Wild Camping in the US – advice for an Englishman, please!

[Gary Dunckel]

Ryan, it won't really help Alister much, but why don't you list a few for us? In the interest of cultural diffusion, you understand.

Y'all's truly,

"Billy Bob" Dunckel, master of the thread drift

[todd]

Y'all ain't gonna believe this!!!!

Y'all = you all

Yep, it's plural.

[David Thomas]

I'll retract my statement. Mostly. I remember hearing it used (by Southerners) as a second-person singular pronoun but maybe they meant it in the sense of "you and all you people (from snow country / who can't barbecue / with all your teeth)". H. L. Mencken knew more about the American Langauge than any of us and said, (the plural nature of y'all)

"is a cardinal article of faith in the South. … Nevertheless, it has been questioned very often, and with a considerable showing of evidence. Ninety-nine times out of a hundred, to be sure, you-all indicates a plural, implicit if not explicit, and thus means, when addressed to a single person, 'you and your folks' or the like, but the hundredth time it is impossible to discover any such extension of meaning."
— H. L. Mencken, The American Language: An Inquiry into the Development of English in the United States, 1948, p.337

Since "y'all" is plural, then "all y'all" is, what? More plural?

[Bob Gross]

"Since "y'all" is plural, then "all y'all" is, what? More plural?"

All y'all means a whole mess of people, as in "C'mon all y'all."

When I was in the military, I was stationed with many Southerners, so I picked up their dialect temporarily.

–B.G.–

[Ben C]

"All y'all" is probably an conjunction of "all of you all." Before making too much fun of "y'all", note that it exists in most other languages. "Y'all" is really a useful word that I think we should adopt as proper. I don't stick up for all things southern, but "y'all" is a good one.

While "y'all" is fine, there are a few things a southerner just wont say:

We don't keep firearms in this house.
Has anybody seen the sideburn trimmer?
You can't feed that to the dog.
I thought Graceland was tacky.
No kids in the back of the pick-up, it's not safe.
Wrasslin's fake.
Honey, did you mail that donation to Greenpeace?
We're vegetarians.
Do you think my hair is too big?
I'll have grapefruit instead of biscuits and gravy.
Honey, these bonsai trees need watering?
Who's Richard Petty?
Give me the small bag of pork rinds.
Deer heads detract from the decor.
Spitting is such a nasty habit.
I just couldn't find a thing at Wal-Mart today.
Trim the fat off that steak.
Cappuccino tastes better than espresso.
The tires on that truck are too big.
I'll have the arugula and radicchio salad.
I've got it all on a floppy disk.
Unsweetened tea tastes better.
Would you like your fish poached or broiled?
My fiancee, Paula Jo, is registered at Tiffany's.
I've got two cases of Zima for the Super Bowl.
Little Debbie snack cakes have too many fat grams.
Checkmate.
She's too old to be wearing that bikini.
Does the salad bar have bean sprouts?
Hey, it's an episode of "Hee Haw" we haven't seen.
I don't have a favorite college team.
I believe you cooked those green beans too long.
Those shorts ought to be a little longer, Darla.
Elvis who?
Be sure to bring my salad dressing on the side.

Now THAT'S thread drift.

[Gary Dunckel]

That's too funny, Ben!

[Ryan Smith]

"Checkmate" — Out of all of them, that one made me laugh the most for some reason. lol

The South will rise again!

Ryan

[Ben C]

Ah, I forgot my favorite: "You can't fix that with duct tape."

[Glenn S]

Seems to me…

Y'all is plural. (Contraction of you all)
As in "Y'all come back now, ya hear?" To a group.

Ya'll is singular. (Contraction of you will)
As in "Ya'll gonna get a lickin' now!"
Or "Ya'll come back now, ya hear?" To a person.

Seems there's also some confusion over what's a "southerner" and what's a "redneck hillbilly".

[Leigh Baker]

LOL Ben, I have tears running down my face!
This one really hit home to me, being a native Texan that also spent time in GA.
"I believe you cooked those green beans too long." Lot's of ya'll won't get it, but I've lived it. I didn't eat an "al dente" green bean til I left home!

[Luke Schmidt]

Also it the south you can say anything about anybody as long as you preface it with "Bless his heart"
As in "Bless his heart, he's dumb as a bucket of rocks"

A similar one that seems older is "God love um"

As in "God love um those two aren't the brightest kids in the world"

In Arkansas I heard "carry" in place of "take"
As in "I'm gonna carry my grandma to the doctor tomorrow."

Also among church folk gossiping is frowned upon. Ladies would never sit around and "gossip" about someone's life problems. However saying "We need to pray for…" makes it all okay.
As in "We need to pray for Susie… (insert gossip here)."

A very old phrase in Virginia if your chatting with someone in the driveway and want to invite them in is "Why don't you step on down' Apparently it dates back to buggy days when you'd invite someone to step down off their buggy for a glass of tea.

[Daniel Pittman]

Born Mississippi, raised Houston, lived San Diego, work with Vic from New Orleans.

Southern grammar with a Texan drawl, SoCal vocabulary, peppered with phrases from the yat dialect. Oh, my mother is from England so I spell colour and pronounce Aluminium correctly.

[Stephen Barber]

When English dropped "thee/thou", "you" became both the singular and plural second person pronoun. We could no longer distinguish between singular or plural with a pronoun in the second person. Southern dialect has addressed this lack with the form "y'all", which is frankly an advancement in English pronouns. We owe a debt to Southern folk for allowing English speakers to once again distinguish between second person pronoun singular "you" and second person plural "y'all".

I lived in Texas for a couple years back in the 80s, realized how useful "y'all" was, and have used it regularly ever since! If all y'all don't use it, you should!

[Owen McMurrey]

I'd try to explain it, but y'all aren't sophisticated enough to grasp the perambling and permutative nature of our vocabulatin' :D

btw, Southern is always capitalized, we are not "about to" do anything, we're "fixin' to", we drop a lot of g's so words roll off the tongue smoothly, and a Coke is a Coke(so is a Pepsi).

[Michael L]

"Unsweetened tea tastes better."

Born and raised and truly a Texan. I hate sweet tea. During the rationing during WW2, my family gave up sweetening their tea. We never took it back up, so generations of us don't like sweet tea.

[Luke Schmidt]

I don't know, a Texan that doesn't like sweet tea… what is the world coming too.

[Kevin Gurney]

I work with Irish folk, and in our Skype chats/emails they use "ye" as the 2nd person plural, as in:

"Are ye ready for the 10am meeting?"

Very cool. So "ye" still exists in English, just not American English. Do Brits/Scots use "ye", or this only an Irish thing?

[Joel Stephenson]

And I thought getting chased off patch of land by an angry farmer with a stick was bad… How am I going to cope in America where you have bears and guns? Oh well, at least I'll be able to communicate with them now.

[alastair humphreys]

Thank you all for your help.
I had a great 7 days in Texas.
7 days, 7 different sleeping spots.
A few pics here – http://instagram.com/al_humphreys

highlights were Big Bend (wonderful) and various barbecue meals (equally wonderful!)

Al

[Bob Shaver]

I think you uns got the yall form figured out. how about

Yonder comes Aunt Mable

Did you take the trash out? Well I mighta did.

Did you go to town yet? I had already did that.

Can you bring me some salt? I might could do that.

You aint tellin me nothing! (that I don't already know)

the best water I've ever tasted was branch water. (stream or creek or crick water)

me: "I just hiked for 27 days without crossing a road." Southern relative: "Why?"

that is easier said than did.

[Rick M]

del

[David Halterman]

Nice Al. The missus and I just completed our first transcontinental and spent 31 days crossing Texas alone, wild camping almost nightly.

As you said before, courtesy, common sense and discretion is all it takes. Even in Texas.

[Author]

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