Talk:Western American English

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

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 12:51, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Possible outline
 Jack (Lumber) 19:18, 27 June 2008 (UTC)
 * settlement history
 * a dialect area in formation and largely undefined: settlement populations too young and too new
 * vocabulary: words originating in the West (and more recently in Calif.)
 * phonology & phonetics:
 * Unlike the North, cot-caught merger and no NCS
 * Unlike the South, no glide deletion of /ai/
 * Not clearly distinct from either Canada or the Midland:
 * Unlike Canada, little Canadian raising
 * some speakers have the Canadian shift, but /ɑ/ is fronter than in Canada
 * Unlike the Midland, /ou/ is not fronted and the cot-caught merger is complete (but not in San Francisco or (?) L.A.)
 * But /u/ is fronted like in most of North America
 * Some speakers have the pin-pen merger
 * Local dialects:
 * California
 * Pacific Northwest
 * Utahnics
 * Recent studies of Oregon and Arizona


 * Don't be mad if the page ends up being almost exactly like your outline. I'll be sure to include terms like buckaroo, etc.  I don't think the California English or Utahnics articles should really exist.  This is my reference.  I think it's basically a free version of ANAE. Thegryseone (talk) 22:44, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

A great deal of tendencies attributed to California residents are not present in Arizona or New Mexico, so I think California English is worth separating. Of course, this is OR as an Arizona resident.210.250.80.39 (talk) 09:46, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

Conservative /ou/
So you're saying that the /ou/ in Los Angeles is the same as the one in Chicago. I have a hard time believing that. I always thought it would be the same as the /ou/ in the Midland, but I guess not. Thegryseone (talk) 01:10, 18 October 2008 (UTC)
 * I'm not saying that--Labov is. Well, your average Valley girl and surfer dude sure don't have /ou/ = [ou]... But if you check the formant charts, Western /ou/ actually has a back nucleus, not unlike Inland Northern /ou/.  I'm gonna have to check the age of the TELSUR speakers from California. I'm  Jack (Lumber) and I approve this message. 01:32, 18 October 2008 (UTC)
 * It's alright Jack. Don't take it too seriously.  It's not a big deal. Thegryseone (talk) 01:37, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

More specifics
It seems like other American dialect pages (i.e., Southern American English, Inland Northern American English, even Pacific Northwest English) have more in-depth discussions of specifics than this article. I don't know much about it, which is why I requested an expansion.

Info
I live in the western area,and I've never heard anyone say the word "buckaroo".

Likewise, grew up and lived in three different western states and never once heard the word "baby buggy." It's a stroller. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.60.253.168 (talk) 22:33, 7 March 2018 (UTC)

Questions About Vocabulary Section
Based on the descriptions given, I'm unsure as to the relevance of several of the items listed under vocabulary to Western American English. Particularly, "baby buggy", "gunny sack", and "shivaree". Based on the additional information given, it seems like these words may actually be from Southern or Appalachian English. Does anyone have access to the source listed in order to confirm if these terms are actually used in the Western United States? Lmshaw00 (talk) 07:24, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

Merger proposal
English in New Mexico → Western American English # New Mexico

Evaluations of the page English in New Mexico's sources have been carried out in the past by editors, included by myself here and here. A lot has changed within the article since these previous discussions. Although the page seems to show a healthy abundance of references/notes, here are the sources that actually are directly relevant to English in New Mexico: This reminds me of the recent discussion about Utah Mormon English, in which the decision was to merge the page as a section within Western American English. Accordingly, I'm reaching out to all the participants from that discussion, plus some recurring editors of the English in New Mexico page itself: please provide any thoughts or insights.
 * Balukas and Koops (2014) = compares a phonetic feature of bilingual New Mexican Chicanos with typical monolingual New Mexicans; its finding show divergence between the two groups
 * Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006) = shows a full-fool merger in progress in Albuquerque and Santa Fe (as well as in many other regions), plus what every region of the U.S. calls a sweet bubbly drink
 * Hernández (1993) = defines a North-Central New Mexican variety of Chicano English (its info can easily be merged to Chicano English, I feel)
 * "New Mexico" (2018) = provides three Spanish loanwords and a couple other lexical features of New Mexican English
 * 3 other sources that each attest to just one lexical feature in New Mexico (4, if we include a source that's been marked with a WP:NOTRELIABLE tag)
 * 3 sources that describe New Mexican chile
 * Some sources that discuss local placenames

I propose the same basic idea here: "New Mexico" can get a section at Western American English. No notable scholars have found anything overwhelmingly unique about this (generalized) variety of English, let alone the existence of any unified single New Mexican dialect. Wolfdog (talk) 11:58, 8 May 2021 (UTC)

No Nevada?
Is there not enough info on Nevada, or is it's English similar enough to other states for it to not have a section? theawesomepikachu20 (talk) 17:16, 18 October 2022 (UTC)
 * Both? Wolfdog (talk) 19:11, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

T-glottalization more common?
This article states that t-glottalization is more common in the west ("Although common nationwide, T-glottalization is even more common in Western dialects, particularly among younger speakers.") I'm going to remove reference to this source as it doesn't support this claim: this investigates the occurrence of t-glottalization across word boundaries, not word-internally. I have thusly marked it with just 'citation needed' LinguaNerd (talk) 03:54, 23 October 2022 (UTC)


 * I added the source back, and changed the wording to specify that t-glottalization at word boundaries is more common in the Western US, as supported by the reference. Erinius (talk) 10:00, 23 October 2022 (UTC)

New Mexican Spanish loanwords
I removed canales from the list (reasons in the history comment). But I would also question the wording used for "acequia" - this word is not used as a stand-in for a "ditch", which is a generic term for a kind of soil excavation. Acequia refers specifically to an irrigation system - the ditch is constructed to deliver water, and will have flow control mechanisms at its start and/or along its length. It is also an odd example, given that it is itself a recent loan word to Spanish from Arabic (al-sāqiyah ( لاساقیة)) PaulDavisTheFirst (talk) 20:39, 21 June 2023 (UTC)

In fact, the entire loanword section needs reconstruction, because actually even canales is loanword, but precisely because it is not a synonym. The wording should reflect that these are true loanwords for things not found in other (english-speaking) places, rather than syonyms for existing English-denoted objects. PaulDavisTheFirst (talk) 20:43, 21 June 2023 (UTC)