Regional vocabulary within American English varies. Below is a list of lexical differences in vocabulary that are generally associated with a region. A term featured on a list may or may not be found throughout the region concerned, and may or may not be recognized by speakers outside that region. Some terms appear on more than one list.
American English regional vocabulary
Grinder, hero, hoagie, or sub?
Gym shoe, sneaker, or tennis shoe?
Coke, pop, soda, or tonic?
Historically, a number of everyday words and expressions used to be characteristic of different dialect areas of the United States, especially the North, the Midland, and the South; many of these terms spread from their area of origin and came to be used throughout the nation. Today many people use these different words for the same object interchangeably, or to distinguish between variations of an object. Such traditional lexical variables include:[a]
frying pan (North and South, but not Midland), spider (obsolete New England),[1] and skillet (Midland and South)
gutter (Northeast, South, and West), eaves trough (West and Inland North), and rainspouting (Maryland and Pennsylvania)
pit (North) and seed (elsewhere)
teeter-totter (North; widespread),[c]seesaw (South and Midland; now widespread), and dandle (Rhode Island)
firefly (more Northern and Western) and lightning bug (widespread)
pail (North, north Midland) and bucket (Midland and South; now widespread)
sneakers (Northeast and fairly widespread), tennis shoes (widespread outside the Northeast) and gym shoes (Chicago and Cincinnati)
soda (Northeast, Greater Milwaukee, Great St. Louis, California, and Florida), pop (Inland North, Upper Midwest, and Northwest), coke (South), and tonic (Eastern New England possibility) See also: Names for soft drinks in the United States
you guys (widespread), y'all (Southern and South Midland), you'uns and yins (Western Pennsylvania), and yous or youse (New York City, Philadelphia, New Jersey, and Northeastern Pennsylvania)[2]
However many differences still hold and mark boundaries between different dialect areas, as shown below. From 2000 to 2005, for instance, The Dialect Survey queried North American English speakers' usage of a variety of linguistic items, including vocabulary items that vary by region.[2] These include:
generic term for a sweetened carbonated beverage
drink made with milk and ice cream
long sandwich that contains cold cuts, lettuce, and so on
rubber-soled shoes worn in physical education class, for athletic activities, etc.
Below are lists outlining regional vocabularies in the main dialect areas of the United States.
ope – a form of alert or apology used when trying to get around someone or something; E.g. "Ope, let me squeeze right past ya". Ope is most often used in Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois, and Minnesota.[5]
Mischief Night (or, rarer, Cabbage Night) – an annual night when, by custom, preteens and teenagers play pranks; usually, the night before Halloween[b]
hosey – (rare, but esp. parts of Massachusetts & Maine) to stake a claim or choose sides, to claim ownership of something (sometimes, the front seat of a car)[b]
dooryard – area around the main entry door of a house, specifically a farmhouse. Typically including the driveway and parking area proximal to the house[b]
barn-burner (now widespread) – an exciting, often high-scoring game, esp. a basketball game[b]
hoosier (esp. Indiana) – someone from Indiana; (outside of Indiana, esp. in the St. Louis, Missouri area) a person from a rural area, comparable to redneck[c]
A soft drink is generally known in the American Midland as pop, except for being soda around Greater St. Louis in Missouri and Illinois, and coke in central Indiana and central and western Oklahoma[d]
“We picked up one excellent word– a word worth travelling to New Orleans to get; a nice limber, expressive, handy word– ‘Lagniappe.’ They pronounce it lanny-yap: Mark Twain, Life on the Mississippi
pop (widespread in West and North); soda (predominates in California, Arizona, southern Nevada);[d]coke (in parts of New Mexico and Tucson, Arizona)[20] – sweetened carbonated beverage
snowmachine (Alaska) – a motor vehicle for travel over snow. Outside Alaska known as a snowmobile[21]
Dictionary of American Regional English. Vol.IV. 2002. Examples in this section are from this published lexicology from interviews carried out between 1965 and 1970, except where otherwise noted
Frederic G. Cassidy; Frederic Gomes; Joan Houston Hall, eds. (2002). Dictionary of American Regional English. Vol.IV. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.
Vaux, Bert Scott A.; Golder; Starr, Rebecca; Bolen, Britt (2005). The Dialect Survey. Archived from the original on April 30, 2016. Retrieved April 30, 2016. Survey and maps
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