Talk:California English/Archive 2

Freeway nomenclature?
Isn't this article about a dialect of English? Does it really need a whole section about freeway nomenclature? Larry V (talk &#124; e-mail) 20:18, 5 August 2007 (UTC)
 * I'd say definitely not, especially since a great majority of the section itself isn't even necessarily true, so much as a series of gross generalizations.President David Palmer 12:57, 6 August 2007 (UTC)
 * HELLA YEA i agree because in Minnesota we always refer to highways as "94" "35W/35E" "494" "694" etc, we never say I-94 or I-35W ick gross. In terms of a linguistic view, why would people refer to highways with the Interstate prefix when its definitely easier to refer to them without. What source said it anyway? Agreed, grossly generalized. Davumaya 07:46, 23 August 2007 (UTC)
 * Agreed - i'm in milwaukee and we always say '94' '45' '43', and for the exits i never hear anyone refer to them by number...its always 'Take 94 to Van Buren', etc. In fact, can anyone name a place where they actually DO say "take the highway to exit 334B"?32.168.249.216 19:25, 30 August 2007 (UTC)
 * The distinction between southern California and other parts of the US where I've lived is not the omission of the "I" or "Interstate" - it's the addition of the definite article "the." For example, in NJ, "take 295 to 42" but in LA, "take the 5 to the 405." But I believe the paragraph about San Diego County not adhering to the use of "the" is mistaken: I've lived in San Diego for several years, and everybody here says, "the 805 is jammed; take the 5 instead." Not sure how to document that... can examples of actual usage be used? E.g.: http://www.hallontheweb.com/cgi-bin/datacgi/database.cgi?file=hw&report=sp&ID=025

There are only two places I have ever heard the letter "I" used when describing an Interstate highway, and that is in Detroit and Sacramento. Interestingly enough, I-80 is referred to as "Interstate 80". —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jzcrandall (talk • contribs) 17:48, 3 September 2008 (UTC)
 * I heard I-nn often enough in my youth, near the intersection of I-57 and I-74. —Tamfang (talk) 22:18, 19 November 2008 (UTC)


 * Sacramento has a Business-80 and an I-80, hence the distinction. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.174.53.96 (talk) 03:12, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

I grew up in San Diego County during the 50's and 60's. As I recall, there was some use of either "US" or "State" to prefix numbers: "US 80" or "State 94", although perhaps the unadorned number was the most common usage. I never used, nor do I recall others using "the" in describing highways; this sound rather pretentious to me. But since the article seems to be saying this is used for Interstates, such usage may have developed with the increase of that system. There wasn't a lot of interstate in SD County during my time there. Wschart (talk) 19:26, 24 June 2010 (UTC)

Completely unsubstantiated and incorrect. In Texas we refer to all of our city highways as freeways as well. This entire section has been totally made up by whoever wrote it, and I would vote to just delete it, as it is false and doesn't contribute anything. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.77.139.81 (talk) 17:23, 9 December 2010 (UTC)

Many freeways in Southern California are not interstates. Or, they may be interstates for part of the route and state highways for another (see, 91 or 210, for instance). So, it is more accurate to say 91 or 210 instead of I-91 or I-210. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.174.53.96 (talk) 03:09, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

The paragraph on lane numbering is inaccurate, suggesting that it's a Southern California specific nomenclature. Even the citation given is to a state source, not a local source, the DMV handbook teaches lane numbering to any 15 year old applying for a permit, and any police officer in the state can tell you how lanes are numbered. It's true that in areas where there are few lanes, there's no reason for people to refer to numbers.

As an aside, it's legitimate to refer to this as California English, since it's dictated by the CADOT and by definition differs from other state standards (WA is the opposite), most states have no standard, and the DOT has no standard.

I'm moving it from Southern CA to the general area for freeway nomenclature. Although technically lane numbering is not limited to freeways. Hagrinas (talk) 15:56, 20 July 2013 (UTC)

Examples?
I'm not a linguist (and I imagine 99.99% of readers aren't) so it would help if there were some examples, especially when the article is talking about things like vowel shifts. Most people also don't understand the different pronunciation symbols...I realize that these are the tools used to express differences of dialect it's just that they are meaningless to almost everyone. I think that not only should there be an emphasis on accuracy but also on communicating the information to a layperson. Liz Read! Talk! 23:45, 7 September 2013 (UTC)

California drawl
I took a paragraph out, one which described the "California drawl". It had no references. Before deleting, I looked for some support from the linguistics literature, and found no scholarly analysis of the drawl. Spreading my net wider I found a number of uses of the term in fiction and non-fiction, but none of the uses defined the drawl, especially in the way that it was carefully defined here. I deleted the paragraph for WP:Original research. Binksternet (talk) 16:29, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

If you referring to Midwestern and Southern "Drawl" sounds, how about a connection with Oklahoma and Kansas? The Dust bowl migration of the so-called Okies introduced the Southern accent to the west coast in the 1920's and 30's before the migration ended in World War II. This localized dialect is sometimes called "Kernekie", merged the terms Kern County and Okie, and can be heard in the San Joaquin Valley. + 71.102.7.77 (talk) 08:30, 21 February 2010 (UTC)

I agree with some others that this isn't a particularly good article. Also, in the Phonetics section, there is no mention at all of the tendency to pronounce 'a' sounds in foreign words as if they were 'o' sounds. E.g. Milan pronounce like 'Milon' and 'Moulin Rouge' like 'Moulon Rouge'.MarkRae (talk) 13:28, 20 July 2015 (UTC)

Pitch range
Not being a linguist, I'll post this for discussion rather than edit directly: one of the most recognizable features of California English is that its speakers use a broader pitch range than most other U.S. speakers. The Valley Girl song is an extreme example of this (which still occurs in the San Fernando Valley). That is, Californians begin sentences at a higher pitch and end them at a lower pitch than (for example) Midwesterners.  Durova  20:41, 20 September 2006 (UTC)
 * What you're saying might apply to subcultures, but I doubt it applies to Californians in general. Rlitwin (talk) 22:21, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

Talk to a random high school age girl in the bay area and you'll experience this phenomena. I consider it a lilt, as the pitch usually goes up at the end of the sentence. Go listen to Zappa's Valley Girl, you'll hear the lilt in the first 30 seconds. It is still very common. Androsynth (talk) 15:15, 20 May 2017 (UTC)

G-dropping?
I am a native of the bay area and I have always considered g-dropping, across the entire socioeconomic spectrum, to be one of the defining characteristics of the Ca accent. However I can't find any references to this. Androsynth (talk) 19:05, 21 May 2017 (UTC)
 * I wonder if you're referring to the sound change from to . It would be nice to find more sources about this. Wolfdog (talk) 14:00, 15 July 2017 (UTC)

Disambiguation: California English the Journal
There should be a wikipedia entry for the academic journal California English. And a disambiguation link for this page. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 47.208.85.109 (talk) 22:31, 12 July 2017 (UTC)
 * Not sure if I see the connection. The journal seems to be about English education, not English dialectology. Wolfdog (talk) 14:12, 15 July 2017 (UTC)

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Spanglish
The code-switching English linguistic trend, Spanglish, is not mentioned directly in the article, although Chicano English is mentioned. Spanglish only appears as a link at the bottom. Spanglish is a newer term, awareness of its existence was increased by Adam Sandler's movie titled Spanglish_(film) Spanglish is connected to Chicano English, and with the steadily increasing Spanish influence in California English, it should be referenced directly Jason Hall UA (talk) 22:42, 25 March 2018 (UTC)Jason Hall UA (talk) 00:58, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

Surfer Dude?
Is the surfer dude accent and actual thing? 41.242.137.36 (talk) 15:04, 6 June 2018 (UTC)

Article title
Why is this "California English" rather than "Californian English"? It's a very awkward wording. "Californian English" would be much more suitable in my opinion. -Branddobbe 06:20, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
 * I agree. No one else seems to object, I guess. Maybe we can go ahead with a move then? I suspect Californian English already exists though, in which case an admin will have to do it. Theshibboleth 14:09, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Well, I object. To my ear "California English" sounds much more natural than "Californian English". Notice how is labeled "California English", not "Californian English". Also compare 57 Google hits for "California English" for Stanford University websites vs. only 2 hits for "Californian English". (I restricted it to Standford sites to make sure we were getting mostly scholarly pages; other California universities could be checked too.) User:Angr 14:20, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
 * I also object. It is not at all unusual in English for a noun to function as an adjective in a combined form. older ≠ wiser 15:53, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
 * California is indeed both a noun and an adjective - "California Girls" for example. The page is fine where it is. — sjorford++ 16:26, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
 * See also the Guardian style guide. — sjorford++ 16:27, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
 * I actually can't think of one single thing I would trust the Guardian on. And they are most certainly incorrect when they write "the adjective is California" (my emphasis). That represents a grotesque misunderstanding of English. California in "California Girls" is no more an adjective than is music in "music theory" ("musical theory" would mean something else). (Yeah, I know, it's tricky; but "the adjective..." is wrong.) Putting two nouns together (even with a space between them) is absolutely no prob in English.
 * What I've read by the experts (that I recall) suggests that both suggested titles for this article would be correct. I've seen both "California English" and "Californian English." It's almost a question of feel. "New York English" would be correct because "New Yorkian" isn't a word (or, rather, New York, unlike California, can be an adjective). And "America English" would clearly be wrong, same with "Canada English." But "Boston English," or "Bostonian English"? That's as tricky a question as "California English" vs. "Californian English." Tricky. --Cultural Freedom talk 2006-07-04 22:10 (UTC)
 * I agree that Californian can be an adjective as well as a noun referring to an inhabitant, but there really aren't many examples. Besides California Girls and California English, I can think of the California Raisins (thought up by the California Raisin Advisory Board and California oranges, and in none of these examples would "Californian" sound right. Special:Allpages reveals the California barberry, California beer and breweries, California buttercup, California cheeseburger, California Cuisine, California wine and many, many more examples. Sequoia says an alternative name is California Redwood. The only articles using Californian as an adjective are Californian Australian Football League, Californian Hindu textbook controversy, Californian Stakes, and Californian rabbit. User:Angr 07:48, 5 July 2006 (UTC)
 * After reflecting on this a bit, I think "California English" is the correct title, if we mean the English of California, the English spoken in California. Californian English would be English with Californian properties, or characteristics. This would of course characterize California English, but it would also characterize the speaking habits of a New Yorker who said "that is, like, gnarly." By way of analogy: musical theory is a theory with musical properties. The theory itself could be a theory about linguistics. Music theory, on the other hand, is a theory of music. Likewise, California English is the English of California. --Cultural Freedom talk 2006-07-05 08:07 (UTC)
 * As many of the other regional variations on American English regional differences have noun-noun constructions I suppose I can overcome my grammatical reservations and accept the title as California English. Still though, it bothers me that there is inconsistency in the titles, for example with the article on English in the South being titled Southern American English. Theshibboleth 10:45, 5 July 2006 (UTC)
 * If there's an inconsistency, it's the term "American English" instead of *"America English", but that's a real inconsistency in usage; no one would say *"America English". And Southern American English just follows that pattern: it's [Southern [American English]]. User:Angr 10:54, 5 July 2006 (UTC)
 * There's a strange rule (which I believe may be codified in a style guide, the MLA or some other) regarding the use of states' names as adjectives. Whereas one can freely use the adjective form of countries' names with nouns -- Japanese beef, French wine, American cheese -- one cannot do so for states. Usually, the adjective form (Californian, Washingtonian, New Yorker, etc.) can only be used to refer specifically to people from that state. When you want to speak, for example, of wine from California, apples from Washington, or the politics of New York State, you would refer to "California wines", "Washington apples" and "New York politics". Most people would probably agree that the phrases "Californian wines", "Washingtonian apples" and "New Yorker politics" just don't sound right. Strangely enough, however, British English seems fond of using "Californian" (and possibly other state adjective forms also) with nouns -- a simple search of the word "Californian" in the BBC News website will show you many strange combinations. Among them: "Californian condor", known obviously on this side of the pond as the California Condor. Maybe it just sounds better to them, or maybe they adhere more strictly to the rules of grammar at the expense of comfort on the ears. (Just to prove how wonderfully inconsistent American English is, one could reasonably speak of "Washingtonian politics", assuming one was referring to politics in the age of George Washington.)--75.11.161.197 04:36, 23 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Well, as someone whose only linguistic qualification is that I grew up in California, but have spent the last 20+ years living in Europe and the UK, all I can say is that whenever I hear a Brit use "Californian" as an adjective (which is almost always) I involuntarily cringe. Only a foreigner would say "Californian English". JZH (talk) 15:02, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Requested move
The argument for (and mostly against) this move is made in the section above. I oppose this move as unidiomatic. Next we will be speaking of someone's "New English home", instead of "New England home" (I have actually seen this: in the works of an Englishman who spent a few months in the United States.) Septentrionalis 19:39, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
 * The result of the nomination was Not moved -- Kim van der Linde at venus 04:38, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Recent splits
There have been recent splits of this article or new subset articles, San Francisco English and Inland California English, which are admittedly well researched and well sourced but I'm not sure if they provide anything much beyond this current article and any newly added info (which, I should add, is certainly in good faith, much appreciated, and valuable) can easily be merged into the mother page California English. California English is only 28,963 kB as it now stands, and WP's size split suggests that for "40kB / 40,000 chars" the "Length alone does not justify division." The other type of split, a content split, is recommended mainly just when dealing with "two or more distinct topics with the same or a similar titles" (i.e. a need for disambiguation), which is not the case here. The case here is a dialect or class of dialects, whose nuances and internal distinctions are still the focus of much incomplete/ongoing current research that suggests that California varieties themselves are transitional and not necessarily stable (yet). With that in mind, it's probably more appropriate to avoid breaking apart a transitional dialect's article into entirely new articles about its sub-dialects. Like with various other pages (see Western American English, Western New England English, etc.), it's more suitable at this stage to keep everything all in one place. Others' thoughts? Wolfdog (talk) 12:58, 30 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Keeping the description of Mission brogue and Inland California here sounds reasonable at this stage. Nardog (talk) 12:07, 31 December 2019 (UTC)

The editor has responded to my edits on my talk page. I'm copying and pasting their full response here and then giving my own response: Wolfdog (talk) 13:28, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Hey there! IF you remember me, I was the author on the new new dialect pages of San Francisco English and Inland California English. I saw that you took down my pages, shortened them and grouped them together on the California English page. I put many hours of work on those pages, reading through sources, listening to audio recordings to confirm that the sources matched up with what one might hear normally, writing the pages themselves, etc. and I would really like the original pages to be restored as independent articles. I feel that the independent articles give the dialects more detail than the abbreviated versions you put on the California English page. I could do this on my own, but I wanted to discuss this with you before that so we don't get into some sort of back and forth changing things. Again, I also just want to say thanks for the advice you gave and the improvements you made to those original pages. I also don't mean to be attacking you in any way with this—you have more experience on Wikipedia than I do. I was just very proud of those pages I made and would enjoy seeing them restored. Thank you!EagleyeB101 (talk) 08:11, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Hi, EagleyeB101. I apologize; I assumed you would've been looking at Talk:California English or would've added it to your watchlist so you could see the above discussion from a few days ago. Please read it, and note its mention of policy regarding Wikipedia size splits and content splits. That said, I don't feel attacked at all, and I completely understand your feelings of put[ting] many hours of work on those pages, reading through sources, etc. I've been in the exact same position many, many times and had my work reverted. In this case, I've tried to not simply erase your pages, but actually merge as much of the information and sources as I could back into California English. Admittedly, I did a less complete job of this with Inland California English. You made so many newly-worded edits (but with mostly the same content and sources) that it was very difficult for me to try to merge everything back. Feel free to copy and paste info/sources you think I missed into California English by looking at pages' histories. None of this was against your new-page edits themselves (which were excellently written and sourced, and essentially a more fleshed-out version of what we already had, in the case of Inland California English, or what can be easily merged in the case of San Francisco English/Mission brogue). Again, feel free to restore much of that info by merging it to the California English site itself. At this juncture, there is no common name among lay readers (or even the experts themselves!) of these varieties, so for everyone's benefit they would best remain as sections under the easily discoverable and intuitively-named page "California English". I understand your frustrations, and I'm totally open to continue talking here. Wolfdog (talk) 13:28, 5 January 2020 (UTC)

Wolfdog (talk) 14:02, 5 January 2020 (UTC) To start, I apologize if the formatting for this reply seems incorrect or looks strange—I'm not entirely sure how to make this reply look like a "reply". Since your last message, I've just been waiting to see if anyone else had any input and mulling over the best course to take with the Inland California English page and San Francisco English/Mission Brogue page. I understand that the names for those two dialects are not readily known by the general public or agreed upon by experts—that was actually a problem I ran into particularly for the San Francisco page. Considering this, I wouldn't want to put the information on those two topics in some place where they would not be readily seen by readers of Wikipedia. However, with merging these two articles under California English along with the other dialects already on this page, I feel that the page has drifted away from what is typical for most dialect/accent pages. Before, the California English page was fairly restricted to describing the Urban california dialect marked by the California Vowel Shift. Now, with the page's additional information on California's inland varieties and the moribund San Francisco variety, two varieties that do not hold very similar features or histories with the general Urban California variety. (San Francisco English could not even be considered a member of Western American English due to its lack of a cot-caught merger and backed /u/ pronunciations which were present even among non-Mission Brogue speakers.) Typically from what I have found on Wikipedia, accents tend to be grouped on the same page based on similar linguistic grouping, not solely geographic. The example you gave of New England English is actually a perfect example of a dialect grouping with both linguistic and geographic ties. I feel that the page for California English has drifted too far into grouping its sub-dialects based on their similar geography rather than linguistic features. Just as I want the information for Inland California English and San Francisco English, I also wouldn't want to give the wrong idea that the three main dialects in question are necessarily closely related. So, how about we keep the sub-articles for Inland California English and San Francisco English/Mission Brogue on this page, but also bring back their independent pages with a "main article" link? I could also re-word the introduction of California English to put a special emphasis on California's urban variety (what most people think of) and clarify that the two others do not necessarily fall under the same classification. This would create a similar style page to the Western American English page—there is precedent for this. Thanks for reading this far!EagleyeB101 (talk) 18:50, 16 January 2020 (UTC)
 * I see your point that I feel that the page has drifted away from what is typical for most dialect/accent pages, however, I still think this is superseded by the argument about put[ting] the information on those two topics in some place where they would not be readily seen by readers of Wikipedia. Urban and rural California varieties are certainly related and likely are dialects-in-formation, due to the relative "youngness" of Western U.S. dialects, rather than singular or consistent dialects. California English is clearly the place to go for discovering more about any varieties within that state and at this stage all the information fits comfortably there, another solid argument against splitting the page. Once again, refer back to the bytage guidelines and other WP policy I mentioned earlier. And If we're using precedent as an argument, look at even Rhode Island English, a dialect that has actually been well-established and stable for at least a century, yet does not have its own page. This isn't a problem though, since it exists quite comfortably as a section under Eastern New England English. (Dialects like this also exist as sections under Hiberno-English.) There's nothing lowly about certain dialects remaining as sections. Feel free to take any of the information from the former pages and copying-and-pasting them at California English. Wolfdog (talk) 23:18, 16 January 2020 (UTC)

L’s turning to w or y sounds....
Don’t know where I would put in the pronunciation (or placement?) of the consonant “L”

Between the original (colonial)Spanish spoken and the huge influx of African Americans from Louisiana during WWII, the “l” has softened in many places, after a vowel, to the double “ll” of French or Spanish*, with the tongue rising towards the hard palate, but not touching it.

All right > aw right

Already > aw ready

Fillmore > Fiuh more (sorry don’t have an international phonetics keyboard here!) like the French ”fille” (daughter)

ill > ihw sounding like certain british urban pronunciations the word “ill”

This does vary= yellow has a more pronounced “l” sound, with the front of the tongue lightly flicking against the hard palate (but not the tip), which can sometimes almost “miss” touching the hard palate.

Then there are the “t”s..... I can demonstrate but I don’t have the knowledge of how to write this! Sorry!

* Spanish has tended towards using “y” [j] in ella, (her) and amarillo (yellow) but the California “l” is a bit “softer” sounding. Caliallye (talk) 22:37, 15 March 2020 (UTC)


 * Seems like you might be thinking of L-vocalization. AJD (talk) 00:50, 16 March 2020 (UTC)

/o/ and /e/
Is there a reason why North American /oʊ̯/ and /eɪ̯/ are written as monophthongs here? It's not stated within the article if these two are monophthongized, which would be highly unusual in American speech. But if that's true, then it should be stated with proper referencing. AnyGuy (talk) 09:21, 15 May 2020 (UTC)