Seattlest: We Can't Stop Here! This Is Pop Country!

jpv206

Tue, 15 May 2007 21:53:35 -0800

Oh, by the way... The reason I propose a word experiment instead of just running up to a "pop" person and say "Do you say 'pop' because it's pre-mixed?" is because people's language behavior often reflects semantic distinctions even if they can't articulate them. For example, most native English speakers couldn't explain to you the difference between the words "many" and "much." But they don't get them mixed up, either. ****** ice cream soda, *ice cream pop (still not interchangeable).

jpv206

Tue, 15 May 2007 18:51:03 -0800

MvB's assertion is that "soda" and "pop" are used interchangeably in common usage in Seattle. S/he's right, people are from all over the country, and bring their lexical habits with them to Seattle. Among them, "soda" is definitely the prestige variant. However, his/her skepticism regarding whether pre-mixed/not pre-mixed distinction is really about the people who say "pop." Do the people who natively say "pop" maintain a pre-mixed/not premixed distinction? Here's the test: can of soda, can of pop cold soda, cold pop soda machine*, pop machine Italian soda, *Italian pop old fashioned soda fountain, *old fashioned pop fountain soda water, *pop water Please feel free to add your own items. As a native "pop" speaker, the ones with asterisks sound horrible to me, but certainly MvB would accuse me of being "ad hoc" if I reported my own usage. The test is to see if the "pop" really people do the pre-mixed distinction, or if they're really interchangeable. ("Can of soda", "ice-cold soda" don't sound bad to me, but as a native "pop" person I would never say them. "Soda machine" to me sounds very unnatural). So add your own soda vs. pop distinctions, and do it on a few of your "pop" friends. Hell, do it on your "soda" friends as well, see what you get. Do it to a hundred people, and it's a dialectology study, write a paper.... ***** Extra credit: find out what the "pop" people call the fountain drinks at 7/11 or McDonalds, the ones that are separate tanks of syrup and soda(!) but get mixed automatically and come out of the spout. Does that count as pre-mixed (because it's automatic) or not?

James

Tue, 15 May 2007 14:45:07 -0800

I forgot to quote the stats: in King County, pop beats soda 936 to 230. So we're a minority, but not as much as the 39 people who say coke.

Duncan

Tue, 15 May 2007 14:16:19 -0800

I had exactly the same experience, except I was in LA for four years. No one could understand me for the first year and a half.

COMTE

Tue, 15 May 2007 14:11:40 -0800

I'm a PNW native, and I've always said "soda", rarely, "soda pop", but never just "pop" by itself. I would also point out, for the sake of fairness, that my distant relatives were from Wisconsin, but that was three generations ago, so I can't imagine the regionalism would have been passed down from that far back.

Morfydd

Tue, 15 May 2007 13:41:38 -0800

I grew up here saying "pop". When I went to college in Maryland no one understood that so I switched to "soda". When I moved back I just stuck with "soda" because everyone understands it, even if they themselves say "pop".

MvB

Tue, 15 May 2007 11:13:29 -0800

Ha! This is why people don't listen to linguists right here: ad hoc extrapolations and category mistakes. "We" here in Seattle use soda and pop interchangeably to refer to the stuff in cans or bottles or the fountain drinks at McDonalds. While it's true that Italian sodas are called sodas, common usage -- if it ever did -- now does not slice so finely.

jpv206

Mon, 14 May 2007 17:18:48 -0800

James, James, James... You are so wrong. I don't mask my disdain.

Trotter

Mon, 14 May 2007 16:51:01 -0800

I think the linguist has something there. Of course, nobody will ever know it because only the French care about Linguistics. The point is, we should, as a Nation, alter all references to "flavored, carbonated beverage to be used in moderation to prevent tooth decay and gastric issues"

James

Mon, 14 May 2007 16:20:20 -0800

It's not the lingustics degree. It's the poorly masked disdain for those you perceive as intellectual inferiors.

jpv206

Mon, 14 May 2007 16:13:51 -0800

Yawn. We say "soda" here in Seattle when it is mixed. That's how you get an Italian soda, and a soda fountain. However, if the drink comes pre-mixed (i.e., in a can or a bottle) then we call it a pop. Can of pop. Sigh. I know nobody is going to listen to me. Nobody listens to linguists.