''Yinz'' (see below for other spellings) is a second-person

plural The plural (sometimes list of glossing abbreviations, abbreviated pl., pl, or ), in many languages, is one of the values of the grammatical number, grammatical category of number. The plural of a noun typically denotes a quantity greater than the ...

pronoun used mainly in Western Pennsylvania English, most prominently in

Pittsburgh Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Wester ...

, but it is also found throughout the cultural region known as

Appalachia Appalachia () is a cultural region in the Eastern United States that stretches from the Southern Tier of New York State to northern Alabama and Georgia. While the Appalachian Mountains stretch from Belle Isle in Newfoundland and Labrador, C ...

, located within the geographical region of the

Appalachians The Appalachian Mountains, often called the Appalachians, (french: Appalaches), are a system of mountains in eastern to northeastern North America. The Appalachians first formed roughly 480 million years ago during the Ordovician Period. They ...

History and usage

''Yinz'' is the most recent derivation from the original Scots-Irish form ''you ones'' or "yous ones", a form of the second person plural commonly heard in parts of

Ulster Ulster (; ga, Ulaidh or ''Cúige Uladh'' ; sco, label= Ulster Scots, Ulstèr or ''Ulster'') is one of the four traditional Irish provinces. It is made up of nine counties: six of these constitute Northern Ireland (a part of the United Kin ...

. When standard-English speakers talk in the first person or third person, they use different pronouns to distinguish between singular and plural. In the first person, for example, speakers use the singular ''I'' and the plural ''we''. But when speaking in the second person, ''you'' performs double duty as both the singular form and the plural form. Crozier (1984) suggests that during the 19th century, when many Irish speakers switched to speaking English, they filled this gap with ''you ones'', primarily because Irish has a singular second-person pronoun, ''tú'', as well as a plural form, ''sibh''. The following, therefore, is the most likely path from ''you ones'' to ''yinz'': ''you ones'' > ''you'uns'' > ''youns'' > ''yunz'' > ''yinz'' . Because there are still speakers who use each form, there is no stable second-person plural pronoun form in southwest or central Pennsylvania, which is why the pronoun is variably referred to or spelled as ''you'uns'', ''y'ins'', ''y'uns'', ''yunz'', ''yuns'', ''yinz'', ''yenz'', ''yins'' or ''ynz''. In other parts of the U.S., Irish or Scots-Irish speakers encountered the same gap in the second-person plural. For this reason, these speakers are also responsible for coining the yunz used in and around Middletown, Pennsylvania, as well as the '' youse'' found mainly in New York City, the Philadelphia dialect and New Jersey, and the ubiquitous ''

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 a ...

'' of the South. A similar form with similar Irish/Scots roots is found further north in the

Atlantic Provinces Atlantic Canada, also called the Atlantic provinces (french: provinces de l'Atlantique), is the region of Eastern Canada comprising the provinces located on the Atlantic coast, excluding Quebec. The four provinces are New Brunswick, Newfoundlan ...

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 to ...

. Rarely written, it is spelled ''yous'', and is usually pronounced as or something between and . It is sometimes combined with ''all'' for emphasis, as in "Are yous all coming to the party?" This usage is also used widely within Carbon and Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania.

In popular culture

''Yinz'' place as one of Pennsylvania's most famous regionalisms makes it a badge of pride. For example, a group of Pittsburgh area radical cheerleaders call themselves "Yinz Cheer", and an area literary magazine was called '' The New Yinzer'', a take-off of ''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...

''. Those perceived to be stereotypical blue collar Pittsburgh residents are often referred to as ''

Yinzer Yinzer is a 20th-century term playing on the Pittsburghese second-person plural vernacular " yinz." The word is used among people who identify themselves with the city of Pittsburgh and its traditions. History "Yinzer" (or "Yunzer") was histo ...

s''. Yinztagram is a software program with a

theme. YinzCam is a

-based software development company.
YinzFans.com
is a fan site for Pittsburgh sports fans located outside of the Pittsburgh area. At the end of every episode of ''"VH-1's Top 20 Countdown"'' host Jim Shearer always says ''"I'm Jim Shearer, and I'll see yinz later."'' In the TV series ''One Dollar'' (2018) set in a rust belt town (shot in and around Pittsburgh), the Yinz address is frequently used. Waypoint YINZZ in Newell, West Virginia marks the approach to

Pittsburgh International Airport Pittsburgh International Airport , formerly Greater Pittsburgh International Airport, is a civil–military international airport in Findlay Township and Moon Township, Pennsylvania. Located about 10 miles (15 km) west of downtown Pitts ...

References

External links

Pittsburgh Speech and Society
A site for non-linguists, created by

Carnegie Mellon University Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) is a private research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. One of its predecessors was established in 1900 by Andrew Carnegie as the Carnegie Technical Schools; it became the Carnegie Institute of Technology ...

linguist

Barbara Johnstone Barbara Johnstone (born March 24, 1952) is an American professor of rhetoric and linguistics at Carnegie Mellon University. She specializes in discourse structure and function, sociolinguistics, rhetorical theory, and methods of text analysis ...

.
Pittsburghese.com (more humorous than scientific)

PBS Series, "Do You Speak American?"Pittsburgh City Paper, "Philadelphyinz Reps The Burgh with Brotherly Love"
{{Pittsburgh English-language slang Modern English personal pronouns Culture of Pittsburgh Second-person plural pronouns in English

History and usage

In popular culture

See also

References

Further reading

External links