Well, after a year of working at MeySen and taking one trip back to the 'Burgh (as in Pittsburgh, PA), I realized something: I talk like I'm from Pittsburgh. The way that I say some things are just plain wrong, apparently! Now, when you live in Pittsburgh and are teaching native English speakers, it doesn't quite matter if you talk like a yinzer (someone from Pittsburgh with a strong accent and dialect) or not. But when you are teaching ESL students in another country and you want them to understand sounds that specific letters make, it does matter. Over the past year, from having a supervisor listen to me teach and from listening to my students repeat words and sounds that I teach them, I realize that I do speak Pittsburghese after all and do say somethings totally wrong. Here is the Pittsburgh dialect that I've picked up and inadvertently passed on to my students.
- Instead of pronouncing "ee" or "ea" like a long e (as in bee), I pronounce it as a short i sound. So "feel" and "fill" sound the same, as do "still" and "steal". I don't do this for all words, mostly ones ending in "r" or "l". I make extra effort to make sure I pronounce "he'll" like "heal" instead of "hill". (People here make fun of me when I say I'm gonna watch the "Stillers" game.) When I think about the words in stories and songs before I teach them, I am usually pretty good at it; I now realize I need to slow down to say "he'll", "I'll", "steal", etc correctly. But recently, for the past month, I was teaching my kids a song "If I Could Really Fly"; I just now realized that instead of teaching it as the long e sound, I teach it as "rilly". So now all my kids say "rilly". When I heard them pronouncing it that way, it made me realize I'm more of a yinzer than I though.
- Instead of saying "I'll" like "aisle", I say "awl". I didn't even realize that pronouncing the word like "awl" was wrong until one of the supervisors watched me teach a lesson about the contraction "I'll". After class, she kept asking me to pronounce it and I did (the Pittsburgh way) and couldn't see it issue. She finally had to treat me like a kid and say, "Listen to how I say it and watch my lips." The best part is that when I told people from Pittsburgh this story over Christmas break, they all thought the same thing -- "What's wrong with awl?! That's how you say it!".
- "oo" and "u" are two separate sounds?! You've got to be kidding me! Since when do "pull" and "pool" sound different?! I still don't get the difference. Note: if you are not from Pittsburgh, you must think I'm stupid with this, but if you are from Pittsburgh, then you too are reading these two words the exact same way right now and are as confused as me.
- I don't say "can" I say "kin". Again, I didn't realize this until I was teaching my students a chant called "Yes, I Can!". I didn't think I had a problem with this word, because when it is at the end of a sentence I say it correctly. But when I begin a sentence with "can", I always say "kin". When I heard my kids saying, "Kin I have this?" I realized again my Pittsburgh tongue!
- "Slippy" to me is the same as "slippery" and a perfectly acceptable word. On the Kindergarden sledding trip I said, "Be careful, boys and girls, it's slippy out!". A few seconds later one five year old said, "It's slippy!" and another teacher corrected her saying, "Say, 'It's slippERy." Oops!
- The other day I told one of my third grade girls, who was looking in my purse, to stop being so nebby! She looked very confused. When I realized I'd said nebby instead of nosy, I just dropped it.
- During Japanese class, our teacher taught us the word kirenisuru, which means "to clean up". Next to the word, in the book that Kris and I share, I wrote "to redd up". He looked at me like I was crazy and asked me what it meant. I looked at him like he was crazy and said "'To clean up.' Haven't you ever heard that before?!"
- Another thing that I do is use "needs", "wants", and "likes" with a past participle (ex "The room needs cleaned" or "That dog likes petted"). In fact, in high school, I was taught that this WAS proper English! And I constantly argue with other people about it.
- During summer camp I warned my kids to be careful of the "jaggerbushes" so that the didn't get "jagged" by the "jaggers". Yes, this is a true story.
Ah, yinz guyz kin take da girl outta da 'Burgh n'at, but yinz guyz can't take da 'Burg outta da girl!
PS Whether you are from Pittsburgh or not, you should check out Pittsburgh Dad on youtube. Pittsburghers will get a big laugh from this guy and people not from Pittsburgh might understand what I mean by the way I talk.
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