Texan English is the array of
American English
American English, sometimes called United States English or U.S. English, is the set of variety (linguistics), varieties of the English language native to the United States. English is the Languages of the United States, most widely spoken lan ...
dialects spoken in
Texas
Texas (, ; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2 ...
, primarily falling under
Southern U.S. English. As one nationwide study states, the typical Texan accent is a "Southern accent with a twist".
The "twist" refers to
inland Southern U.S.,
older coastal Southern U.S., and
South Midland U.S. accents mixing together, due to Texas's settlement history, as well as some lexical (vocabulary) influences from
Mexican Spanish
Mexican Spanish ( es, español mexicano) is the variety of Dialect, dialects and Sociolect, sociolects of the Spanish language spoken in Mexican territory. Mexico has the largest number of Spanish speakers, with more than twice as many as in a ...
.
In fact, there is no single accent that covers all of Texas and few dialect features are unique to Texas alone. The newest and most developed Southern U.S. accent features are best reported in
Lubbock
Lubbock ( )
is the 10th-most populous city in the U.S. state of Texas and the seat of government of Lubbock County. With a population of 260,993 in 2021, the city is also the 85th-most populous in the United States. The city is in the northwe ...
,
Odessa
Odesa (also spelled Odessa) is the third most populous city and municipality in Ukraine and a major seaport and transport hub located in the south-west of the country, on the northwestern shore of the Black Sea. The city is also the administrativ ...
,
Houston
Houston (; ) is the most populous city in Texas, the most populous city in the Southern United States, the fourth-most populous city in the United States, and the sixth-most populous city in North America, with a population of 2,304,580 in ...
and variably
Dallas
Dallas () is the List of municipalities in Texas, third largest city in Texas and the largest city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the List of metropolitan statistical areas, fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States at 7.5 ...
, though general features of the dialect are found throughout the state, with several exceptions:
[Labov et al., 2006, p. 126-131.] Abilene and somewhat
Austin
Austin is the capital city of the U.S. state of Texas, as well as the seat and largest city of Travis County, with portions extending into Hays and Williamson counties. Incorporated on December 27, 1839, it is the 11th-most-populous city ...
,
Corpus Christi, and
El Paso
El Paso (; "the pass") is a city in and the seat of El Paso County in the western corner of the U.S. state of Texas. The 2020 population of the city from the U.S. Census Bureau was 678,815, making it the 23rd-largest city in the U.S., the s ...
appear to align more with
Midland U.S. accents than Southern ones.
History
After
Mexico
Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...
gained independence in 1821,
Mexican Texas
Mexican Texas is the historiographical name used to refer to the era of Texan history between 1821 and 1836, when it was part of Mexico. Mexico gained independence in 1821 after winning its war against Spain, which began in 1810. Initially, ...
legally permitted an influx of American settlers from the United States (mainly the Southern United States),
[Walsh, Harry, and Victor L. Mote. "A Texas Dialect Feature: Origins and Distribution." ''American Speech'', 49.1-2 (1974). 40-53.] who within a decade outnumbered Hispanics in Texas,
["Texas English."](_blank)
''Do you speak American?''. 6 Sept 2012 making English as common as Spanish in
central
Central is an adjective usually referring to being in the center of some place or (mathematical) object.
Central may also refer to:
Directions and generalised locations
* Central Africa, a region in the centre of Africa continent, also known as ...
and
north Texas
North Texas (also commonly called North Central Texas) is a term used primarily by residents of Dallas, Fort Worth, and surrounding areas to describe much of the north central portion of the U.S. state of Texas. Residents of the Dallas–Fort Wor ...
. After
Texas became an independent republic in 1836, English, with its distinct Southern influences, became the predominant language. After the
Mexican Revolution
The Mexican Revolution ( es, Revolución Mexicana) was an extended sequence of armed regional conflicts in Mexico from approximately 1910 to 1920. It has been called "the defining event of modern Mexican history". It resulted in the destruction ...
of 1910-1920, a great number of Spanish-speaking Mexicans immigrated to Texas,
[Wolfram, Walt, and Natalie Schilling-Estes. ''American English: Dialects and Variation''. Malden: Blackwell Publishing, 2008.][Atwood, E. Bagby. ''The Regional Vocabulary of Texas''. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1962.] slowing down in the mid-20th century only to increase massively since 1990,
driving the development of a young Spanish-influenced dialect of Texan English: Tejano English.
Research
Some linguists draw dialect boundaries based upon
phonological
Phonology is the branch of linguistics that studies how languages or dialects systematically organize their sounds or, for sign languages, their constituent parts of signs. The term can also refer specifically to the sound or sign system of a ...
(sound-pattern) differences and others on lexical (word-usage) differences, leading to various views on how to classify dialects in Texas, often by dividing the state into an eastern versus a western dialect region.
[Underwood, Gary N. (1990), "Scholarly Responsibility and the Representation of Dialects: The Case of English in Texas", ''Journal of English Linguistics'' 23: 95-112.] 20th-century lexical research delimited Texas into two "layers": a southern Texas layer along the Mexican border with several Spanish
loanwords
A loanword (also loan word or loan-word) is a word at least partly assimilated from one language (the donor language) into another language. This is in contrast to cognates, which are words in two or more languages that are similar because the ...
and a central Texas layer settled by speakers of German and other
European language
Most languages of Europe belong to the Indo-European language family. Out of a total European population of 744 million as of 2018, some 94% are native speakers of an Indo-European language. Within Indo-European, the three largest phyla are Rom ...
s amidst a dominant
Anglo-American
Anglo-Americans are people who are English-speaking inhabitants of Anglo-America. It typically refers to the nations and ethnic groups in the Americas that speak English as a native language, making up the majority of people in the world who spe ...
settlement.
[Walters, Keith]
"Dialects"
''Handbook of Texas Online''. Texas State Historical Association. Web. 14 August 2012[Carver, Craig M. (1987), ''American regional dialects : a word geography''. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.] 21st-century phonological research reveals accents in Texas grouped in a way not easy to demarcate in terms of simple geographical boundaries,
[Labov, William; Ash, Sharon; Boberg Charles (2006). ''Atlas of North American English: Phonetics, Phonology and Sound Change''. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.] and ongoing research reveals an urban–rural divide within Texas becoming more significant than a region-wide divide.
Some linguists propose that
urbanization
Urbanization (or urbanisation) refers to the population shift from rural to urban areas, the corresponding decrease in the proportion of people living in rural areas, and the ways in which societies adapt to this change. It is predominantly t ...
, geographic and
social mobility
Social mobility is the movement of individuals, families, households or other categories of people within or between social strata in a society. It is a change in social status relative to one's current social location within a given society ...
, and the
mass media
Mass media refers to a diverse array of media technologies that reach a large audience via mass communication. The technologies through which this communication takes place include a variety of outlets.
Broadcast media transmit information ...
have homogenized the speech of the United States to a national norm.
[Bailey, Guy. "Directions of Change in Texas English." ''Journal of American Culture'' 14.2 (1991): 125-134.] Due to rapid urbanization, increasing dominance of
high tech
High technology (high tech), also known as advanced technology (advanced tech) or exotechnology, is technology that is at the cutting edge: the highest form of technology available. It can be defined as either the most complex or the newest te ...
industries, and massive migrations, Texan speech has been reshaped as well, especially since 1990.
The general tendency in the phonology of Texas English is that mergers expand at the expense of distinctions, although traditional Southern-style Texan English preserved older phonemic distinctions.
Since much of the traditional regional vocabulary concerned farming and rural life, these terms are now disappearing or being replaced by technical terms.
Urban–rural contrast
As stated above, an internal rural–urban split is emerging within Texan English, meaning that most traditionally Southern (or stereotypically Texan) features remain strong in rural areas but tend to disappear in large urban areas and small cities.
The urban-rural linguistic split mainly affects Southern-style phonological phenomena like the
pen-pin merger
The close and mid-height front vowels of English (vowels of ''i'' and ''e'' type) have undergone a variety of changes over time and often vary by dialect.
Developments involving long vowels
Until Great Vowel Shift
Middle English had a lon ...
, the loss of the offglide in /aɪ/, and upgliding diphthongs, all of which are now recessive in metropolitan areas.
Meanwhile, some traditional grammatical features like ''y'all'' and ''fixin' to'' are expanding to
non-natives in metropolitan areas as well as to the Hispanic population.
Phonology
Essentially all Texas English phonologically falls under the
Southeastern super-dialect region of the United States and often specifically the
Southern dialect region, though noticeably not the cities of El Paso, Abilene, and Austin, and not particularly Houston and Corpus Christi.
Moreover, as of 21st-century research, the accents of Dallas show enormous variability.
*Of the three possible stages of the
Southern Vowel Shift
Southern American English or Southern U.S. English is a regional dialect or collection of dialects of American English spoken throughout the Southern United States, though concentrated increasingly in more rural areas, and spoken primarily by Wh ...
, the first two stages occur throughout Texas, except in El Paso, Abilene, Austin, and Corpus Christi—the first stage alone appears in Houston.
[Labov et al., 2006, p. 61.] This means
monophthong
A monophthong ( ; , ) is a pure vowel sound, one whose articulation at both beginning and end is relatively fixed, and which does not glide up or down towards a new position of articulation. The monophthongs can be contrasted with diphthongs, wh ...
ization of in many contexts ( → ) and lowering of → (the two of which also result in
Southern drawl
A drawl is a perceived feature of some varieties of spoken English and generally indicates slower, longer vowel sounds and diphthongs. The drawl is often perceived as a method of speaking more slowly and may be erroneously attributed to laziness ...
ing: /æ/ →
(j)ə and /ɛ/ →
(j)ə.
**
Monophthong
A monophthong ( ; , ) is a pure vowel sound, one whose articulation at both beginning and end is relatively fixed, and which does not glide up or down towards a new position of articulation. The monophthongs can be contrasted with diphthongs, wh ...
ization of in all contexts, even before
voiceless consonant
In linguistics, voicelessness is the property of sounds being pronounced without the larynx vibrating. Phonologically, it is a type of phonation, which contrasts with other states of the larynx, but some object that the word phonation implies v ...
s, is a linguistic innovation concentrated in the
Texas Panhandle
The Texas Panhandle is a region of the U.S. state of Texas consisting of the northernmost 26 counties in the state. The panhandle is a square-shaped area bordered by New Mexico to the west and Oklahoma to the north and east. It is adjacent to ...
and
North Texas
North Texas (also commonly called North Central Texas) is a term used primarily by residents of Dallas, Fort Worth, and surrounding areas to describe much of the north central portion of the U.S. state of Texas. Residents of the Dallas–Fort Wor ...
: the whole northern half of the state (except Abilene). This makes words like ''mite'', ''rice'', ''life'', ''type'', etc. sound like , , , and .
[Feagin, Crawford. "Vowel Shifting in the Southern States." ''English in the Southern United States''. Ed. Stephen J. Nagle and Sara L. Sanders. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003. 126-140.]
**A study of
Texas Triangle
The Texas Triangle (also known as Texaplex) is a region of Texas which contains the state's five largest cities and is home to the majority of the state's population. The Texas Triangle is formed by the state's four main urban centers, Austin ...
English shows a strong orientation of primarily young, female, and urban speakers towards a diphthongization of /aɪ/ in all contexts. In fact, the monophthongization of /aɪ/ has left Texas Triangle speech almost entirely.
[Jung, Natalie A. (2011) "Real-Time Changes in the Vowel System of Central Texas English". "Texas Linguistics Forum" 54:72-78.] 89% of the speakers born in the 1980s use diphthongal realizations of /aɪ/, whereas only 11% use monophthongal or intermediate realizations of /aɪ/.
* The
cot-caught merger of the two historical vowels sounds and , in words like ''caught'' and ''cot'' or ''stalk'' and ''stock'', is becoming increasingly common throughout the United States, thus affecting Southwestern and even many Southeastern dialects, towards a merged vowel .
[Bailey, Guy. "Directions of Change in Texas English.".''Journal of American Culture'' 14.2 (1991): 125-134.] The ''ANAE'' reports a completed merger in Amarillo, Odessa, and variably El Paso, but the rest of Texas is also rapidly transitioning towards the merger.
*A few younger speakers realize the vowel , unlike typical Southerners, as open front , which is more in line with the
Western U.S. dialect. This lowering occurs only in speakers with the cot-caught merger, and is not yet as common as in
California
California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...
and
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...
.
*Three
mergers before /l/ are recorded in some Texas English: the ''fill–feel'' merger (most concentrated from the Panhandle down to San Antonio), the ''fell–fail'' merger, and the ''full–fool'' merger.
*Non-rhoticity has reversed on a massive scale, as in most of the Southern U.S., and is now only heard in some older speakers.
Grammar
Texas English may use many grammatical constructions typically associated with Southern U.S. English, including ''fixin' to'',
[Pederson, Lee, ed. ''Linguistic Atlas of the Gulf States: Social Pattern for the Linguistic Atlas of the Gulf States''. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1992. (Shows the term used by 57% of the population of Upper Texas and by 43% in Lower Texas] multiple modals like ''might could'' and ''should oughta'' (reportedly used by every social class and, as of the 1980s ''Linguistic Atlas of the Gulf States'', predominately in Upper and Lower East Texas), and plural verbal ''-s'' as in ''Our father and mother helps'' used by both black and (somewhat less commonly) white Texans.
[Bailey, Guy, Natalie Minor, and Patricia Cukor-Avila. "Variation in Subject-Verb Concord in Early Modern English." Language Variation and Change, 1 (1989): 285-300 (Shows that 70% of the black population and 43% of the white population put an ''–s'' on the third person plural in folk speech.)]
Vocabulary
Many of these lexical terms are shared with the Midland and Southern dialects generally:
*''buzzard'': vulture
*''blue norther'': The term ''blue norther'' refers to a weather phenomenon that often appears in the
temperate zone
In geography, the temperate climates of Earth occur in the middle latitudes (23.5° to 66.5° N/S of Equator), which span between the tropics and the polar regions of Earth. These zones generally have wider temperature ranges throughout t ...
s all over the world (including Texas). It is a quickly moving autumnal
cold front
A cold front is the leading edge of a cooler mass of air at ground level that replaces a warmer mass of air and lies within a pronounced surface trough of low pressure. It often forms behind an extratropical cyclone (to the west in the Norther ...
which drops the temperatures rapidly and brings along rain and after a period of blue skies and cold weather. The derivation of this term is unclear. Some people say that the term refers to a norther (borealis/north wind) which sweeps "out of the Panhandle under a blue-black sky" – from the heat to the blue black cold. Others suggest that ''blue norther'' denotes the color of the sky that appears after the bad weather front has passed. Yet others say that people associate blue with the cold that the front brings along. Variants of this term are ''blue whistler'', ''blue darter'' and ''blue blizzard''. Whereas the term ''blue whistler'' is also used in Texas the two latter terms are from out of state. ''Blue norther'', however, is purely Texan. Since Spanish times, the effect of blue norther has been noted in Texas and this phenomenon has often been exaggerated. But contrary to the belief of many people blue norther is not unique to Texas.
[Barkley, Roy]
"Blue Norther"
.2012. Texas State Historical Association. 5 Sept 2012.
*''
bowie knife'': a long hunting knife (pronounced ''boo-ee''). Named for Alamo hero Jim Bowie.
*''dogie'': calf.
["Texas English"](_blank)
''Do you speak American?'' Web. 14 August 2012
*''fixin' to'': a future-tense
modal verb
A modal verb is a type of verb that contextually indicates a modality such as a ''likelihood'', ''ability'', ''permission'', ''request'', ''capacity'', ''suggestion'', ''order'', ''obligation'', or ''advice''. Modal verbs generally accompany the b ...
analogous to "about to" or "going to" in much of
American English
American English, sometimes called United States English or U.S. English, is the set of variety (linguistics), varieties of the English language native to the United States. English is the Languages of the United States, most widely spoken lan ...
.
''E.g.,'' "I'm ''fixin' to'' leave for school."
*''geddup'': outfit (clothing)
get up" but pronounced with accent meaning an outfit or costume typically meaning an exceptional context and may be negative or positive connotation*''howdy'': a general greeting; a shortened form of "How do you do?"
*''looker'': an attractive woman
*''maverick'': stray or unbranded.
*''motte (mot)'': The term ''motte'' or ''mot'' refers to a small grove of trees in open grasslands. It was first introduced by
Irish
Irish may refer to:
Common meanings
* Someone or something of, from, or related to:
** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe
***Éire, Irish language name for the isle
** Northern Ireland, a constituent unit ...
immigrants in the 1830s. They brought this term from Ireland where people used to call similar woods this way. In the United States one hears of motte only in Texas.
*''plumb'': superlative adjective, equivalent to "absolutely" or "very much". E.g., "He's ''plumb'' out of luck."
*''
pole cat'': a skunk
*''shinnery'': a well-known term in western Texas for a
shinnery oak
''Quercus havardii'' (common names include shinnery oak, shin oak and Havard oak) is a deciduous, low-growing, thicket-forming shrub that occupies some in the southern Great Plains of North America. Clones may reach hundreds to thousands of year ...
or a sand shinnery oak. These trees grow in Texas, western
Oklahoma
Oklahoma (; Choctaw language, Choctaw: ; chr, ᎣᎧᎳᎰᎹ, ''Okalahoma'' ) is a U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States, bordered by Texas on the south and west, Kansas on the nor ...
, and eastern
New Mexico
)
, population_demonym = New Mexican ( es, Neomexicano, Neomejicano, Nuevo Mexicano)
, seat = Santa Fe
, LargestCity = Albuquerque
, LargestMetro = Tiguex
, OfficialLang = None
, Languages = English, Spanish ( New Mexican), Navajo, Ker ...
. The term shinnery can also mean the area or landscape in which shinnery oaks grow.
*''spindletop'': a gushing oil well
*''tank'': stock pond.
*''varmint'': a wild or rascally animal, especially a mammal (sometimes used endearingly). Derivative of ''vermin''.
*''
y'all
''Y'all'' (pronounced ) is a contraction of ''you'' and ''all'', sometimes combined as ''you-all''. ''Y'all'' is the main second-person plural pronoun in Southern American English, with which it is most frequently associated, though it also ap ...
'': a second-person plural pronoun; a shortened form of "you all"
*''(over) yonder'': an adverbial used to designate a faraway place; analogous to "over there"
Statewide Spanish loanwords
Due to Spain's past influence in Texas, the vocabulary of Texas is much more influenced by Spanish than the vocabulary of other states. Some of the Texan terms that originated from Spanish are listed below.
*': Sometimes grassy strips between two divided highway lanes are called '.
*': The Spanish word used to be solely Texan. Not until recently did the term start to expand. Now it is well known in other States of the U.S. and many other countries. It refers to a
hot pepper
Chili peppers (also chile, chile pepper, chilli pepper, or chilli), from Nahuatl '' chīlli'' (), are varieties of the berry-fruit of plants from the genus ''Capsicum'', which are members of the nightshade family Solanaceae, cultivated for t ...
originated from Mexico.
*' (from Spanish ): rope or lasso.
*' or ' (from Spanish = ''painted''): familiar spotted or piebald Western pony.
*' (from Spanish = ''to exchange''): spare horse or remount; mainly used in West Texas.
*': The noun ' is derived from the Spanish adjective or (feminine). It refers to a Hispanic Texan whose heritage is from Texas before Texas was incorporated into the United States. This term also embraces cultural manifestations in language, literature, art,
music
Music is generally defined as the art of arranging sound to create some combination of form, harmony, melody, rhythm or otherwise expressive content. Exact definitions of music vary considerably around the world, though it is an aspect ...
, cuisine, etc. already in 1824 the author of the Mexican Constitution of 1824, Miguel Ramos Arispe, called the citizens of Texas . After the Mexican War the term which contains the term denoted the residents of the Mexican state
Coahuila y Tejas
Coahuila y Tejas, officially the Estado Libre y Soberano de Coahuila y Tejas (), was one of the constituent states of the newly established United Mexican States under its 1824 Constitution.
It had two capitals: first Saltillo (1822–1825) for ...
. Already in 1833 Hispanics in Texas started to identify themselves as . In 1855 when the
San Antonio
("Cradle of Freedom")
, image_map =
, mapsize = 220px
, map_caption = Interactive map of San Antonio
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdivision_name = United States
, subdivision_type1= U.S. state, State
, subdivision_name1 = Texas
, s ...
newspaper reported a letter by
José Antonio Navarro
José Antonio Navarro (February 27, 1795 – January 13, 1871) was a Texas statesman, revolutionary, rancher, and merchant. The son of Ángel Navarro and Josefa María Ruiz y Peña, he was born into a distinguished noble family at Sa ...
read at the second meeting of the Spanish-speaking members of the
Bexar County
Bexar County ( or ; es, Béxar ) is a county in the U.S. state of Texas. It is in South Texas and its county seat is San Antonio.
As of the 2020 census, the population was 2,009,324. Bexar County is included in the San Antonio–New Bra ...
Democratic party the term first appeared in print. occurred more often in speech and texts when the political activity of Hispanics in Texas became pronounced, in particular since the
Chicano
Chicano or Chicana is a chosen identity for many Mexican Americans in the United States. The label ''Chicano'' is sometimes used interchangeably with ''Mexican American'', although the terms have different meanings. While Mexican-American ident ...
movement of the mid-1960s started. This term is common enough that it is considered an item in the Texas lexicon. Other and broader terms used for the same ethnic group are ', ', ', ', and '.
[Metcalf, Allan. ''How We Talk: American Regional English Today''. Boston: Houghton Mifflin,2000.]
*' or ' (Anglicized form of the Spanish word '): a groom; the typical Texas wrangler was "a bachelor and worked with several outfits over the course of his hard career".
South Texas vocabulary
*''acequia'' (from Spanish ''acequia''): an irrigation ditch.
*''arroyo'' (from Spanish ''arroyo''): a gulch, ravine, creek bed
*''
caliche
Caliche () is a sedimentary rock, a hardened natural cement of calcium carbonate that binds other materials—such as gravel, sand, clay, and silt. It occurs worldwide, in aridisol and mollisol soil orders—generally in arid or semiarid regions, ...
'' (from Spanish ''caliche''): a hardened layer of calcium carbonate in the ground.
*''chaparral'' (from Spanish ''chaparral''): brush-covered terrain
*''frijoles'' (from Spanish ''frijol''): beans
*''hacienda'' (from Spanish ''hacienda''): the main house of a ranch
*''icehouse'': a term used in the San Antonio area to mean a convenience store. Elsewhere, this denotes an open-air tavern, the origin of which dates back to the times when fresh beer was stored in "ice houses" placed strategically along beer delivery routes for local and regional delivery. Over time these locations began to serve cold beer, since it was stored there already, and other conveniences, such as food items, cigarettes, etc. In more modern times, the surviving ice houses are little more than open air beer bars. It is the "open air" feature (often obtained with multiple garage doors in place of walls), in fact, that distinguishes an ice house from a tavern.
*''llano'' (from Spanish ''llano''): a plain
*''olla'' (from Spanish ''olla''): an earthenware pot or crock
*''pelado'' (from Spanish ''pelado''): a catch-all term for low-class and popular-culture people. Now considered an offensive and derogatory word
Pelado
In Mexican society, ''pelado'' is "a term invented to describe a certain class of urban 'bum' in Mexico in the 1920s."
Historical background
Mexico has a long tradition of urban poverty, beginning with the ''léperos'', a term referring to shiftle ...
*''pilon'' (from Spanish ''pilón''): a bonus, lagniappe
*''reata'' (from Spanish ''reata''): a rope or lasso
*''resaca'' (from Spanish ''resaca''): a small body of water
*''toro'' (from Spanish ''toro''): a bull
*''vaquero'' (from Spanish ''vaquero''): a cowboy
Central Texas vocabulary
*''clook, cluck'': (from German ''Glucke'') a setting hen
*''cook cheese, kochcase'': (from German ''Kochkäse'' = (literally) ''smearing cheese'') a soft cheese cooked and poured into jars
*''grass sack'' or ''gunny sack'': a burlap bag
*''icebox'': a refrigerator or freezer (used interchangeably to refer to both)
*''plunder room'': a storage room
*''roping rope'': a lariat
*''settee'': (from ''settle'') a couch or sofa
*''smearcase'': (from German ''Schmierkäse'') cottage cheese
*''tarviated road'': a paved or blacktopped road
*''tool house'': a toolshed
*''wood house'': a woodshed
In the media
Texan English frequently shows up in the media. In the 1950s and 1960s, many
Hollywood
Hollywood usually refers to:
* Hollywood, Los Angeles, a neighborhood in California
* Hollywood, a metonym for the cinema of the United States
Hollywood may also refer to:
Places United States
* Hollywood District (disambiguation)
* Hollywood, ...
western movies
The Western is a genre set in the American frontier and commonly associated with folk tales of the Western United States, particularly the Southwestern United States, as well as Northern Mexico and Western Canada. It is commonly referred ...
like
''Giant'',
''Hud'', and
''The Alamo'' were set in Texas. In those movies, Hollywood stars like
James Dean
James Byron Dean (February 8, 1931September 30, 1955) was an American actor. He is remembered as a cultural icon of teenage disillusionment and social estrangement, as expressed in the title of his most celebrated film, ''Rebel Without a Cause' ...
,
Rock Hudson
Rock Hudson (born Roy Harold Scherer Jr.; November 17, 1925 – October 2, 1985) was an American actor. One of the most popular movie stars of his time, he had a screen career spanning more than three decades. A prominent heartthrob in the Golde ...
,
Dennis Hopper
Dennis Lee Hopper (May 17, 1936 – May 29, 2010) was an American actor, filmmaker and photographer. He attended the Actors Studio, made his first television appearance in 1954, and soon after appeared in ''Giant'' (1956). In the next ten years ...
,
Paul Newman
Paul Leonard Newman (January 26, 1925 – September 26, 2008) was an American actor, film director, race car driver, philanthropist, and entrepreneur. He was the recipient of numerous awards, including an Academy Award, a BAFTA Award, three ...
, and
Patricia Neal
Patricia Neal (born Patsy Louise Neal, January 20, 1926 – August 8, 2010) was an American actress of stage and screen. A major star of the 1950s and 1960s, she was the recipient of an Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award, a Tony Award, and two ...
first had to learn how to speak Texan English and were instructed by native Texans. Also the famous TV series ''
''Dallas'''' was often characterized by Texan English.
Texas Instruments
Texas Instruments Incorporated (TI) is an American technology company headquartered in Dallas, Texas, that designs and manufactures semiconductors and various integrated circuits, which it sells to electronics designers and manufacturers globall ...
sometimes uses Texan English in its products. The TIFORM software for its
TI-990 {{Short description, Series of 16-bit computers by Texas Instruments.
The TI-990 was a series of 16-bit minicomputers sold by Texas Instruments (TI) in the 1970s and 1980s. The TI-990 was a replacement for TI's earlier minicomputer systems, the T ...
minicomputer sometimes displayed "Shut 'er Down Clancey She's a-Pumping Mud" as a humorous error message.
The Texan accent gained nationwide fame with the presidency of native Texan
Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon Baines Johnson (; August 27, 1908January 22, 1973), often referred to by his initials LBJ, was an American politician who served as the 36th president of the United States from 1963 to 1969. He had previously served as the 37th vice ...
. A lifelong resident of the
Texas Hill Country
The Texas Hill Country is a geographic region of Central and South Texas, forming the southeast part of the Edwards Plateau. Given its location, climate, terrain, and vegetation, the Hill Country can be considered the border between the Ameri ...
, Johnson's thick accent was a large part of his personality and brought attention and fame to the dialect.
The Texan dialect gained fame again when
George W. Bush
George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Republican Party, Bush family, and son of the 41st president George H. W. Bush, he ...
started to serve as president. He had moved to
West Texas
West Texas is a loosely defined region in the U.S. state of Texas, generally encompassing the arid and semiarid lands west of a line drawn between the cities of Wichita Falls, Abilene, and Del Rio.
No consensus exists on the boundary betwee ...
at the age of two and has since retained the Texan dialect. Words like America sometimes sounded like "Amur-kah" or even just like "Mur-kah".
["Drawl or Nothin’"](_blank)
''Do you speak American?''. 6 Sept 2012 Former U.S. Secretary of State
Rex Tillerson
Rex Wayne Tillerson (born March 23, 1952) is an American engineer and energy executive who served as the 69th U.S. secretary of state from February 1, 2017, to March 31, 2018, under President Donald Trump. Prior to joining the Trump administ ...
also speaks with a distinctively Texan accent.
Tejano English
Due to hundreds of years of
Spanish
Spanish might refer to:
* Items from or related to Spain:
**Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain
**Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many Latin American countries
**Spanish cuisine
Other places
* Spanish, Ontario, Cana ...
and later
Mexican
Mexican may refer to:
Mexico and its culture
*Being related to, from, or connected to the country of Mexico, in North America
** People
*** Mexicans, inhabitants of the country Mexico and their descendants
*** Mexica, ancient indigenous people ...
intermingling, around 6 million (ca. 29%) people in Texas speak Spanish as the first language.
[Feal, Rosemary G., ed]
"MLA Language Map Data Center."
Modern English Association. 4 Sept 2012
Recent data shows that Spanish is still increasing.
[Feal, Rosemary G., ed]
"MLA Language Map Data Center."
Modern English Association. 4 Sept 2012 Since there are so many Spanish speakers in Texas, Spanish has a high impact on the
English dialect spoken in Texas.
["MLA Language Map Data Center."](_blank)
Modern English Association. Ed. Rosemary G. Feal. 4 Sept 2012 Many
Mexican Americans
Mexican Americans ( es, mexicano-estadounidenses, , or ) are Americans of full or partial Mexican heritage. In 2019, Mexican Americans comprised 11.3% of the US population and 61.5% of all Hispanic and Latino Americans. In 2019, 71% of Mexica ...
in Texas speak their own variety of English which has many Spanish features (terms, phonology, etc.),
Tejano
Tejanos (, ; singular: ''Tejano/a''; Spanish for "Texan", originally borrowed from the Caddo ''tayshas'') are the residents of the state of Texas who are culturally descended from the Mexican population of Tejas and Coahuila that lived in the ...
English, a
Chicano English
Chicano English, or Mexican-American English, is a dialect of American English spoken primarily by Mexican Americans (sometimes known as Chicanos), particularly in the Southwestern United States ranging from Texas to California,Newman, Michael.T ...
dialect mostly spoken by working-class Mexican Americans. A very distinctive feature of that dialect is the /-t,d/-deletion in words which contain a /t/ or /d/ in the final position.
[Bayley, Robert. "Variation in Tejano English: Evidence for Variable Lexical Phonology." ''Language Variety in the South''. eds. Cynthia Berstein et al. Tuscaloosa: The University of Alabama Press, 1997. 197-210.]
References
External links
William Labov's webpageTexas English Linguistics LabTexan Translation (KUT Radio)
{{Portal bar, Texas
American English
Dialects of English
Languages of Texas