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Edited by Azizi Powell
This pancocojams post presents showcases two YouTube videos of people from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania doing the "Accent challenge tag". A few comments from these videos are included in this post.
The content of this post is presented for linguistic and socio-cultural purposes.
All copyrights remain with their owners.
Thanks to all those who are featured in this post and thanks to all those who are quoted in this post.
This is part of an ongoing pancocojams post about United
States dialects in general and African American dialects in particular.
Click https://pancocojams.blogspot.com/2024/01/black-washington-dc-accents-non-black.html for a pancocojams post that showcases some YouTube accent tag videos of people from Washington D. C.
Also, click the United States accents tag below for additional pancococojams posts
on that subject
SELECTED COMMENTS FROM THE DISCUSSION THREAD FOR VIDEO #1
1. @ohevshalomel, 2013
"You said "ahrn" for "iron" and "gum band". You're a real Pittburgher. :D"
**
2. @livviewashington6011, 2013
"Love you, Girl!!!! Love the Pittsburghese!!!"
**
3. @ThePinkHammerLA, 2014
"Its not a water bug its a potato bug lol"
**
4. @SteelCityMagnolia, 2014
"Thanks for the correction on Potato Bug. "Bug that rolls up...". Water bugs are the ones I used to mistake for crickets as a kid. Lol."
**
5. @Dantastic123, 2014
"What i don't like about the accent tag setup is that everyone is reading. So basically you are thinking about what you say BEFORE you say it. For instance, if someone told you to read "Did you eat yet?" you would read it normally. But in common conversation, you'd say "Jeet yet?" or Jeet jet?"
Also,for instance, people read "probably", but true pittsburghese people tend to say "prolly" (without really pronouncing the L's, and sometimes we say "probly". Also, instead of "fire", we say "fahr", and so on, and so on, and so on.... I grew up in the HEAVY accent part of Pittsburgh you talk about, and we almost never pronounce L's or "Th" sounds. For example, the silent L's..... kyle, tile, mile, towel, and vowel all rhyme. And the ending sounds like the "ow" in cow (the animal). And the silent "th's". "There" sounds like "air", example. "over air" instead of "over there". "Is one" instead of "this one", etc.
But you are correct, the Pittsburgh accent is fading with the local youth. It seems like a lot of people are moving to Pgh and making fun of the accent so people are trying hard to lose it.
P.S. I went to Perry too! Go commodores!"
-snip-
How Pittsburghese is spoken (or was spoken) might vary on which neighborhood a person lives/lived in. For those who are curious about this, SteelCityMagnolia, the woman who made this video, indicated that she went to Perry High School. That Pittsburgh public school is located in the Perry neighborhood of the Northside* area of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. That public high school's name has changed to "Perry Traditional Academy" and it is now a neighborhood high school for Northside students with partial magnet programs.
"Magnet programs" are programs within a neighborhood public school. Those magnet programs include students who don't live in a school's feeder neighborhood/s. A "magnet school" is a school whose entire student population consist of people who apply for that school regardless of where they live in that city. Everyone who applies to a magnet program/school may not be selected to attend that program or school.)
*There are a number of Northside neighborhoods in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Depending on which part of the Northside one lives in, that neighborhood ranges from being almost entirely Black or almost entirely White. Click https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perry_Traditional_Academyfor a list of the neighborhoods that are considered "the Northside" of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
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SHOWCASE VIDEO #2 -Accent Tag From A Pittsburgher
SoFarAway2419, Oct 25, 2011
WORDS:
Garage
herb
schedule
figure
jaguar
lieutenant
water
advertisement
vase
route
ballet
tomato
leisure
address
ate
buoy
aluminium
aunt
wash
oil
theater
iron
salmon
caramel
fire
sure
data
ruin
crayon
toilet
New Orleans
pecan
both
again
probably
spitting image
Alabama
lawyer
coupon
mayonnaise
syrup
pajamas
caught
QUESTIONS:
What is it called when you throw toilet paper on a house?
What is the bubbly carbonated drink called?
What do you call gym shoes?
What do you say to address a group of people?
What do you call the kind of spider that has an oval shaped body and extremely long legs?
What do you call your grandparents?
What do you call the wheeled contraption in which you carry groceries at the supermarket?
What do you call it when rain falls while the sun is shining?
What is the thing you change the TV channel with?
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SELECTED COMMENTS FROM THE DISCUSSION THREAD FOR VIDEO #2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RBw_acrVao4
1. @mininurulaini97, 2011
"I'm from Pittsburgh born and raised, but I have
immigrant/asian parents. So i dont have an accent at all. And I say pill bug,
soda, sneakers or tennis shoes and shopping cart"
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2. @patrickdcameron, 2012
"haha you have a serious pittsburgh accent especially on the
word iron. fyi the word pop came from the noise an old glass soda bottle used
to make when you removed the rubber stopper with the metal hinged that held it
on... POP! practice the words iron, eagle and hill/pill/etc. those took me
quite awhile to say propertly. also your mouth shouldn't contort so much when
you try to enunciate words."
**
3. @awyeahitsme, 2012
"Well I don't know about others but I can tell a difference. I'm from Pittsburgh and when I've been in WV, West Virginians seem to have a more defined "southern" accent mixed in. Otherwise its probably pretty similar"
**
4. @Ellwoodcitygirl, 2013
"I from Pittsburgh but now live in the SC :( The word that
stood out to me that you have a Pitt accent was when you said iron. Also its
definitely roll polly bugs or potato bug, pop not soda, you guys or yinz when
addressing a group of people. I can't stand the y'all crap it like finger nail
on the chalk board. lol"
-snip-
"SC" = South Carolina
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