were are you all from?

[thirdrail]

Y'all is not substandard English, it is the plural of "you". Sure beats the pants off the "youse" many of you Yankees use! Y'all is gaining acceptance nationally.

A New Yorker that got smart and moved South a half century ago. 

[Kevin Strong]

My wife's got an aunt in Saskatoon. Surely you know her. (Actually, her name is Shirley.) Great place, albeit rainy when were there.

Me, I live in mass suburbia. I'm the green house with the trees in the front and the SUV in the driveway.  (Centennial, CO)

And yes, "y'all" is proper.

Later,

K

[SteamGene]

Third Rail,
Formal standard English got rid of a separte plural form for "You" around the time of Shakespeare's death.  Even then it only occured in the familiar form.  (Thou art a knave.  You are knaves.)  You are obviously old enough to have sat through the congugation of verbs back in high school:
I run trains                   We run trains
You run trains               You run trains
He runs trains                They run trains.

Remember? 
OTOH, I agree that ya'll sounds nicer than "youse." 
Gene

[Teamanglerx]

Southeast Iowa.  I have several railroads that operate in my area for inspiration.

[kevin2083]

I live in the brown house near that trailer park just past the cotton field and before that little church. There's a mailbox in front and a bass boat in back, and this little yappy dog every now and then.

Y'all is very commonly used around here. It seems 'formal' to me because I have heard it so much.

This place would be Huntsville, AL

[dave2-8-0]

From the land of the Mudhens, 40mi S. of The Durango & Silverton, & 90mi W. of the Cumbres & Toltec.  Farmington, New Mexico. Whose Oil Boom of the 50s & 60s saved the narrow gage lines West of Alamosa Co, and all the Mudhen Ks that hauled the drill pipe and pipelines in to Farmington, there by making the D&RG from Walsenberg West profitable for years..

Dave Taylor
New Mexico Northern RR

[r.cprmier]

Gene;
Y'alls mean to tell me they said "youse" when Willie the Shake was around?

Rich

Connecticut-THE Constitution State!  Also the fourth smallest.  Youse'll see when y'alls come on down!!

[SteamGene]

"Ya'll" is plural. 
No, in Shakespeare's time, and it was beginning to change then, second person singular familiar was "thou art," but second person plural familiar was "you are."  Second person formal was "you are" in both singular and plural.
But it was changing.  In one of the comedies one character says to another: "You are an ass."  Tradtionally he should have said "Thou art an ass." 
Gene

[jsmvmd]

Dear Gene,

My sister-in-law from KY says "y'all" is singular and "all y'all" is plural!  Around here in central PA that pertains to "yinz" being singular and "yinzes" as plural.  Ain't that a hoot!

Best Wishes,

Jack

[SteamGene]

Jack, folks say things like that.  I've heard the same in many areas of the South. 
Gene

[Philc40]

I'm from the South's most northern city, Y'all know what city? Hint, Home of the "Standard Railroad of the World"

[Royce Wilson]

  Or if you are from above the Mason-Dixon line, it s "U'ins".

    white house on Oak Street in Atlanta.....Royce

[Atlantic Central]

Philc40,

Not to challenge your own definiton of yourself, but if you mean Philly, home the once mighty PRR, than I have to take exception to your notion that Philly is a Southern city.


And to all,

As a life long resident of the border state of Maryland, which truely is the state that is not really comfortable as part of the South or the North, nothing North of the Mason Dixon has any claim to being part of the South.

But poor Maryland, the only slave state that did not secede and the only state to have formal named units fighting on both sides in the War of Northern Agression. Home of Lincoln's assin, Conferate Generals, and home of industries and a railroad that helped the North win. The State that had both free and slave blacks in 1860, in fact it had more free blacks than slave on the fatefull day of the first shots on Baltimore streets when crouds threw bricks at Yankee troops.

So, now, if you want to speak of the the special nature of the Mid Atlantic, that's another story. The Mid Atlantic, those states south and west of the Hudson River and North of the Potomac, (New York, Pennsylvana, Maryland, Delaware and New Jersey), has its own unique style, speach, history, architecture, cluture, and traditions that are neither "Northern" or "Southern".

And generally, most people native to the Mid Atlantic don't use any of the phrases in question, we simply say "you", but we fail at pronoucing the name of one of our major cities, Baltimore is often heard as "balmore" or "balimore".

As for me, I live in the big blue Queen Anne house with the turret and the wrap around porch, eight houses up from Tucker's store, and the tracks of the Ma & Pa run right behind my house, in the little village of Forest Hill. (at least this would have been a accurate discription in 1905 or so)

Sheldon

[SteamGene]

Sheldon,
Deleware, Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri were all slave states.  None of them passed Ordinances of Succession. 
Gene

[Atlantic Central]

Gene,

Thank you for the correction and reminder on that. I simply forgot about Delaware's slave status, and forgot about those two "new" states alltogether.

Delaware, Kentucky and Missouri, while allowing slavery, did not have slavery based economies. Maryland, especially southern Maryland was truely a "southern state" in an economic sense. Baltimore and the western part of the state had many "northern sympathies" and had little use for slavery, but even many of those people where reluctant to go against their neighbors in the southern part of the state. As a State we where truely divided on the issue.

But my main point was Maryland is certainly the northern most southern State and the identity of the Mid Atlantic is allways lost in this "North - South" thing.

Maryland, Delaware, Pennsylvana, New Jersey and even New York (espescialy up state), have many things in common that seperate them from New England and from the South East.

I have enjoyed most of my time living, working and traveling in the Mid Atlantic, but will happily move to the south in a few years as the Mid Atlantic now cannot decide if it wants to be like New England or California, neither outcome is acceptable for me.

Sheldon