Editing Western Pennsylvania English (section)

==Overview==
[[Scotch-Irish American|Scots-Irish]], [[Pennsylvania Dutch language|Pennsylvania Dutch]], [[Polish people|Polish]],<ref name="DARE1">{{cite book|editor-last=Cassidy|editor-first=F. G.|title=Dictionary of American Regional English, Vol. I: A-C|year=1985|publisher=Harvard University Press|location=Cambridge|isbn=978-0-674-20511-6}}</ref> [[Ukrainians|Ukrainian]]<ref>{{cite news | url = http://www.ukrweekly.com/old/archive/2000/020012.shtml | title = Demographic, social, cultural characteristics of persons of Ukrainian ancestry in Chicago | work = [[The Ukrainian Weekly]] No. 2, Vol. LXVIII | date = January 9, 2000 | access-date = May 16, 2008 | last = Wolowyna | first = Oleh | archive-date = September 6, 2008 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20080906191606/http://www.ukrweekly.com/old/archive/2000/020012.shtml | url-status = dead }} (based on 1990 US Census)</ref> and [[Croats|Croatian]]<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=KxW_BKtCjqkC&q=croatian+descendants+in+pittsburgh&pg=PT277|title=Transforming America: Perspectives on U.S. Immigration [3 volumes]: Perspectives on U.S. Immigration|last=LeMay|first=Michael C.|date=2012-12-10|publisher=ABC-CLIO|isbn=9780313396441|language=en}}</ref> immigrants to the area all provided certain [[loanword]]s to the dialect (see "Vocabulary" below). Many of the sounds and words found in the dialect are popularly thought to be unique to Pittsburgh, but that is a misconception since the dialect resides throughout the greater part of western Pennsylvania and the surrounding areas.<ref name="johnstone2">{{cite journal|last=Johnstone|first=Barbara|author-link=Barbara Johnstone|author2=Baumgardt, Dan|title="Pittsburghese" Online: Vernacular Norming in Conversation|journal=American Speech|year=2004|volume=79|issue=2|pages=115–145|jstor=40281107|doi=10.1215/00031283-79-2-115|s2cid=3861413|url=https://works.bepress.com/barbara_johnstone/10/download/|access-date=2018-04-20|archive-date=2018-04-21|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180421030804/https://works.bepress.com/barbara_johnstone/10/download/|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref name="johnstone3">{{cite journal|last=Johnstone|first=Barbara|author-link=Barbara Johnstone|author2=Bhasin, Neeta|author3=Wittkofski, Denise|title="Dahntahn" Pittsburgh: Monophthongal /aw/ and Representations of Localness in Southwestern Pennsylvania|journal=American Speech|year=2002|volume=77|issue=2|pages=148–166|jstor=40281028|doi=10.1215/00031283-77-2-148|s2cid=2783229|url=https://works.bepress.com/barbara_johnstone/12/download/|access-date=2019-09-17|archive-date=2017-09-22|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170922030945/https://works.bepress.com/barbara_johnstone/12/download/|url-status=dead}}</ref> Central Pennsylvania, currently an intersection of several dialect regions, was identified in 1949 by [[Hans Kurath]] as a subregion between western and eastern Pennsylvania,<ref name="Kurath1949">{{cite book|last=Kurath|first=Hans|title=A Word Geography of the Eastern United States|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HJQhAQAAIAAJ|access-date=21 October 2012|year=1949|publisher=University of Michigan Press|isbn=9780472085323}}</ref><ref name="Salvucci 1999">{{Cite web |url=http://www.evolpub.com/Americandialects/PennaDialMap.html |title=Linguistic Geography of Pennsylvania |publisher=Evolution Publishing |access-date=2012-10-21 |year=1999 |last=Salvucci |first=Claudio}}</ref> but some scholars in the 20th century onwards have identified it within the western Pennsylvania dialect region.<ref name="Salvucci 1999" /><ref>{{cite book|last=Thomas|first=Charles|title=An Introduction to the Phonetics of American English|url=https://archive.org/details/introductiontoph0000thom_i1s5|url-access=registration|access-date=21 October 2012|year=1958|publisher=Ronald Press|isbn=9780826086303 }}</ref> Since Kurath's study, one of western Pennsylvania's defining features, the [[cot–caught merger]], has expanded into central Pennsylvania,{{sfnp|Labov|Ash|Boberg|2006|p=66}} moving eastward until being blocked at [[Harrisburg, Pennsylvania|Harrisburg]].{{sfnp|Labov|Ash|Boberg|2006|p=123}} Perhaps the only feature whose distribution is restricted almost exclusively to the immediate [[Pittsburgh metropolitan area|vicinity of Pittsburgh]] is {{IPA|/aʊ/}} [[monophthongization]] in which words such as ''house'', ''down'', ''found'', and ''sauerkraut'' are sometimes pronounced with an "ah" sound, instead of the more standard pronunciation of "ow", rendering [[eye dialect|eye spellings]] such as ''hahs'', ''dahn'', ''fahnd'', and ''sahrkraht''.

Speakers of Pittsburgh English are sometimes called "Yinzers" in reference to their use of the second-person plural [[pronoun]] "[[yinz]]." The word "yinzer" is sometimes heard as pejorative, indicating a lack of sophistication, but the term is now used in a variety of ways.<ref name=johnstone1>{{cite conference |last=Johnstone |first=Barbara |author-link=Barbara Johnstone |title=Place, language, and semiotic order |conference=Urban Symbolic Landscapes conference |location=Helsinki |date=May 3, 2011}}</ref> Older men are more likely to use the accent than women "possibly because of a stronger interest in displaying local identity...."<ref>{{cite web|title=Questions and Answers: Who Uses Pittsburgh Speech the Most?|url=http://pittsburghspeech.pitt.edu/PittsburghSpeech_FAQ.html|work=Pittsburgh Speech and Society|publisher=University Library System, University of Pittsburgh|access-date=16 May 2013}}</ref>