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From: das@ucla-cs.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.nlang
Subject: 'enry 'iggins in America
Message-ID: <2712@ucla-cs.ARPA>
Date: Tue, 11-Dec-84 01:11:20 EST
Article-I.D.: ucla-cs.2712
Posted: Tue Dec 11 01:11:20 1984
Date-Received: Thu, 13-Dec-84 01:40:53 EST
Reply-To: das@ucla-cs.UUCP (David Smallberg)
Organization: UCLA Computer Science Department
Lines: 29

Dialect games are fun:

	Scene:  an office where I was teaching for a week

	Me:  Any messages for me?
	Receptionist:  Please?
	Me (a little louder):  Are there any messages for me?
	Receptionist:  Let's see...no.
	Me:  OK, thanks.  So how long since you left Cincinnati?
	Receptionist (dumbfounded):  How did you know I was from Cincinnati?

	[The use of "Please?" when you didn't catch the question someone asked
	 is local to the Cincinnati area.]

Another one:

	Scene:  I just handed someone a small stack of fresh IBM cards.

	She:  Thanks.  Could I get a gum band for these?
	Me:  Sure.  (I gave her a rubber band.)  So, how are things in
	     Pittsburgh?
	She (dumbfounded):  How do you know I'm from Pittsburgh?

Anybody else have any good ones?  These worked because the localisms are not
known by the speakers to be localisms -- I don't think a Bostonian who ordered
a frappe, for example, would be so surprised if someone placed him/her, because
that regionalism is fairly well known (I think).

-- David Smallberg, das@ucla-cs.ARPA, {ihnp4,ucbvax}!ucla-cs!das