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Honestly, I never thought about the "rules" of how these words were used... that's just how we talk in much of Texas (and probably other places). I can guess t
by blunte 9y ago
Honestly, I never thought about the "rules" of how these words were used... that's just how we talk in much of Texas (and probably other places).
I can guess that "out" meaning west is because in early American times, going west was dangerous. You were going "out" of safety and into the wild. Going "over" just meant going horizontally on the map but within an established (safe) area.
Up and down are kind of obvious, given their relationship to a map. We go "up north" or "down south".
Also, and I imagine this has been brought across HN before - y'all can be singular or plural. Or rather, it can be "about singular", meaning we may not be sure if we're talking about one or a few. But if we want to be clear that we're talking about more than a few, we say "all y'all". Make no mistake, it means every one of you.
Every region has its interesting local language quirks. I guess few regions are full of people as proud as Texans, so we don't often hear about the quirks of Iowans.
- gowld 9y ago> so we don't often hear about the quirks of Iowans. It's highlighted in one of the most famous Broadway shows of all time. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xV7ZcVFSWWU&t=1m50s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xV7ZcVFSWWU&t=1m50s
- blunte 9y agoI clearly picked exactly the wrong example!
- look_lookatme 9y agoThe sing-songy nature of "all y'all" provides such a nice wind-up for dropping the hammer on a bunch of kids not listening to their mother. The foundational difference between "y'all get out in the yard for family photos" vs "all y'all better get your asses out in the yard for family photos" is unmistakeable if you grew up in Texas. I use y'all in slack/email within the company I work at and correspondence with just about anyone (I live in the Northeast, but still use it), but I save "all y'all" for my closest friends, even though they might not have grown up hearing it.
- ianamartin 9y agoDefinitely agree with this. Both are plural, but all y'all is a direct address to a specific group of people. I might be chatting with people at work, standing around getting a snack in the kitchen or, like you said, hanging out in slack general. And I might toss something out to the room, "Y'all want to go out to this comedy club on Thursday night?" But when Thursday night rolls around and 3 of us are waiting on 5 people to commit and log out, then it's, "All y'all need to wrap it up."
- blunte 9y agoHaha, I love hearing other uses of this. For me, "all y'all" is usually followed by "can fuck off" or "are about to get your asses kicked". I'm not violent, but it means I'm _really_ frustrated. Funny!
- adrianmonk 9y agoIt's still kind of true within Texas that going to the West takes you away from civilization. The four biggest cities are all in the eastern part of the state, and the western part of the state is a whole lot of very empty desert punctuated with smaller cities and towns that are very far apart. One could even consider it a smaller equivalent of the Australian Outback, another occurrence of the word "out".
- blunte 9y agoSame concept! And I bet there is a similar feeling for Texans and Aussies (may I use that term?) when speaking of the wild regions.
- js2 9y ago> y'all can be singular or plural. Or rather, it can be "about singular", meaning we may not be sure if we're talking about one or a few. But if we want to be clear that we're talking about more than a few, we say "all y'all". I can't get a straight answer on the y'all / all y'all distinction from you Texans. I asked here before and someone from Dallas said both are plural. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15234742 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15234742 :-)