Scots-Irish,Pennsylvania Dutch,Polish,[3]Ukrainian[4] andCroatian[5] immigrants to the area all provided certainloanwords 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.[6][7] Central Pennsylvania, currently an intersection of several dialect regions, was identified in 1949 byHans Kurath as a subregion between western and eastern Pennsylvania,[8][9] but some scholars in the 20th century onwards have identified it within the western Pennsylvania dialect region.[9][10] Since Kurath's study, one of western Pennsylvania's defining features, thecot–caught merger, has expanded into central Pennsylvania,[11] moving eastward until being blocked atHarrisburg.[12] Perhaps the only feature whose distribution is restricted almost exclusively to the immediatevicinity of Pittsburgh is/aʊ/monophthongization in which words such ashouse,down,found, andsauerkraut are sometimes pronounced with an "ah" sound, instead of the more standard pronunciation of "ow", renderingeye spellings such ashahs,dahn,fahnd, andsahrkraht.
Speakers of Pittsburgh English are sometimes called "Yinzers" in reference to their use of the second-person pluralpronoun "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.[13] Older men are more likely to use the accent than women "possibly because of a stronger interest in displaying local identity...."[14]
A defining feature of Western Pennsylvania English is thecot–caught merger, in which/ɑ/ (as inah) and/ɔ/ (as inaw) merge to a rounded/ɒ/ (phonetically[ɒ~ɔ]). As in most other American dialects, thefather–bother merger also occurs.[6][7][15] Therefore,cot andcaught are both pronounced/kɒt/;Don anddawn are both/dɒn/. While the merger of the low back vowels is also widespread elsewhere in the United States, the rounded realizations of the merged vowel around[ɒ] is less common, except inCanada,California andNortheastern New England.[6][7]
/ɒ/ has a stylistic variant, which is open central unrounded[ä], as in the sarcastic pronunciation ofI apologize as[aɪəˈpʰäɫɨdʒaɪz]. It may also occur before/r/, as instart[stäɹʔt] orcar[kʰäɹ], but a more common pronunciation is back and rounded:[stɒɹʔt] etc. The vowel inhoarse is the same as the one inhorse, phonetically[ɔ]:[hɔɹs] but phonemically/oʊ/ due to the cot-caught merger:/hoʊrs/.[16][17]
/ʌ/ is backer and more open than[ɜ] found inMidland American English, being closer to[ɑ]. This makesSTRUT an unrounded counterpart ofLOT, with pairs such asnut[nɑʔt] vs.not[nɒʔt] orcut[kʰɑʔt] vs.cot[kʰɒʔt] contrasting mainly byroundedness. This is also found in contemporary Standard Southern British English, wherenut[nʌʔt] also differs fromnot[nɔʔt] by rounding (thoughnought has a contrastiveTHOUGHT vowel instead:[no̞ːʔt], which falls together with[ɒ] in Pittsburgh). Earlier reports give[ɜ] as the norm forSTRUT in Pittsburgh. The remaining checked vowels/ɪ/,/ʊ/,/ɛ/ and/æ/ are all within the General American norm.[18][19][20]
TheGOAT vowel often has an unrounded central or fronted starting point in Pittsburgh:[əʊ]. Outside of the city itself,[oʊ] is more common.GOOSE is sometimes also fronted, to[ɨu] (more usual value:[ʊu]). As in other American dialects,FLEECE andFACE are narrow diphthongs[ɪi,ee̝].CHOICE is also within GenAm norm:[ɔ̟ɪ].[21]
ThePRICE vowel alone undergoesCanadian raising to[ɜɪ] before voiceless consonants, as inice[ɜɪs]. In 1971, theJournal of the International Phonetic Association published a description of the dialect, whose author Bruce Lee Johnson notes that the auxiliary verbmight is typically pronounced with nasalization, as[mɜ̃ɪ̃ʔt].[22] Elsewhere in the article, this allophone is transcribed ⟨ʌɪ⟩, following its usual transcription on Wikipedia.
TheMOUTH vowel typically begins front in the mouth[æʊ]. A less common variant has a central starting point,[äʊ], matching the starting point ofPRICE ([äɪ]).[16] It ismonophthongized to[aː] in some environments (sounding instead likeah), namely: beforenasal consonants (downtown[daːnˈtʰaːn] andfound[faːnd]),liquid consonants (fowl,hour) andobstruents (house[haːs],out,cloudy).[6][7][15] The monophthongization does not occur, however, in word-final positions (how,now), and the diphthong then remains[æʊ].[23] That is one of the few features, if not the only one, restricted almost exclusively to western Pennsylvania in North America, but it can sometimes be found in other accents of the English-speaking world, such asCockney andSouth African English.[6][7] Monophthongization also occurs for the sound/aɪ/, as ineye, before liquid consonants,[6][7][15][24] so thattile is pronounced[tʰɑːɫ];pile is pronounced[pʰɑːɫ]; andiron is pronounced[ɑːɹn]. That phenomenon allowstire to merge with the sound oftar:[tʰɑːɹ].
TheNURSE vowel (phonemically an/ər/ sequence) is phonetically close-mid[ɘ˞].[25]
Johnson notes a tendency to diphthongize/æ/ to[ɛə] not only before nasals (as in GenAm) but also before all voiced consonants (as inbad[bɛəd]) and voiceless fricatives (as ingrass[ɡɹɛəs]).[25] This has since been reversed and now[ɛə] is confined to the environment of a following nasal, matching the GenAm allophony.[26]
Anepenthetic (intruding)/r/ sound may occur after vowels in a few words, such aswater pronounced as[ˈwɔɹɾɚ], andwash as[wɔɹʃ].[6][7]
A number ofvowel mergers occur uniquely in Western Pennsylvania English before the consonant/l/. The pair of vowels/i/ and/ɪ/ may merge before the/l/ consonant,[6][7][15][27] cause bothsteel andstill to be pronounced as something like[stɪɫ]. Similarly,/u/,/oʊ/, and/ʊ/ may merge before/l/, so thatpool,pull, andpole may merge to something like[pʰʊɫ]. On the/il/~/ɪl/ merger, Labov, Ash and Boberg (2006) note "the stereotype of merger of/ɪl~il/ is based only on a close approximation of some forms, and does not represent the underlying norms of the dialect."[28] The/i/~/ɪ/ merger is found in western Pennsylvania,[6][7][15][27] as well as parts of the southern United States, including Alabama, Texas and the west (McElhinny 1999). On the other hand, the/u/~/ʊ/ merger is consistently found only in western Pennsylvania. The/i/~/ɪ/ merger towards[ɪ] may also appear before/ɡ/:eagle then sounds to outsiders likeiggle.[6][7][15]
L-vocalization is also common in the Western Pennsylvania dialect; an/l/ then sounds like a/w/ or a cross between a vowel and a "dark"/l/ at the end of a syllable.[6][7][29] For example,well is pronounced as[wɛw];milk as[mɪwk] or[mɛwk];role as[ɹʊw]; andcold as[ˈkʰʊwd]. The phenomenon is also common inAfrican-American English.
The wordmirror can be pronounced as the single-syllablemere.[citation needed]
Western Pennsylvania English speakers may use falling intonation at the end of questions,[6][7][30] for example, in "Are you painting your garage?"[↗ˈɒɹjəˈpʰeɪɾ̃ɪŋjɚɡə↘ˈɹɒdʒ] (with pitch rising in intonation up to just before the last syllable and then falling precipitously).[30] Such speakers typically use falling pitch for yes–no questions for which they already are quite sure of the answer. A speaker uttering the above example is simply confirming what is already thought: yes, the person spoken to is painting their garage. It is most common in areas of heavy German settlement, especially southeastern Pennsylvania,[30] hence its nickname, the "Pennsylvania Dutch question", but it is also found elsewhere in Pennsylvania, including Pittsburgh.[6][7][30][31][32][33][34] It is of German origin.[30]
gutchies; or undergutchies (n.) term used to describe undergarments of any variety.
hap - (n.) comfort; or, comforter or quilt:[37][g]
hoagie - (n.) asub (i.e., submarine sandwich; used throughout Pennsylvania)[38]
hoopy - (n.) a person perceived as unsophisticated or having rural sensibilities (i.e., redneck or hillbilly; used especially in Ohio Valley and northern West Virginia)
jag - (v.) to prick, stab, or jab;[40] to tease[34] (often,jag off orjag around)[h][40]
jagger - (n./adj.) any small, sharp-pointed object or implement,[40] usuallythorns, spines, and prickles (as in ajagger bush or "I got a jagger in my finger").
n'at (/əˈnæt/) - et cetera; and so on; a "general extender";[6][7] literally, a contraction of "and (all) that"[43][j]
neb - (v.) to pry into a conversation or argument intrusively or impertinently[40] (this term and its derivatives are common to Pennsylvania, but especially southwestern Pennsylvania, from Scots-Irish English)
neb out - to mind one's own business
neb-nose ornebby-nose (alsonebshit) - (n.) the kind of person who is always poking into people's affairs;[40] inquisitive person[36]
nebby - (adj.) given to prying into the affairs of others; nosey;[6][7][43] inquisitive[36]
redd up (alsoret, rid, ridd, orredd out) - (v.) to tidy up, clean up, or clean out (a room, house, cupboard, etc.); to clean house, tidy up (hence v bl.redding up house-cleaning; tidying up)[44][45][46][k][47]
All to meanall gone: When referring to consumable products, the wordall has a secondary meaning:all gone. For example, the phrasethe butter's all would be understood as "the butter is all gone." This likely derives from German.[54]
"Positiveanymore": In addition to the normal negative use ofanymore it can also, as in the greaterMidland U.S. dialect, be used in a positive sense to mean "these days" or "nowadays".[55][56][57] An example is "I wear these shoes a lot anymore". While in Standard Englishanymore must be used as a negative polarity item (NPI), some speakers in Pittsburgh and throughout the Midland area do not have this restriction.[52] This is somewhat common in both the Midland regions (Montgomery 1989) and in northern Maryland (Frederick, Hagerstown, and Westminster), likely of Scots-Irish origin.[57]
Reversed usage ofleave andlet:[6][7][58] Examples of this include "Leave him go outside" and "Let the book on the table".Leave is used in some contexts in which, in standard English,let would be used; and vice versa. Used in Southwestern Pennsylvania and elsewhere, this is either Pennsylvania Dutch or Scots-Irish.[58]
"Need,want, orlike + past participle":[6][7][59] Examples of this include "The car needs washed", "The cat wants petted", and "Babies like cuddled". More common constructions are "The grass needs cutting" or "The grass needs to be cut" or "Babies like cuddling" or "Babies like to be cuddled"; "The car needs washing" or "The car needs to be washed"; and "The cat wants petting" or "The cat wants to be petted." Found predominantly in the North Midland region, this is especially common in southwestern Pennsylvania.[60][61][62]Need + past participle is the most common construction, followed bywant + past participle, and thenlike + past participle. The forms are "implicationally related" to one another (Murray and Simon 2002). This means the existence of a less common construction from the list in a given location entails the existence of the more common ones there, but not vice versa. The constructions "like + past participle" and "need + past participle" are Scots-Irish.[60][61][63][62] While Adams argues that "want + past participle" could be from Scots-Irish or German,[58] it seems likely that this construction is Scots-Irish, as Murray and Simon claim.[61][62]like andneed + past participle are Scots-Irish, the distributions of all three constructions are implicationally related, the area where they are predominantly found is most heavily influenced by Scots-Irish, and a related construction, "want + directional adverb", as in "The cat wants out", is Scots-Irish.[37][52]
"Punctualwhenever": "Whenever" is often used to mean "at the time that."[63] An example is "My mother, whenever she passed away, she had pneumonia." Apunctual descriptor refers to the use of the word for "a onetime momentary event rather than in its two common uses for a recurrent event or a conditional one". This Scots-Irish usage is found in the Midlands and the South.
Fred Rogers[78] – Rogers' accent is an example of the softer variation of the accent that was spoken by the middle class of the era that he grew up in.
^In Russian, Slovak, and many other Slavic languages, the word babushka (a familial/cute extension of the wordbaba) means "grandmother" or (endearingly) "old woman." In Pittsburgh and much Northern U.S. English, the word also denotes a type of headscarf that might be worn by an old woman. Predominantly used in the northeast United States,babushka is most heavily in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Michigan. It is sometimes used as a derogatory term for an elderly woman, similar to calling someone an "old hag."[citation needed]
^Kurath (1949) mentions that speakers in a large portion of Pennsylvania use the term, but that it is "very common in the Pittsburgh area[,]...[in] the adjoining counties of Ohio and on the lower Kanawha"
^According to Kurath (1949), this may be heard from the western edge of the Alleghenies to beyond the Ohio line
^This is heard in Southwestern Pennsylvania and Northern West Virginia. It origins are not entirely known, but rumored to have begun during theDepression Era, when people took meat scraps and fashioned a makeshiftdrumstick out of them.
^Kurath (1949) claims these forms are used from the western edge of the Alleghenies to beyond the Ohio line; and Crozier claims that they are restricted to southwestern Pennsylvania, from Scots-Irish English origins.
^Kurath 1949): This term is used from the western edge of the Alleghenies to beyond the Ohio line.
^This can mean "comfort", as in "He's been in poor hap since his wife died",[31] or "comforter or quilt," as in "It was cold last night but that hap kept me warm."Hap is used for "comfort" in western Pennsylvania;[31] and a "quilt" is known as ahap only in western Pennsylvania.
^abThe word is often followed byoff to mean (as a verb) "to annoy, irritate, play tricks on; to disparage; to reject", or (as a noun) "an annoying or irritating person;" as well asaround to mean "annoy, tease, or engage in a frivolous endeavor." These phrases are probably influenced byjack off andjack around, respectively. "Jus' jaggin'" is a common expression, the same as standard "just kidding". Descended from Scots-Irish usage in English, this is chiefly a Pennsylvania term, especially southwestern Pennsylvania, but also portions of Appalachia.
^The OED (1991) listskolbasa as a variable pronunciation ofkielbasa, and notes that the former pronunciation is Polish and the latter Russian.
^The distribution ofn'at is Southwestern Pennsylvania, possibly Scots-Irish. Macaulay (1995) finds it in the regular speech and narratives of Scottish coal miners in Glasgow, a principal area from which Scottish settlers emigrated to Northern Ireland, and from there, to the American colonies.
^An example of this term is "Yinz better redd up this room". Dressman notes that it is common to the Pittsburgh area and throughout Pennsylvania, but less so in Philadelphia. It is also scattered about New England States and in New Brunswick, though its occurrence is heaviest in Pennsylvania. Hall states that its distribution is "scattered, but chiefly N. Midland, esp PA". Dressman suggested that it was brought to the U.S. by Scots. It's almost certainly of Scandinavian/Viking origin; the Danish "rydde op" means to clean up. "Redd up" and its associated variants probably entered the English language from old Norse.
^abcdefGagnon, C. L. (1999).Language attitudes in Pittsburgh: 'Pittsburghese' vs. standard English. Master's thesis. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh.
^Kortmann, Bernd; Schneider, Edgar W., eds. (2004).A Handbook of Varieties of English: A Multimedia Reference Tool. Vol. 1. New York: Mouton de Gruyter. pp. 407–416.doi:10.1515/9783110175325.ISBN978-3-11-019718-1.
^Hankey, Clyde T. (1965). "Miscellany: 'tiger,' 'tagger,' and [aɪ] in western Pennsylvania".American Speech.40 (3):226–229.doi:10.2307/454074.JSTOR454074.
^abcdeFasold, Ralph W. (1980). "The conversational function of Pennsylvania Dutch intonation".Paper Presented at New Ways of Analyzing Variation (NWAVE IX) at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI.
^McElhinny 1999; Wisnosky 2003; Johnstone, Andrus and Danielson 2006: Used Southwestern Pennsylvania and elsewhere in Appalachia,yinz is a particularly salient feature of Pittsburgh speech
^Kloman, Harry (February 1992)."The Truth and Consequences of Pittsburghese: How you sayDowntown can affect your career"(PDF).Pittsburgh Magazine. pp. 40–43. RetrievedJune 3, 2025.When the world hears Sophie Masloff, ... they know something about her, at least they think they do, from her accent. It tells where she's from. ... It does have a very provincial sound or feel to it.
Brown, C. (1982).A search for sound change: A look at the lowering of tense vowels before liquids in the Pittsburgh area (MA thesis). Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh.
Duncan, Daniel (2016). Hansson, Gunnar Ólafur; Farris-Trimble, Ashley; McMullin, Kevin; Pulleyblank, Douglas (eds.)."'Tense' /æ/ Is still lax: A phonotactics study".Proceedings of the Annual Meetings on Phonology.3. Washington, D.C.: Linguistic Society of America.doi:10.3765/amp.v3i0.3653.
Layton, N. N. (1999).The dialect of western Pennsylvania: evaluation of ten sounds (MA thesis). Gothenburg, Sweden: University of Gothenburg.
Maxfield, E. K. (1931). "The speech of south-western Pennsylvania".American Speech.7 (1):18–20.doi:10.2307/451308.JSTOR451308.
McElhinny, B (1999). "More on the third dialect of English: linguistic constraints on the use of three phonological variables in Pittsburgh".Language Variation and Change.11 (2):171–195.doi:10.1017/s0954394599112031.S2CID145656857.
Montgomery, M. B. (1989). "Exploring the roots of Appalachian English".English World-Wide.10 (2):227–278.doi:10.1075/eww.10.2.03mon.
Montgomery, M. B. (2001). "'My mother, whenever she died, she had pneumonia': The history and functions ofwhenever".Journal of English Linguistics.29 (3):234–249.doi:10.1177/00754240122005350.S2CID143776545.
Murray, T. E.; Frazer, T. C.; Simon, B. L. (1996). "Need + past participle in American English".American Speech.71 (3):255–271.doi:10.2307/455549.JSTOR455549.
Murray, T. E.; Simon, B. L. (1999). "Want + past participle in American English".American Speech.74 (2):140–164.JSTOR455576.
Murray, T. E.; Simon, B. L. (2002). "At the intersection of regional and social dialects: the case of like + past participle in American English".American Speech.77 (1):32–69.doi:10.1215/00031283-77-1-32.S2CID143892781.
Kurath, Hans (1949). "Western Pennsylvania".A Word Geography of the Eastern United States. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. pp. 35–36.LCCN49050233.
Kurath, Hans; McDavid, Raven I. Jr. (1961). "Western Pennsylvania".The pronunciation of English in the Atlantic United States. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. pp. 17–18.LCCN60005671.
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