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In the 1970s, Marc Okrand, who later created the Klingon language, taught an introductory course in linguistics at the University of California at Santa Barbara
by tkgally 6y ago
In the 1970s, Marc Okrand, who later created the Klingon language, taught an introductory course in linguistics at the University of California at Santa Barbara. As an exercise to make students aware of language variation, he distributed a questionnaire that asked what terms the students used for various concepts. It also asked where the students were from. I was a TA for the course and helped to compile the students’ responses.
As I recall, some of the questions were about well-known differences within American English, such as soft drink vs. soda vs. pop or sneakers vs. tennis shoes. But a few were specific to California and were intended to show differences between the dialects of the northern and southern parts of the state.
For example, to the question “If you’re going to the city, where are you going?,” most southern Californians responded “to a city” or something similar, while northern Californians responded “to San Francisco.” There might have been one or two East Coasters who answered “to New York City.”
Another question was “Name a freeway.” The northern Californians almost invariably gave a number (“101,” “5”), while southern Californians gave a name (“the Harbor Freeway,” “the Golden State”).
I moved away from California a couple of years later and have lost track of linguistic trends there. Have southern Californians shifted away from using names for freeways to using numbers?
- dehrmann 6y ago> Name a freeway You'll occasionally hear people call parts of (the) 101 the Bayshore Freeway, or 880 the Nimitz Freeway.
- Stratoscope 6y agoOr even just "the Nimitz", especially if it's a radio traffic report. And of course there is the MacArthur Maze, not to be confused with The Stack. https://www.google.com/search?q=macarthur+maze https://www.google.com/search?q=macarthur+maze https://www.google.com/search?q=los+angeles+the+stack https://www.google.com/search?q=los+angeles+the+stack
- kuang_eleven 6y agoLiving in West LA, it varies; but it's usually the number. There are a few exceptions, but they are specific to the freeway, like most people would take the PCH, not "the 1", although people would know what you are talking about. The big 3 freeways down here (405, 5, 101) are all referred to exclusively by number.
- tkgally 6y agoThat's interesting. I grew up in Pasadena in the 1960s and early 1970s, and my recollection is that freeways in the Los Angeles area were referred to by their names, both in the mass media and in conversation. Reading the following Wikipedia entry, I wonder if that popular usage changed after the overhead freeway signs were changed. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_California_freeways#Freeway_names https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_California_freeways#F... While we're talking about the use of "the" with proper names, I've long been amused that, in most or all dialects of English, the names of rivers and oceans are preceded by "the" while the names of lakes are not: "the Nile," "the Indian Ocean," "Lake Baikal," "Lake Michigan." If anyone has an explanation for that, I would be very happy to hear it.
- kuang_eleven 6y agoJust speculation, but I wonder if it is because of the order of words; the Indian Ocean has the same structure of "[adjective] [noun]" where the adjective is describing the noun. In that case, English requires using "the" (think "the red car" or "the small book". Lakes don't do that; English would never have "[noun] [adjective]" and so the pattern isn't recognized as requiring "the" In that vein, SoCal uses "the" because "101 freeway" is the same pattern as "Indian Ocean", "101" is describing the kind of freeway you are talking about. No idea why NorCal doesn't do that; I blame brain damage caused by excessive fog.
- tatersolid 6y agoIn Chicago nearly everyone refers to highways by the person honored in their naming instead of Interstate number: Kennedy, Ryan, Ford, Edens, Reagan, Addams, Stevenson, Eisenhower. Lake Shore Drive is also an expressway in many sections but is never referred to by its State Highway number in writing or conversation.