I rarley heard).

I don't know about Dixon but in Napa (and Solano) the word "Hella" is used alot and by no means is a "fad" word. As J3ff said, I think it's much more likley that it's a Bay Area word and after discussing it with about 5 people, for about 8-15 minutes in late 03 we seemed to all agree it was either Napa-Solano, or Bay Area word (depending on which one you asked). I definently think it's unique to California because I recently moved to Arkansas and no one uses it, Arkansas is only one example of but... Bucket I've heard but never seemed an integral part of the lexicon. If any words should be added I would say "fool," "puto," and "sick" (many Arkansans look at me like "WTF?" when I saw it and that's all to often). Taboo Tongue 00:09, August 27, 2005 (UTC)

For what it's worth, I've heard "bucket" used to mean "beaten-down car" on Pimp My Ride on more than one occasion. So it's definitely used in SoCal. --Angr/_{tɔk tə mi} 04:40, 2 September 2005 (UTC)

As far as I know, I think the word "hella" is on the wane. It was common in the Bay Area back in the late 90s, but I haven't heard it as much since then. "Fool" seems to be common in inner-city speech in both Northern and Southern California, though. --Coolcaesar 08:03, 4 September 2005 (UTC)

I've never heard the words "hecka" or "hella" uttered by anybody over 6. ςפקιДИτς ^{СФГиганты} 03:26, 12 November 2005 (UTC)

Yes, it is original research, but it's real—I am an oakland native, and I distinctly remember when I first used the word "hecka" at the dinner table in second grade (1983). It got me popped by dad, but it would have been worse had I not used the "censored" version. When I arrived at college in LA, I had a conversation with someone and I used the word "hella." Her response was "you're from seattle???" My girlfriend, an urban seattle native, said that she heard all the time growing up, but rejected it as part of the "california invasion" of her city. I currently work at a jr high in Hayward & still live in the O, and I hear "hella"...well, hella times a day. I always correct the kids (suggesting hecka), but I hear it from the adults as well. Its use is in no way waning. However, it is evidentally not as prevalent in workplaces that only have adults (and Bay immigrants), and many of my peers have said they have had to coach it out of their vocabulary. Its use does, however, cover the urban bay and beyond. As for its lack of use in SoCal, I'm not so sure it's true-- I've heard plenty of use in orange county and certainly where I used to work in south central. Of course, I may have influenced that as well—that word is hella catchy!Reggaedelgado 02:31, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

From SF here and I still hear "hella" a lot. I hear it a lot from mostly girls (frequently with emphasis in "he-"). I used to use it, but now I don't. I guess the view of whether it's waning or still in use is more about the personal preference of the people you know. —the preceding unsigned comment is by 205.174.22.28 (talk • contribs) 06:04, December 29, 2005 (UTC)

I learned about "hella" right here. Never heard it in actual speech. I have lived in the Sacramento area for the past 20 years; this sounds like a Bay Area thing to me. 24.10.78.185 23:19, 25 February 2006 (UTC)

I didn't write the thing about "hella" users being singled out in So-Cal, and while I believe it's generally true, until we find academic sources to back it up it shouldn't be there, so I'll delete it. If someone finds a source it would be a good addition to the section. Svenska84 01:37, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Yiddishism

I know New York gets most of the credit for hybridizing Yiddish with English, but has there been any attention paid to the amount of Jews in the SoCal entertainment industry and the influence they might have on TV scripts and the like? jengod 23:38, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

Has any research been published on the question? We can't use original research or speculation. --Angr/_{tɔk tə mi} 04:18, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

My guess is that there is very little direct Yiddish influence on California English ; what Yiddish influence there is comes from Northeastern American English and specifically New York English. While Jews have been present in California since it became a state, the Jews who migrated to Los Angeles in the 20th century - not necessarily due to the entertainment industry, although many did - tended to speak the English of where they came from, generally Northeastern US varieties of English (especially those from the New York and Philadelphia areas, due to the large numbers of Jews there and the US Jewish population historically being concentrated in those cities). The Jewish population of 20th century Los Angeles tended to be natives of the Northeast U.S. (although with a substantial minority coming from the Great Lakes area, and others coming from Europe) or their children, and it was these people who had formerly dominated the entertainment industry and still have some influence. —the preceding unsigned comment is by 4.231.179.82 (talk • contribs) 19:54, December 6, 2005 (UTC)

King/keen

The article says:

Front vowels are raised before velar nasal [ŋ], so that the near-open front unrounded vowel /æ/ and the near-close near-front unrounded vowel /ɪ/ are raised to a close-mid front unrounded vowel [e] and a close front unrounded vowel [i] before[ŋ]. This change makes for minimal pairs such as king and keen, both having the same vowel [i], differing from king [kɪŋ] in other varieties of English.

I'm from SoCal myself, and I can't say I really hear these two sounds merging, although the vowel in "king" definitely does come closer to [i] than it does in other dialects. What I do hear a lot, though, is people pronouncing words like "king" with the vowel having undergone that pre-velar mutation, but then pronouncing the /ŋ/ as [n], so that the only difference between "king", "keen", and "kin" is in the vowel sound (and these three are all distinct). However, I don't believe that anyone I know who does this does it across the board: sometimes it will come out [n] and sometimes [ŋ]. And I don't know if it only affects i/ɪ, or if it affects everything that comes before /ŋ/. Is there some documentation of this phenomenon that's better researched than me listening to my friends talking? -Branddobbe 08:52, 15 November 2005 (UTC)

I disagree with that part of the article. I'm a Californian, born and raised, and I do not associate king and keen as being minimal pairs at all. That seems like more of an Massachusetts or (moreso) Southern thing, but not in the least Californian. Where did this come from? I differentiate the vowels i and ɪ completely. I and everyone I know pronounce king [kɪŋ]. --LakeHMM 08:02, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

It is not a matter of /i/ and /ɪ/ "merging" in any way: there are no minimal pairs of /i/ and /ɪ/ before /ŋ/. It is simply a case of a shift of /ɪ/ to /i/ before /ŋ/. This change is identified by Eckert on her web site as being peculiar to California: "/i/ The vowel in him, sit, and bid is moving in two directions. Before ng, it shifts towards the vowel in beam, bean. Example: think sounds like theenk". I can also vouch for the existence of this shift, as I have the shift, and I was born and raised in San Jose. In my own speech, "king" and "keen" are minimal pairs. It is not because I have merged /i/ and /ɪ/ in any way: it is simply the case that in my internal lexicon, the phonemes of "king" are /kiŋ/, not /kɪŋ/. Same with /æ/ shifting to /e/ before /ŋ/: "bang" and "bane" are minimal pairs for me, their phonemic representation being /beŋ/ and /ben/, respectively. Nohat 08:50, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

I know exactly what you're talking about, but I just don't think it's by any means a trait to Californian English. As I said before, it sounds more southern. --LakeHMM 23:34, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

Just because it's a feature of California English doesn't mean that every single Californian will pronounce it as such. I'm from central California and it's a feature of my speech. I'd also like to note that I didn't even realize there was a difference between my speech in this regard and other dialects until it was pointed out to me. AEuSoes1 03:14, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Obviously not everyone has to have it, but nobody I know has it, and I don't associate it with a Californian accent at all. --LakeHMM 09:02, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Well, Eckert does, and she's a professor of linguistics who has done actual research on the topic. Your anecdotal (lack of) evidence does not provide a very strong counterargument to scholarly research. Nohat 11:55, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Oh ouch. --LakeHMM 23:41, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Yes, as the preface to that section states, those are features which have been identified as being in Californian speech but it does not mean that everyone who speaks English in California has those features, nor are all of those features restricted to California. I personally have the /ɪŋ/ --> [iŋ] (I consider [i] to be a same-morpheme pre-/ŋ/ allophone /ɪ/) raising described by Eckert ("sink" and "seen" have the same vowel as I say them) and hear it commonly in the speech of those around me. I've spent a lot of time (and lived) in both Northern and Southern California, and I've heard this feature from people in both areas. My parents are Bay Area natives and while they don't have it to the extent I do, it is present in their speech. It appears the feature has been spreading in terms of speakers that have it and instances in which it shows up. Svenska84 06:56, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

What part of California do you live in? AEuSoes1 09:15, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Los Angeles. --LakeHMM 01:38, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

My dad's from Iowa and he merges king/keen. I remember once mentioning to him how wierd I found it that Californians merge it (I grew up in CO), and he said something along the lines of "you mean you don't pronounce them with the same vowel?!" I remember another conversation a while later in which I found he merges rain/rang. I don't think this is just a California thing...Linguofreak 23:51, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

Maybe it's an age thing too? I don't think I do it, I'm in my 30's, but one of my students got confused because I used 'king' for the [I] vowel, and she said, 'but it's keeng!' Lingprof 00:59, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

Northern vs southern

This section really needs some help. There seem to be a lot of people posting their own personal experiences or the difference between themselves and their one friend from the other end of the state. Personally, after 30 years of life in CA, the oonly differences I have heard between my 5 years in LA and 25 in Oakland is "hella" and the "the" before freeways. I'm not sure if SF being called "the city" really merits being in this section, and certainly I've heard about 5000 different ways of saying "u-turn"... and would u-turn really merit it's own discussion? For now, I deleted references to "crazy" because it is not prevalent in southern ca, at least not more prevalent than the rest of the nation. Can we perhaps discuss improving this entire section here instead of editing willy nilly on the main page??Reggaedelgado 21:01, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

I agree. The Wikipedia policies of no original research and citing sources apply just as strongly here as anywhere else. If you can't produce published evidence backing up your claims, please don't post them. --Angr (t·c) 21:12, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

I agree as well. The entire section strikes me as mostly anecdotal accounts of slang rather than any serious linguistical distinctions. I don't know enough about the subject myself, but I would suggest someone either find sources that back up the claims of regional differences in phrases such as "flip a bitch," or just scrap the whole section in its entirety. PenguiN42 22:49, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

I'd like to point out that I have lived in northern California my entire life, and I have NEVER heard the phrase "flip a bitch." -- Annonymous Californian.

I haven't either. That section needs to either be backed up with evidence or deleted. Svenska84 06:56, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

Freeway names

Regarding the use of freeway names in the 1970s:

Larry Niven's 1970s short stories used freeway names, instead of numbers. Most of Niven's published short stories are set in Southern California and/or distant time periods. For example, "Cloak of Anarchy" is a short story on pages 111-133 of the Tales of Known Space collection. "Cloak of Anarchy" mentions the San Diego Freeway.

Unfortunately, this is just one citation. While it might be appropriate for a dictionary usage example, I doubt that it demonstrates sufficiently widespread usage to justify the comment in the article.

-- Jasper 08:07, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

As a Los Angeles native (1950) who moved north 25+ years ago, one of the differences most obvious to me between speech then and speech now is in how people refer to the freeways. In the south part of the state, where freeways are generally named for destinations, the freeway names were generally used then rather than the numbers. When I moved to San Jose, I quickly learned that most people didn't even know the names of the freeways (generally named for people) and referred to them by number only. I'm not sure when usage changed in Southern California, but it's clear that things are different now. Whether it merits inclusion in the article or not, usage has definitely changed over the past 25 years. The most reliable way to check might be going into (way) back issues of the LA Times. 24.10.78.185 23:19, 25 February 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I believe that is an accurate description of change that has happened. However, until we find sources to back it up it should probably be deleted, so I will do that. Svenska84 01:39, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Freeways have names? -a south bay resident --63.193.241.64 16:30, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

Nasalization patterns in California English

Can anyone provide any insights into the nasalization patterns in California English? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 171.64.133.51 (talk • contribs) 00:03, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

Hey - you guys do know that the word "freeway" is native to California too, right? At least thats what I know of. I live on the east coast and I've never heard that word before in my life until I travelled to California on vacation. Everybody else says "highway" or "expressway". The word "freeway" is never used - ever 0% of the time in NY, New England, Maryland, Florida, anywhere in the east. Its so funny for you guys to keep saying how northern californians say freeway and southern californians say freeway, but your both missing the fact that the word freeway is part of your english as well!

You never use the word because you have to pay toll on your equivilant roadways :) --Stacey Doljack Borsody 19:11, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Ummmm nope. No tolls on the Long Island Expressway. No tolls on any of NY's roads actually. No tolls on I-80 either in NJ. And yes, there are real interstates! Its a west coast thing - trust me! Nobody in the northeast, the south, florida - noobody uses it! People from Cali don't believe me its hilarious! You really think all highways are tolled in NY? Yea right!

That must be fairly recent, when I lived in New York State (1970-77 and again 1992-97) I-90 was a toll road. Angr/talk 17:02, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

I-90 (The New York State Thruway) is still a toll road, as are parts of I-87 in the Albany area. However, it should be noted that the "free" in the word "freeway" doesn't have anything to do with tolls--it refers to the fact that on a freeway, traffic is free-flowing; that is, traffic on the freeway is not impeded by any traffic control devices (such as stop lights or stop signs) and there is no at-grade cross traffic. Both toll roads and nontoll roads can be "freeways". Nohat 02:32, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

"Drawl" paragraph and Citation issues

Words like "drawl" and "twang" are vague and as such are not accurate enough for an article which aims to seriously describe the linguistic features of a particular speech variety. Because of that, in addition to the fact there is no citation for said claims, I think it's better that particular section get deleted. Svenska84 06:56, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

Go for it! --Angr (tɔk) 07:01, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

Done :) Now I'm busy trying to find sources so we can fill in the remaining citations. One problem is that for the "Influence of California English" section it's not really the domain of scholarly linguistic research to claim any variety is the American "standard." However, sociolinguistically speaking, I have often read in the past about those who perceive Midwestern English to make up the "standard" while others claim California English has largely been filling that role in recent history. Does anyone have any reliable sources which would back up that this debate exists (not that one side is right because it's a fuzzy issue to begin with)? Besides that, the only other remaining missing citation would be the one claiming "For example, according to one former California resident, in the 1970s it was common in Los Angeles to refer to freeways by name instead of by its highway number (i.e., to say "the San Diego Freeway" instead of "the 405" was common in the 1970s)" in the "Northern vs. Southern California" section. While I'm sure this is anecdotally true, this feature does need a citation (and one that's not anecdotal) so I'm wondering what should be done with it Svenska84 08:44, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

What does Geyer 2001 have to say? I haven't seen it. --Angr (tɔk) 08:54, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

I haven't either. If the person who originally put the source in isn't here anymore, I wonder if I can find the article at my college's library. Svenska84 03:20, 21 January 2006 (UTC)

I deleted the remaining two sections of text which remained uncited in the article. They were actually probably true but until we have academic sources for verification they are best left out. Now that there are no more missing citations it would probably be appropriate to remove it from the list of articles missing citations, right? Svenska84 01:48, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Oh, it looks like that's done automatically. Never mind. Svenska84 01:49, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Vowel chart

Assuming that the points in the vowel chart in the "Phonology" section accurately represent the vowels used (at least as accurately as possible with all the variation that can occur), why are ʌ and ɝ used when it looks like ɜ and ɚ, respectively, are closer? Is this for "historical reasons" like what is described in Open-mid back unrounded vowel? Ardric47 03:55, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Pretty much. It's a convention in English phonology to use the symbol ʌ for the vowel of strut, ɜ for a non-rhotic pronunciation of the vowel of nurse, and to use ɝ and ɚ for the stressed and unstressed versions (respectively) of the rhotic pronunciations of the vowels of nurse and letter. This isn't terribly accurate from a purely phonetic point of view, but it makes comparison with other accents much easier. The values of the IPA vowels characters aren't set in stone anyway; so long as you define how you're using each symbol, and the use is more or less plausible, you have a degree of flexibility. Angr/talk 06:55, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Yes, it makes comparison with other accents easier. Another interesting point is that according to this vowel chart /e/ is higher than /ɪ/ (I believe in many/most dialects /e/ is lower than that, or more specifically, /ɪ/ is higher), but for cross-dialectal comparisons it makes sense to use those to make it clear which classes of words are being referred to ("face" and "kit," respectively). Svenska84 08:47, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Influence section

I'm going to remove this section in a couple of days if none of the assertions in it can be substantiated by reliable sources. I added a NPOV tag to the section, as well. --AaronS 02:27, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't mind the citation requests (except for the one I took out) but I don't think you need to delete the entire section because no one can quickly find sources on a couple of statements that outline different points of view. AEuSoes1 09:20, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

There's nothing "quick" about it, those statements have been there unsupported by facts for months. The whole section is really nothing more than someone's vague impression that because a lot of movies and TV shows are filmed in California, that means California English is becoming a de-facto standard for American English. That would only be true if (1) the accents people hear in the media have an effect on the accent they used (an idea that's debated by a link in the section), and (2) all Hollywood actors themselves grew up in California and speak California English (they didn't and don't). I wouldn't mind seeing the whole section deleted as unverifiable POV original research. Angr/talk 09:42, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't recall anyone requesting a factcheck until now. A few days is pretty short notice. We could ask User:Svenska84 if he has a source since he's the one who put it in there. How about it, Kirk? AEuSoes1 09:51, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

If the assertions are in any way verifiable by reliable sources, a couple of days should be plenty of time. Angr is right, the section seems to have been there for a while, and the whole thing can be deleted, because all of it is built from a few dubious and unsupported assumptions. --AaronS 13:49, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

See this article [1] regarding the dominance of TV in Hollywood because all the movie studios are outsourcing production to Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. --Coolcaesar 17:13, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

That's an interesting article. But, the discussion is really rather irrelevant, since the "influence" section assumes that California English is being exported through TV, movies, and radio. We all know that only a fraction of the television shows and movies filmed in California are actually set in California. Unless there is some scholarly or reliable source that can back up all of the strange and, in my opinion, unverifiable assumptions in this section, I think that it should be removed entirely. It serves no purpose other than pure fanboy cruft. --AaronS 18:24, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

I went ahead and removed the section. Please don't put it back unless you have reliable sources to back up the seemingly POV assumptions made there. --AaronS 17:00, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

I guess I could add that p.133–134 of How We Talk: American Regional English Today by Allan Metcalf (ISBN 0618043624) say:

But California has place of pride among dialects of the West because it has a microphone. California language is amplified across the whole country, including the rest of the West, thanks to the nerve center of American entertainment in souther California. On the television, in the movies, and in popular music we hear the real and simulated accents of California kids, cops, cranks, comics, crusaders, and just plain citizens.... the California word is broadcast to America and the world.

...For the most part, nowadays as in the past, California English sounds unaccented to most Americans

...The influence of the California accent on the rest of American English is therefore largely unnoticed. California media simply reinforce our sense that the state's language is "normal."

Now, of course this is all highly unscientific as far as I can tell, but it is the opinion of an author who has published a book on American dialects. Nohat 17:25, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

In the domain of sociolinguistics and what's considered "neutral" or not, things get really fuzzy because what someone considers "neutral" is inherently subjective. My text in the original section intended to address that issue, although I think some people misinterpreted it to mean that the article felt that California English somehow defined some norm or "accentless" English (which is not what I intended people to get out of that section). I attempted to convey the notion that what's "neutral" is subjective and while some might claim the English spoken in California is "neutral," others might strongly disagree. However, it is worth citing what those such as Metcalf have noted, purely for their sociolinguistic value (scholarly observations of sociolinguistic perceptions are entirely valid and say nothing of someone's POV on the matter). I don't think it's a POV problem to state that opinions differ as to what's "neutral" or "accentless" as long as the article doesn't side with one or the other. From what I originally wrote I thought it would be clear the article was not claiming such a position on either side but simply pointing to the existence of different sociolinguistic viewpoints. One thing is certain--this is no "fanboy fluff" but a worthy and academically valid topic to pursue. I think that a section addressing the media in relation to the variety/varieties of a language spoken in a state with particularly noteworthy media concentration is desirable. Maybe we can reword it and make sure it sounds clear to everyone that no POV is being taken, and cite those such as Metcalf (and ideally others, as well) in pointing out differing views and observations from linguists. I would hope everyone would keep in mind that simply by stating the existence of differing views there should be no POV problems (which is why I'm frankly surprised some would interpret what I wrote as "fanboy fluff" when none of the rest of the article took on such an undesirable and academically inaccurate bias). Svenska84 01:29, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Weird sound change

Two of my friends from California insert an /l/ into the word "both." (thus "bolth"). Has anyone heard of this? Does anybody know what causes it? (I assume that it must be an assimilation of the off-glide on the o to the /þ/, or something like that.) Also, is there any information on Western US dialects other than Californian? If so could an article be written up on them? There are several features of my Denverese that I'd like to compare to some hard data to see if they're actual Coloradan or whether I'm just crazy. Linguofreak 06:44, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't know what causes it, but I can add that I say it too (I'm from SoCal). I also do the same thing in "oatmeal" ("oltmeal"), but I think that if I didn't eat (and thus say) oatmeal as much as I do, I probably wouldn't have that. I think I have a tendency to do it in "remo(l)te control", but that's most likely due to the influence of "control". -Branddobbe 08:02, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

I typically have /l/ in "both" as well, though I'm not sure this is specific to California. I don't appear to have "intrusive l" in any other positions. Svenska84 09:24, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

And apparently some of my friends from other areas have it too. Illinois and Minnesota, if I recall their states of origin correctly. Linguofreak 02:42, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

Illinois has some of this, I've noticed it in a couple of people. However, one of them has a father from california so that may be the cause. -Kode 23:58, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

That's interesting. I wonder if there is any linguistic research out there concerning "bolth"--it seems to be pretty common here and is pretty much my default pronunciation of the word. In fact, for a language forum I frequent I made an audio recording in response to another participant's audio post and I didn't realize it at the time I was recording it but when I played it over I definitely heard myself saying "bolth." If anyone's curious here's the recording [2]. If you listen in just a little bit before halfway through the recording I say "both" with what sounds to me like "bolth" now when I listen to it over again (tell me if you think it's something different). As far as I can tell I have no "intrusive l" anywhere else, even in the same environment (like "oath"), but of course "both" is a high frequency word whereas something like "oath" isn't. Svenska84 05:27, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

I heard Richard Roeper say it on a recent episode of Ebert & Roeper at the Movies. Interestingly, a Google search for "bolth" shows a lot of hits of people using that spelling both self-consciously and un–self-consciously. Here is a couple LINGUIST list postings that mention it: [3] [4]. Nohat 09:04, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

The origin of "bolth" remains a mystery. It sporadically occurs throughout the United States and has been noted to occur sporadically in California, Illinois, Michigan, and New Jeresey.

hella

• I live in Southern California and I hear this phrase a lot. I think it's worth noting that the song "Hella Good" is performed by a Southern Californian band. Also, regarding "a grip of", I heard this term a lot in high school, but I graduated in 1996 and I rarely hear this term anymore. Danny Lilithborne 03:45, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

• Incidentally, as a Northern Californian who's now gone to college for several years in Southern California, it should be noted that I hear "hella" more down here than I did back in Santa Cruz (where the phrase was frequently self-consciously not used, as many people thought its use marked one as being from "over the hill" (i.e. the San Jose area)). Meanwhile, I have never before heard "grippa" or "a grip of", ever, except in this article.

• • Dr. Dre used the word "hella" in his 2001 album, for God's sake. I changed it. Danny Lilithborne 05:19, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

Coupla more words

Just thought I'd throw out a few more differences in pronunciation, although they may just be more prevalent in NorCal English. (My wife's family is from NY and they've pointed these out -- repeatedly...). - milk pronounced as "melk" - were pronounced as "war" - man pronounced as "mon," especially when used in place of dude or brah -- although that may just be an ironic fakey-jamaikey accent....

Bias?

Is it just me or is this article overwhelmingly NorCal-centric? There is very little discussion about the LA basin or San Diego meto, both of which are bigger than the Bay area. Perhaps, some more discussion of the effects of Spanish on the pronunciation and vocabulary of SoCal. At the very lease exchange a few of the NorCal examples for SoCal examples, in the interest of equal time.HoratioVitero 15:45, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

  The Bay Area has a much larger population than San Diego metro.

This should be two articles

Nearly all of the content on this page is either about features of Northern California English or of Southern California English. The page itself is a strong argument that there are two distinct dialects here. Most of the phonological material is on a vowel-shift that is referred to on its original page as the "Northern California Shift". Lexical features are subdivided into Northern phenomena and Southern phenomena. The article doesn't provide any evidence that Northern Californians speak more like Southern Californians than they do like, say, Oregonians, and so there's no grounds for grouping the two dialects into a single article. Several other articles that link to the page employ constructions such as "southern [[California English]]" (for example, English_phonology#Phonemes). I propose therefore that the article be split into a Northern California English and a Southern California English article. It may be worthwhile also to have a page on differences between the two, just as there is a page on differences between British English and American English.--Atemperman 20:48, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

i agree. although Californians do share ligutisic siliarities. Northern California and southern California are TWO SEPARATE AREAS. in fact the should be two different states!

Vowel Raising before ŋ

This happens to me, and I live in NW Kansas, isn't this just a General American thing?Cameron Nedland 17:42, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

• As a Bay Area life-long resident, I've always used the raised I (as in keen) for words like king and sing; I've never known any other pronunciation until a few years ago. I can, however say and hear the differences, though they are very slight to me.

I also raise it when I drop the G in -ing forms, so even if there's no /ŋ/ there I raise as well. So I wind up saying stuff like "dreenkeen" (sampa = /dr\iNkin/) for drinking —Preceding unsigned comment added by 190.0.136.131 (talk) 01:35, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

This is just anecdotal. Rlitwin (talk) 22:22, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

Words

Should there be a list of the different words or usage of words like gay, retard, emo, and so on. (Recharge330 (talk) 15:39, 5 June 2008 (UTC))

California English is seen by many in other US regions that we're so affluent, we speak "Yupplish" or a kind of English associated with Yuppies, a socioeconomic class between rich and middle-class who work in white-collar professions and Californian words are a "Yuppiefied" English dialect. Not all Californians live in a "Yuppie" lifestyle, but the Los Angeles/SoCal and NoCal/San Fran. bay areas are filled with images of their residents are generally speaking most likely to be depicted as "yuppies" who speak in fast, energetic, trendy, youthful, liberal and professional terms. Californian English may well have a larger share of upper-middle class speakers, but be in mind there are alot more working-class and low-income residents in California. + 71.102.10.169 (talk) 05:49, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Interesting. Citations or anecdotal? Rlitwin (talk) 22:26, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

original research?

Does the notion of "California English" actually have currency among linguists? If so, the article doesn't indicate that or offer any support for the claim. What is written here looks like original research to me; if we can't show that this is a real concept among linguists (or other language experts), we shouldn't invent it here and we should remove this article. Thoughts? csloat (talk) 05:23, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

Northern vs. Southern

User:A Doon just removed without explanation a bunch of facts about the difference between Northern and Southern California, most notably the fact that "the" is not used with highway numbers in Northern California ("the 5" and so on) and the Northern-California shibboleth "hella". Why? These are both well-known and notable facts about California English.

On the other hand, the fact that San Franciscans don't refer to their city by cute nicknames doesn't seem to me to be a particularly interesting or notable fact. Lots of cities are referred to as "the city". AJD 23:36, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

I think that's a meaningful statement about the Bay Area, particularly when Sacramentoans and San Jose residents refer to San Francisco as The City, even as their cities are technically larger. It defers to the urban primacy of San Francisco in Northern CA even from the Gold Rush days. Daniel M. Laenker 08:47, 22 November 2006 (GMT)

[[Image:NonFreeImageRemoved.svg -->|thumb|right|The San Francisco Warriors' "the City" logo]]

The Golden State Warriors, while playing in San Francisco, actually had "the City" on their jerseys and logo, rather than "San Francisco". This shows the extent to which San Francisco is referred to as "the city"—they could print that without any ambiguities. ¿ςפקιДИτς! ☺ ☻ 02:43, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

Were the facts he removed verifiable by means of cited sources? If not, he was quite right to remove them. The same goes for the lack of cute nicknames for San Francisco. User:Angr 05:00, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Let's see... A Doon removed the citation for "the" with freeways along with removing the fact itself (Geyer 2001: "'The' freeway in southern California"). "Hella" was not cited in the article as it stood, but Bucholtz et al. (2005: "Hella Nor Cal or Totally So Cal?") report that "hella" is stereotypically associated with northern California by Californians. AJD 05:14, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

I strongly protest A Doon's deletion of "bucket" and "trippy," based on his/her not hearing these in 8 years California experience. I have lived in California about six times that long, and I know these terms to be correct, especially "trippy," which I would even say is common and ordinary. "Bucket" is also correct, but I will concede, less common. Fluffbrain 28 August

I also protest, at least, the removal of "trippy". I've never heard anyone say bucket, but "trippy" has definitely been around for a while (and I've lived in SoCal my entire life). -Branddobbe 08:08, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

It's "boo-kay". —ptk✰fgs 03:15, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

I’ll second bucket —Wiki Wikardo 11:18, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

The burden of finding sources falls on those wishing to include material, not those wishing to remove it. Find a source and it's appropriate to put it back in, otherwise not. Ƶ§œš¹ _{[aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]} 20:51, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

I don't know the arguments going about North and South variations, but there are significant differences between NorCal and SoCal language. There needs to be mention of this. For example, statements about how Californians refer to freeways with the word the is only a SoCal method, and is simply wrong for NorCal. Also, phrase-abbreviate words such as Hyphy and Hella is a phenomenon of NorCal. Fcsuper 05:53, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

I've already talked about hella... well, hella. It's used often in SoCal these days as well. JuJube 05:56, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Ok. It's blended into the article instead of a distinctive section. Fcsuper 15:02, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Southern Californians do refer to Freeways as "The 10", "The 101", etc. But this really only applies to Freeways. The article states that,

"...California State Route 1, which runs down the coast, is called "Highway 1" or simply "one" in Northern California, but "PCH" (for Pacific Coast Highway) in Southern California, sometimes pronounced as "peach" but much more often as "the PCH"."" I was born and raised in SoCal and I never heard anyone refer to PCH as "The PCH". It is pretty much always called simply PCH or, sometimes, Coast Highway. The "The" designation is always used for freeways, not highways. For example, in "I Love LA", Randy Newman rolls down Imperial Highway, not "The Imperial Highway". And these highway names are not nicknames, they are actually legally defined routes that are separate from the numbered highway. For example, most of Imperial Highway is synonymous with Highway 90. But part of Hwy 90 runs separately as The Marina Freeway, while Imperial Hwy continues along a different route. Part of Pacific Coast Highway is not signed as Hwy 1 near the San Diego County line. And many parts of Hwy 1 have different names. In much of West LA and Santa Monica, it is actually Sepulveda Blvd. and Lincoln. People in NorCal don't call it PCH because it isn't called that there. From Santa Barbara to San Francisco it is mostly called Cabrillo Highway. North of San Francisco it is Shoreline Highway. This is true for freeways, too, "The Hollywood Freeway" is a confusing term for many because it actually runs along several different numbered freeways. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 69.181.152.165 (talk) 05:42, 25 April 2007 (UTC).

As a third generation Southern Californian, I can attest that people in So Cal DO use THE in front of freeway numbers (it is correct to say the 101, the 405, etc.) As far as I know, Northern Californians do NOT. The information given in this article is incorrect. Also, PCH is just PCH. No THE. The information given directly above is correct. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.217.166.226 (talk) 21:34, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

yep, they even use "the" in the news for traffic reports. on the topic of N vs S variation, is there any way someone can edit the phonemics section to include that in socal, people tend to glottalise final plosive T's?? ie. http://web.ku.edu/~idea/northamerica/usa/california/california1.htm and http://web.ku.edu/~idea/northamerica/usa/california/california2.htm. its spreading from the valley girl dialect. MattTabarnaknaytev (talk) 19:52, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

Abbreviations

"Southern Californians rarely refer to the South as SoCal, where as Northerners are more likely to use both abbreviations without any derogatory connotations." I live in Northern California (Oakland to be precise) and the use of the abbreviations "Norcal" and "SoCal" is frowned upon. In fact, it is seen as a shibboleth for those who are not from the area. This is unfortunately original research, and thus inadmissible in an actual edit, but if anyone can help correct this error with admissible support, I'd appreciate it. 71.139.182.90 (talk) 19:16, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

It's also wrong that Southern Californians rarely refer to their own region as SoCal, I hear it all the time. JuJube (talk) 23:14, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

I also live in Southern California and hear and read "SoCal" a lot. However, I've never heard Southern Californians use "NoCal" or "NorCal" in any way that is derrogatory toward Northern California or Northern Californians.Seashinegirl (talk) 00:53, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, i hear SoCal and NorCal used all the time, rarely as a derogatory. He's thinking of "cali"; that is frowned upon MattTabarnaknaytev (talk) 19:09, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

What is the significance of slang terms like these to an article on California English, if there is such a thing? Rlitwin (talk) 22:27, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

i dont think these terms belong here either. i think 71.139.182.90 brought it up cause of the whole "sacra" thing. i dont see how abbreviations for regions should be in here, unlike say, regional variations in grammar, which would be true to a dialect. they should be moved to their respective region's pages. MattTabarnaknaytev (talk) 00:07, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

Penelope Eckert and the California Vowel Shift

The inclusion of Ms. Eckert's research as a general quality of California accents strikes me as a rather unfortunate mistake. Her research has centered around 10-13 year old girls who are apparently displaying a new pronunciation of certain vowel sounds, but I've neither seen nor heard of any research that would indicate that this is related to a larger vowel shift across California. The way it's presented in this article, however, makes it seem that Californians as a whole are using such shifted vowels. Please listen to the NPR interview linked at Ms. Eckert's site for more information, which you can also find here: http://www.npr.org/programs/atc/index.html%3Ci -- KuriosD (talk) 19:37, 17 September 2009 (UTC)

here: http://www.pbs.org/speak/seatosea/americanvarieties/californian/ in the 'chicano' paragraph, it says that the same shifts found in the north can be found in southern california. link also provides an explanation to why they centre around the youth. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.104.1.236 (talk) 07:28, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Hapa

Is this a SoCal thing? I ain’t never heard it —Wiki Wikardo 11:18, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

I lived in Sacramento, and we used it there.Jzcrandall (talk) 17:40, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

• Me neither, and I am from SoCal. Danny Lilithborne 08:49, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
• This is a California Asian-American thing; both NorCal and SoCal AAs use it. Rin Tohsaka 18:28, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  • Really? As a Northern California Asian-American in a predominantly Asian-American community, I would think I would have heard it at least once. ¿ςפקιДИτς! ☺ ☻ 02:21, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
• I don't think it is as wide-spread as it is being made out to be. You probably have to be part-Hawaiian to understand it. I've only seen the term used in media. For example: Part Asian, 100% Hapa - http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0811849597 --Stacey Doljack Borsody 07:47, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

'Hapa' is certainly catching on in the SF Bay area. It's tied in part to the frequent use of race-specific census and fill-out-this-form questions, when so many respondents are now of mixed race. Also with the celebrity of various mixed-race individuals.

Overall, I agree with the article's linguistic contentions, but must admit I am not familiar with the scientific symbols. This may be anecdotal, but it's based upon my family living in the SF Bay Area for a full century. -Paul Carlson

Ive lived in SoCal all my life and I`ve heard it only a few times. All of them, it was a half asian or pacific islander and half european decent person saying it. My conclusion: valid, just like mulatto and mezcla; said only rarely, but stil valuable as a cultural associational term.Neotribal42 18:59, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Hapa means half in Hawaiian, and almost always refers to a person with one parent Caucasian and the other parent something else. It is short for "Hapa-Haole" which you still hear from time to time, but most of the time you will just say 'hapa' as in "She looks hapa" (that 100% hapa made me laugh, it is such a good representation of most people from Hawaii ;) ) Anyway... this is supposed to be a California Dialect page and since the only people I hear use this word have ties to Hawaii, I will go out on a limb and say this word really isn't a candidate for "California English" (just yet anyway) --Billy Nair (talk) 10:15, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

The passage as it now stands says that hapa can apply to FOBs. Eh? I'm guessing that it formerly said "hapa meaning half-Islander and FOB meaning Asian immigrant", and the hapa part got expanded without enough attention to making the rest of the sentence make sense. —Tamfang (talk) 22:10, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

FOBs (Fresh Off the Boat) can mean anyone from another country, I guess, that has not assimilated, but you rarely hear an Asian called a FOB, it is usually a Polynesian. But if you were born and raised in "the islands" with one white parent (making you hapa) your chances of being FOB-ish are a lot lower than other FOBs. If you are half Samoan half Tongan few people will ever think of you as hapa, yet there is a good chance that if you moved to California in your early adult life you would be called a FOB. Don't agree with hapa being a term for a FOB. --Billy Nair (talk) 20:04, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

Oops

Oops, I am terribly embarrassed. I wrongly corrected "The most populous of the United States ...", because I forgot to notice that the United States was being referred to as a collective group of states, not as just one entity. Sorry. Good job Binksternet. 71.178.238.238 (talk) 04:11, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

--I deleted Long Beach as being part of SoCal's "South Bay". Long Beach is never considered "South Bay" here. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 167.88.201.100 (talk) 21:12, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Place names

The text about Norcal, Socal and Frisco is relevant and factually correct. There was no reason to delete it. Similarly, there was no reason to substitute "Sactown" for "Sacto", since the list says explicitly, "and other nicknames. I've heard Sacto, but not Sactown - how about a cite? Until then, I'm putting it back the way it was. I'm using the revert procedure because it's easier, not because I'm accusing anyone of vandalism. And no, I'm not one of the no-revert-rule people. Cbdorsett 07:43, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

Actually, even the California State Anthem itself refers to Sacramento as "Sactown", not "Sacto". Observe,

From Oakland to Sactown

The Bay Area and back down

Cali is where they put they mack down

Give me love!

Triggtay 09:01, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

Okay, so it's used in a rap song - that doesn't make it the State Anthem :). Just for the record, I noticed the nickname on a list of city nicknames on Wikipedia. That list includes both of the nicknames we're talking about here. I still see no reason to prefer one over the other. Cbdorsett 09:05, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

Are you sure that's the state anthem? I believe you're referring to I Love You, California. Hachiko 18:36, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

I've lived in the Bay Area all my life, and I think I've heard 'Sacto' once or twice, but mostly just as 'Sac'. I sometimes call it Sakuramento, after an anime club from there. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.23.166.38 (talk) 06:41, 1 March 2007 (UTC).

I changed it to "sactown," because that nickname is used more frequently than "sacto." And if anyone complains, I'll change it to Sacramento's REAL nickname: nutSac. You can add sacto if you want, but sactown needs to stay. catgirl667 4/25/2007

Having lived in Sacramento for eighteen years now, I can safely say that "Sacto" seems to have prevalence typically in just the Downtown region and "Sactown" is accepted outside of the city proper. I have heard denizens of some nearby cities in the metropolitan area like Davis or Folsom refer to the city proper as "Capital City". So, "Sactown" has held more harmony throughout the entire city than has others like "Sacto"; simply saying "Sacramento" is however more profound than using its nicknames. Seemingly disparaging nicknames like "nutSac" or "Cowtown" is accepted here as we find it risibly amusing, but you will not hear our residents use those terms in parlance, except for humorous effect. Referencing for this can be easily found, but I am at a loss for time right now. Slof 22:36, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Question, since I'm addressing a Sacto resident here: is it true that people call it (or at least used to call it) "Sackatomato", as Herb Caen used to say? Is/was this widespread, or just another bit of three-dot journalism? +ILike2BeAnonymous 00:09, 28 April 2007 (UTC)

That and its variants ("Sack-of-tomatoes", "Sac of Tomatoes") used to have prevalence as one of its nicknames said by people outside of the area. However, the decline of tomato production as a crop and transition to other mainstay crops since the latter half of the twentieth century has dated this nickname. You might even say that it is obsolete. Slof 02:57, 28 April 2007 (UTC)

This material may be true, but what does it have to do with a dialect of English? Isn't there a better article to handle what people call the Bay Area, or nicknames for Sacramento? ·:· Will Beback ·:· 02:07, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

i have heard scaramneto called suck a tomato. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.37.139.5 (talk • contribs) 21:01, 30 December 2007

This is about slang. What is the significance of slang to California English, if there is such a thing? Rlitwin (talk) 22:23, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

my two cents two years later: as i understand it, 'sacto' is the postal abbreviation from ages ago. badmachine (talk) 07:14, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

California English

I think this is a valuable article, and should remain. And even though a lot of people do not realize it, there is a "California Accent". And many of us can recognize it. The problem is probably that because of the vast quantity of entertainment and news that comes out of California, most people simply do not recognize it as such when they hear it. And a lot of people simply do not recognize accents and speech patterns unless they are very distinct, like South-East USA. And when you think about it, how many people can recognize a Canadian accent? It is there, it is real, but most people would not recognize it. Mushrom (talk) 17:43, 11 September 2009 (UTC)

Valspeak is absolutely distinct from any other American English dialect, the authentic sound of Southern California in pop culture. The center of Valspeak has been in L.A.'s San Fernando Valley beginning in the 1970s', but has been spoken by teens who grew up to be young adults living in the South Bay, Los Angeles and Orange County communities. + 71.102.7.77 (talk) 08:32, 21 February 2010 (UTC)

Sacra(mento)?

"Northern Californians refer to Sacramento the state capital, as "Sac", "Sacto", "Sactown", "Sacra" (by the Chicano community), and various other nicknames." Yeah.. Where is this happening? In some Midwesterner's mind? Come on now. No one says that. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.126.75.174 (talk) 22:33, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

I have lived in Sacramento and yes, many locals call it "Sac". The historic downtown is fondly known as "Old Sac." I have occasionally heard "Sacto". Perhaps more interesting, linguistically, is the pronunciation of "Sacramento." It is always "Sacramenno" (no "t"), except among Spanish speakers of course, who use the Spanish pronunciation. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 198.94.221.66 (talk) 22:17, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

These are slang terms. What is the significance to an article on a California English dialect, if there is such a thing? RlitwinRlitwin (talk) 22:28, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

There are deleted entries on the article discussed the closer speech patterns of Northern California (esp. north of Sacramento) with the Pacific Northwest, Upper Midwest and New England states. The Inland Empire and desert regions are referred to as the "Desert Southwest", and have more of a Texan, Southwestern and Midwestern influences in local speech. The Sierras and other mountain areas have a history of Appalachian and Mid-Atlantic settlers. + 71.102.7.77 (talk) 06:37, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

Apostrophic vowels in terminal syllables

Something I first noticed in younger Californian and Hawaiian English speakers in the last 20 or 30 years, and now I run into among relatively younger others, is the lengthening of terminal syllables that traditionally have been suppressed. I'm not talking about just stressing terminal elements of words (e.g., what-EVER). I'm referring to making did-unt out of didn't, wood-in out of wooden, would-unt out of wouldn't, etc.--in other words, articulating a final syllable's vowel that the pronunciation guide in Webster's New World College Dictionary renders with just an apostrophe. I don't know what the formal linguistic term for this phenomenon might be, but if it has been discussed in the literature, it may be worth including in this article. Wbkelley (talk) 17:13, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

In this preview for "How we talk: American regional English today", i find exactly what you're talking about, via the Allyn Partin Hernandez bit. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.104.11.116 (talk) 03:43, 2 June 2010 (UTC)

Bomb-Balm divergence

Though I can't find a source on this, I know from lifelong experience that both northern and southern Californians pronounce the /l/ in words like palm, balm, etc. Can anyone help out on that? Samhuddy (talk) 22:42, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

I came across something regarding /l/ in palm,balm, etc in Californian speech a while ago, but cant find it at them moment... I myself use a slight /l/. I must find that file, and go ask someone to say the words so I can hear it myself. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.104.9.227 (talk) 21:12, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I have heard people in San Fran pronounce the /l/ in words like calm. I personally have always distinguished bomb and balm, not by pronouncing the /l/ but by using the same vowels as in cot and caught, respectively. But I'm from Tucson, not CA. Benwing (talk) 04:56, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

Comments on History and Accent

DISCLAIMER: I am neither a liguistic nor a historian so please interpret these comments accordingly.

The linguistic history on this page I found a bit curious. My understanding is that the original anglophone visitors/settlers in California (even before it was annexed by the U.S.) were predominantly Texans (and others from the southern areas of the U.S.). The Gold Rush, of course, changed things substantially but I have always understood from what I've read that this early history was still influential in California's development. I lived in the SF Bay Area for 4 years back in the 90s. Although most of the people I encountered had fairly neutral accents, most of the people I actually dealt with regularly were actually from other parts of the U.S. To the extent that I did meet people who actually were from families that had lived in California for some generations I tended to hear traits in their speech that are not described here. In particular I had two friends, one from the north bay and one from the Eureka area, both with similar accents (and similar to others I had met in California). Their accents although not "thick" by my standards were very much what I've always thought of as the "western" accent. That is, an accent that has a lot of similarities to the "southern" accents although not quite as distinct (notably these friends grew up saying "y'all" but stopped as they grew into their professional lives). These aspects of the accent and the dialect (and their history) don't seem to be discussed here. I was curious why.

Your experience might be fairly anecdotal. Scholorly sources find more generalized traits but there will always be exceptions to the tendencies. Basically what you're saying is that California English is influenced from multiple regions, which the article already states. AEuSoes1 04:11, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

I think that there should be some audio samples of what is meant by a California accent. Would this be the thick sort of Southern California dialect we've heard from, say, Keanu Reeves and Alicia Silverstone, or is more of a Northern California accent I'm not especially aware of? Daniel M. Laenker 08:44, 22 November 2006 (GMT)

I grew up in on the outskirts of the S.F. Bay Area, and I agree that native Californians outside of the major urban areas have a definite "country" twang. I didn't realize it until I moved to San Francisco and people started teasing me about my "accent". I don't suppose it is much different than other western U.S. accents like you might hear in rural areas in Nevada or Oregon. 25 January 2009 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.55.173.232 (talk) 06:36, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

In Southern California, I`ve never heard "Ya`ll" except by ebonics users and people from various Southern states. Also, there is no such thing as a "neutral" or nonexistant accent or dialect, they might not be an identifiable regionl accent, but they still are accents. Neotribal42 19:07, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

There's a definite difference in accent between northern and southern California. Northerners, in my experience, seem to speak in a strained, staccato fashion that is unusual further south.

75.25.30.9 (talk) 04:21, 15 August 2010 (UTC)

Hella

the overwhelming majority of written work regarding "hella", both by linguists and casual observers of popular culture alike, describe "hella" as characteristic of the Northern California lexicon, and describe the San Francisco Bay Area as it's place of birth. In so far as this word has entered the vocabulary of speakers outside the Bay Area, it has been through diffusion--and the further from the epicenter, the less frequent the usage. Thus, recent deletions of the passage referring to the word hella are not justified, nor has anyone, to my knowledge, referenced a source that would contradict the preponderance of referrable works (including those already cited) which support it's continued inclusion. Triggtay 06:25, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

• Nevertheless, the part saying "hella" is seldom, if ever, used in SoCal is patently false, as I can give you no less than two popular artists from SoCal that have used it. JuJube 06:29, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

Like whom? As someone said down below, it's only NorCal transplants that say it. I've lived in SoCal all my life and it's not a common phrase among those who grew up here. It may be an overstatement to say it is seldom used, but I certainly think its unwarranted to say it's "popular throughout the state", as the article currently claims. Therefore, I'm going to delete that part. sdbulldog 22:03, 24 January 2011 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.174.249.102 (talk)

• I agree. When I was a teenager in Sacramento I used it all the time. Now that I live on the east coast I almost never hear it unless I talk to my friends back in NorCal.Jzcrandall (talk) 17:43, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

'K. As I noted in my last edit summary, I put in a {{fact}} just to get someone (you?) to actually connect the statements regarding "hella" with the references at the bottom.

By the way, you might want to do something about those greengrocer's apostrophes of yours. +ILike2BeAnonymous 06:31, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

I've also heard (and used) "hell of" (said as one word: "hel-love") as a strictly ironic replacement for "hella" (I've been a Bay Area resident all my life).

I've lived in SoCal my entire life (25 years). Hella is so infrequently used down here, that I didn't even hear of the word until I was 20 (after a friend of mine returned from a bay area trip), and we generally laugh whenever we hear some one from NorCal use it. On the rare occasion that we do use the word hella, it is usally used as a joke or comically. The NorCal/SoCal hella difference should stay. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Catgirl667 (talk • contribs) 22:52, 25 April 2007 (UTC).

I changed hella because I live in orange county never hear anybody say it.(Recharge330 (talk) 15:29, 5 June 2008 (UTC))

I've lived in SoCal for 30 years. Grew up in Long Beach. Only ever heard "hella" used when I got to college and met NorCal folk. The people who I know who do use it in SoCal are usually NorCal transplants.

We're talking about slang here. Does slang have such a prominent place in an article about California English? Rlitwin (talk) 22:23, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

As a NorCal resident for the very vast majority of my life, I just wanted to say thank god for those of you who have come out to say that SoCal doesn't use "hella"! I heard that recently from a friend, and I was devastated. Hella is a NorCal thing and should NOT move to SoCal, as I'm very sure most SoCal residents would like as well. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.202.135.113 (talk) 05:32, 19 March 2012 (UTC)

"Phonology" section is too technical, very difficult to understand!

The Phonology section looks very nice, technical, and seems good for those who can understand it. Personally, I learned a little bit of that stuff years ago, and it looks like Greek to me now. As a Californian who wants to understand the differences between our own and other's pronunciation, this section was very disappointing! Can someone add a simplified description to it? Perhaps more examples for us to contrast? This would be extremely appreciated. Thank you very much! --71.202.135.113 (talk) 05:42, 19 March 2012 (UTC)

Unverified but true

Don't delete the section on freeway nomenclature. It is absolutely correct. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.27.73.102 (talk) 22:09, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

Seconded.RaynDrahps (talk) 02:22, 22 August 2012 (UTC)

Worst article ever?

Most insubstantial and useless article ever?71.131.213.157 09:55, 15 September 2007 (UTC) I totally agree, I've lived in three states and most of America will agree that California and many other states simply don't have an accent. Sure, the surfer "dialect" originated in California, but absolutely no accent exists in more than 1% of the population in many states. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.214.195.138 (talk) 02:52, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

I agree, this article is ridiculous. Regional slang does not constitute a dialect. Nor does a slight accent. The nation has become far too homogenous and mediated by television and other forms of mass media for it to make sense to speak of such a strong regional difference for California English. This article is wishful thinking. Rlitwin (talk) 18:30, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

This is a pretty terrible article. That said, there are serious things to say about California English as a subtype of Western U.S. English (it's different from, say, Utah English, another Western subtype), and sociolinguists such as Penny Eckert at Stanford do serious research on it. However, California itself isn't a linguistically uniform dialect region; this article really should focus on whatever dialect sociolinguists refer to as the California dialect, not all linguistic features that may be found somewhere within California. AJD (talk) 01:23, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

Then let's see if we can rewrite the article accordingly. I'd start by weeding out the stuff about slang. It could have a separate article, California Slang, if someone cared to write it. Rlitwin (talk) 22:25, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

Worst article ever? I'm sure I could find at least a dozen articles about the dietary habits of obscure cartoon characters if you need some perspective. California English may not be Gullah, but it is also not the most standard American English (that would be Omaha, Nebraska). Whether the dialect is California or Pacific or western is something I'd love to see a credible source of, but it's not absurd to have the article, even if just to indicate that this dialect is not particularly marked and is pretty much just standard american english. 76.126.249.172 (talk) 07:31, 29 August 2012 (UTC)

Citation for existence of California Dialect

I don't have access to the full text of the Buchholtz paper cited as the source for the articles leading assertion that there is a *dialect* of *California English*, but the abstract makes it clear this article is the dialectal boundaries within California. As such it seems an unlikely candidate for demonstrating that there is a dialect of California English distinct from standard american english. An article on California English may make sense even if it doesn't meet the standard definition of a dialect, given in the [dialect] article as "A dialect is distinguished by its vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation (phonology, including prosody). Where a distinction can be made only in terms of pronunciation, the term accent is appropriate, not dialect." So there are two questions here: 1) is California the relevant distinction, instead of being within a larger geographic region or Northern and Southern California differing from each other more than they differ from their neighbors in other states, and 2) is it a dialect as opposed to an accent and some trivia about highway naming? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.126.249.172 (talk) 07:45, 29 August 2012 (UTC)

Since when is California(n) English a "dialect"?

I think that this very first assertion in the article is incorrect. As I understand it, a dialect is a variant of a language which, while it is understandable to other speakers of that language, contains significant unique elements. In no way does what passes for English in California constitute a dialect. This should be stricken from the article, which should serve to further diminish whatever importance this mish-mosh of an article has. Basically, it's a collection of language trivia, not a description of anything of linguistic importance. +ILike2BeAnonymous (talk) 21:09, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

So you're saying that California English has no distinctive features? —Tamfang (talk) 22:20, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

Agreed. Calling it a "dialect" seems like nonsense to me. More like a few phonetic variations. Wikidemon (talk) 11:42, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

Using that criterion, there would be really few, if any "dialects" of American English at all, since most Americans can understand other Americans with little or no difficulty. Some varieties of American English, such as that spoken by native inhabitants of New York City, may be irritating to listen to, while others, such as what is spoken by some in the rural South, may sound "funny," but even in those cases, usually there is little trouble for any native American English speaker in understand what is being said. 169.199.121.7 (talk) 21:58, 18 December 2012 (UTC)

A "dialect" is just a variety of a language—the way people in a particular region use the language. AJD (talk) 22:11, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

i agree, dialect at this stage is still quite a stretch, but i disagree that its "just a few phonetic variations"; many linguists find that california english is establishing its own identity and will continue to diverge from GA. MattTabarnaknaytev (talk) 19:31, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

I agree. I've studied languages extensively and speak 4 foreign languages including 2 variants of German. California has an accent and regional slang but no dialect, because even people in California do not understand the slang. An accent refers to different pronunciation, but a dialect refers to different vocabulary and grammar. The majority of these "examples" are slang because they are circumstantial and not standard. For instance, "I'm gonna hit the beach" (west coast) and "I'm down the shore" (East coast/NJ/PA) applies only to that situation. "Beach" and "shore" are used exactly the same by both sides of the US in other circumstances. A dialect is largely unintelligible to people who don't speak it, for example Swiss German and High German. True German speakers may understand 40% of any of the 26 Swiss German dialects. For example in High German, "I'm going shopping" could be "Ich gehe einkaufen," but a Swiss dialect would say "I gang gö shoppe." Same with "Hier bin ich noch nie gewesen" becomes dialect "Do bini nonia gsi." The amount of variation is astounding, meaning they are dialects and not merely accents. 76.89.137.125 (talk) 22:05, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

Chesterfield

"In 1958, essayist Clifton Fadiman pointed out that Northern California is the only place besides England where the word chesterfield is used as a synonym for sofa or couch"

This is common in Canadian English. CüRlyTüRkey^Talk_Contribs 13:03, 16 December 2012 (UTC)

Most Americans would probably think of a formerly popular brand of cigarettes if they heard the word "Chesterfield." Of course, many of the younger generation (even those who smoke) have probably never heard of the Chesterfield brand, so they might be more amenable to thinking of it as at least some kind of furniture. 169.199.121.7 (talk) 22:02, 18 December 2012 (UTC)

Original research etc.

There appears to be a lot of original research in this article, as well as junk that's probably true but of questionable encyclopedicness, like the whole section on freeway nomenclature. Examples of stuff that I question are:

• "Norcal" or "NoCal"? Maybe this is an LA thing, but sure as hell not in SF.
• "over the hill, up the hill" etc. as a Bay Area thing? I understand the reason for these terms but I lived in SF all through the 90's and never heard these terms.

More basically, I'm a linguist and I think a lot of the stuff about California speech is very questionable. For example, much of the stuff that's supposedly "particular" to California speech, e.g. raising of vowels before "ng", near monophthongization of /ou/ and /ei/, the cot-caught merger, the merry-marry-Mary merger, are actually characteristic of the speech of large parts of the U.S. Furthermore, as pointed out by an earlier comment, much of the supposed "California vowel shift" is actually very incipient and not characteristic of most speakers. Some of the vowel movements are present in many speakers, e.g. the fronting of /u/, some are characteristic of certain speakers (e.g. the fronting of /ou/ is traditionally associated with surfers), but many of them appear to be present only in certain groups of young speakers. It's true that sound changes in process tend to be visible in younger speakers but not older ones, but that still doesn't mean that all changes characteristic of some young speakers are necessarily in the process of being generalized. Benwing (talk) 05:09, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

Are you saying you've never heard the term "NorCal"? I find that hard to believe, if you lived in SF for an extended period of time. "NorCal" and "SoCal" are probably used more by younger speakers, but I'd be surprised if any Bay Area resident hadn't at least heard those terms.

The over the hill/up the hill thing is more questionable. Where I grew up in the Berkeley area people would say "over the hill" sometimes to refer to the suburbs on the other side of the Berkeley/Oakland Hills ("Lamorinda") but I've never heard either of these used the way they're described in the article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 58.8.59.101 (talk) 11:02, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

I grew up in the Bay Area (80s and 90s) and never heard "NorCal" or "SoCal" until I moved to the East Coast. People from the Northeast U.S., not just Southern California, used those terms. Things may have changed in the past 10 years, but that would be hella fast ( :) ) --Atemperman (talk) 05:44, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

In the 90's, "SoCal" was used occasionally, but only in a joking way, and it was perceived as an LA thing. The opposite was claimed sometimes to be "NoCal" but this was even less common and even more of a joke if/when it was ever heard. "NorCal" didn't exist at all. Possibly these terms existed in the suburbs, but not in the city. Benwing (talk) 05:08, 14 February 2013 (UTC)

I've been in "SoCal" for thirty years (LA and San Diego) and have never heard anyone say "NorCal" or "NoCal". Most people just say "up north". I've only heard "SoCal" in advertising, mostly in print, since it's an obvious way to save space, but never in regular conversation. Another variant, "The Southland", I've never heard anyone but LA area newscasters say.71.103.82.103 (talk) 03:30, 21 February 2013 (UTC)

• Speakers in the Greater Los Angeles area often quickly slur vowel sounds, making certain syllables sound longer and flow closer.[6]

is this serious? not only is this a disaster from a linguistic point of view [none of those descriptions would fly in any linguistic paper], but the citation is to tvtropes whos accent pages are even worst than some of the things people get away with on wikipedia. And while i do see where Benwing is coming from, i would presume a fellow linguist to know that its the collection of all these qualities that separate this region from others. --Sisgreenflag (talk) 19:19, 3 July 2013 (UTC)