Paige has a lot of jawn to do
March 25, 2016 8:13 AM   Subscribe

 
I'm from Philly and I like this jawn. I was going to snark and say you should have tagged this with a jawn jawn, but you already did. Solid.
posted by Rob Rockets at 8:23 AM on March 25, 2016 [6 favorites]


I guess web developers think it clever to pop up a "subscribe" box which cannot be closed.
posted by telstar at 8:27 AM on March 25, 2016 [1 favorite]


I think there is an equivalent though -- Hawaiian pidgin's "da kine."
posted by cubby at 8:28 AM on March 25, 2016 [8 favorites]


This is good jawn
posted by Itaxpica at 8:29 AM on March 25, 2016


So, jawn=thing?
posted by Splunge at 8:33 AM on March 25, 2016 [4 favorites]


When I was a kid, some friends and I had the word "bodo", which we used to essentially mean "insert word here".

You could use it to bodo just about anything. I guess jawn works pretty well too, but I suspect that I would find it very confusing, for personal reasons.
posted by mrjohnmuller at 8:35 AM on March 25, 2016 [4 favorites]


Yeah, but broader. You can use it in places you wouldn't use thing because it would be too vague, or scan weirdly. It's still just as vague, but you use it anyway.
posted by Itaxpica at 8:36 AM on March 25, 2016


Marklar?
posted by Drinky Die at 8:38 AM on March 25, 2016 [13 favorites]


"We need some art for this story."
"Just slap in some Philly jawn."
posted by Etrigan at 8:40 AM on March 25, 2016 [12 favorites]


Now I can use jawn when I can't remember the word dingus because it sounds too much like Dyngus. If only Portland had a Wawa I could go to for a hoagie.
posted by munchingzombie at 8:46 AM on March 25, 2016 [2 favorites]


Something for the tree ...
posted by carter at 8:49 AM on March 25, 2016


Youse gon like this jawn in Filluffya. Hoagiemouth 4 eva.
posted by Special Agent Dale Cooper at 8:50 AM on March 25, 2016 [6 favorites]


Something for the tree ...

A jawn jawn fer yer Chrimmas jawn.
posted by Special Agent Dale Cooper at 8:52 AM on March 25, 2016 [2 favorites]


I knew I was a real Philadelphian when I include "potato mashing jawn" on a shopping list.
posted by ActionPopulated at 8:58 AM on March 25, 2016 [8 favorites]


I'm from the Jersey side of Philly and generally grew up with a Philly accent ("wooder" FTW), but never heard "jawn" until I was an adult and had moved away. I guess it never reached the white suburbs in the 1980s. Now I'm sad to have missed out on a truly unique linguistic trait. I have to settle with boring people by my insistence that Mary/merry/marry are different.
posted by nev at 9:01 AM on March 25, 2016 [8 favorites]


'vaina' in Venezuelan works similarly.
posted by gorestainedrunes at 9:49 AM on March 25, 2016 [1 favorite]


There are a few instances where “jawn” can be used but “joint,” in, say, New York, cannot.

"A few" is a vast understatement. The alleged New York provenance is pretty tenuous.
posted by desuetude at 10:23 AM on March 25, 2016


So, like yoke in Ireland?
posted by scruss at 10:59 AM on March 25, 2016 [3 favorites]


I am kinda angry that they didn't caption that photo "The Liberty Jawn".
posted by benito.strauss at 11:00 AM on March 25, 2016 [5 favorites]


I have to settle with boring people by my insistence that Mary/merry/marry are different.

I'm still shocked that there are native English speakers who insist this is not true. But I've also been chastised for enunciating ladder vs latter.
posted by a halcyon day at 11:07 AM on March 25, 2016


But I've also been chastised for enunciating ladder vs latter.

I do this, a little bit, but I can't even really say Mary/merry/marry differently if I try. Which puts me in the majority, in the U.S. - we're coming for you and your vowels!
posted by atoxyl at 11:34 AM on March 25, 2016 [2 favorites]


From the article:

in Memphis, there’s one that’s somewhere between “jaint” and “jeent.

I would render it more like "jernt", but this is true. There are aspects to the Memphis accent that defy the english alphabet.
posted by vibrotronica at 11:35 AM on March 25, 2016 [2 favorites]


Love it. Regionalisms are fascinating, and it’s great that they still exist.
The whole East Coast is still a mystery to me, Philly more than any. When I read these articles about the language and culture I can’t really get a feel for it. Do I need to watch Rocky movies?
posted by bongo_x at 12:03 PM on March 25, 2016


the Philebrity blog was getting angry yesterday because some blogger had said that "jawn" is derived from NYC's "joint" and HELL NO JAWN IS OUR ALONE I mean calm down
posted by angrycat at 12:05 PM on March 25, 2016 [3 favorites]


and uh I see the article I referenced is the FPP. Okay. Carry on. Sorry.
posted by angrycat at 12:05 PM on March 25, 2016 [3 favorites]


I remember people using "jonx" in exactly the same way back in the 90s, at my DC-area high school. It's definitely just a mutated version of "joint".
posted by The Lamplighter at 12:14 PM on March 25, 2016


Oh me too, but it was pronounced junx and it was plural!
posted by clavicle at 12:31 PM on March 25, 2016


Oh crazy, I went to high school in the DC area in the 2000s and we said "janx"! But it was a variant on "junk", not on "joint".
posted by capricorn at 12:51 PM on March 25, 2016


The only other word I've seen used quite like it is the way the Smurves use "smurf"

I'm pretty squanched that squanch didn't squanch on
posted by prize bull octorok at 1:25 PM on March 25, 2016 [3 favorites]


When I first encountered people saying "jawn" it was like - "yo gimmie that jawn" or "fuck this jawn let's go." So I thought it was just a regional/AAVE pronunciation of "joint" which I was familiar with even though it's probably not as much of a thing on the west coast. It wasn't until later that I learned that it was a whole thing with even more versatile usage.
posted by atoxyl at 1:53 PM on March 25, 2016


The only other word I've seen used quite like it is the way the Smurves use "smurf"

"The Smurves" (1993) -- Picking up far beyond where the beloved children's show left off, this Victorian period drama unflinchingly depicts the long, bloody, and ultimately fruitless struggle of the blue-skinned creatures for classification as non-human persons in a society decades away from understanding, let alone approving of such an idea. Starring Randy Quaid with voices by Tony Danza and Cher. (0 out of 5 stars)
posted by clockzero at 2:09 PM on March 25, 2016 [1 favorite]


Yo, that jawn is mad fly = that's a very pretty lady.
posted by nikoniko at 2:21 PM on March 25, 2016


Do I need to watch Rocky movies?

The definitive source is PhillyTawk.
posted by nev at 2:35 PM on March 25, 2016


It's like a combination of "stuff" and "thing".
posted by bracems at 3:40 PM on March 25, 2016


Like cubby said, this sounds a lot like how "da kine" is used in Hawaii. When I try to explain "da kine", I say "That thing/person/event/stuff, you know what I'm talking about, so why waste energy saying a longer word when we can say 'da kine'".
posted by King Sky Prawn at 3:46 PM on March 25, 2016 [1 favorite]


Mary/merry/marry are different

Okay, merry is not pronounced like the other two, but what's the difference between "Mary" and "marry?" Do you roll the double-r or something?
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 3:53 PM on March 25, 2016


the "a" sound is imperceptibly different in a way I cannot possibly describe. HTH
posted by prize bull octorok at 3:54 PM on March 25, 2016 [3 favorites]


We were using truc like that a decade ago in France and Switzerland en français.
posted by blue_beetle at 4:03 PM on March 25, 2016 [2 favorites]


Mary, merry, marry
posted by nev at 4:19 PM on March 25, 2016


Okay, merry is not pronounced like the other two, but what's the difference between "Mary" and "marry?" Do you roll the double-r or something?
"Mary" uses the vowel from "hate" and "marry" uses the vowel from "hat".
posted by dfan at 4:20 PM on March 25, 2016 [6 favorites]


We were using truc like that a decade ago in France and Switzerland en français.

"Truck" in my childhood Louisiana also meant unspecified junk or refuse. I wonder if it was a leftover from the French times.
posted by telstar at 4:36 PM on March 25, 2016


Sadly, all of these pieces always seem to miss the use of "the jawn" as a positive adjective. The phrase "That jawn is the jawn." is a phrase I heard a fair amount as a kid in Philly. (Trans: "That $item is the best.")

But this native son of Philadelphia is pleased to see "jawn" getting its linguistic due.
posted by SansPoint at 4:42 PM on March 25, 2016


a halcyon day: "I have to settle with boring people by my insistence that Mary/merry/marry are different.

I'm still shocked that there are native English speakers who insist this is not true. But I've also been chastised for enunciating ladder vs latter.
"

Mary, merry & marry are the same to me, but I do notice some people in my region who pronounce "button" as "buddon" which I imagine bothers me in the same way that I pronounce ladder & latter the same.

Also? Settler. Sett-ler (emphasis on "t" sound) or Settle-er. I pronounce the latter (LOL!), but other pronounce with the former.

And yeah - my thought was - so... "thing?" Is it sorta like "thingamabob" or "thingamajig" or "whatchamacallit"?
posted by symbioid at 6:15 PM on March 25, 2016


This (slyt) is a great breakdown of the Mary/marry/merry pronunciation jawn that reflects pretty closely how I (a suburban Philly native) see them as three distinct words.
posted by kellygrape at 6:49 PM on March 25, 2016 [1 favorite]


Um, but "jimmies" as a Philadelphia word? Sorry, but no, says the Bostonian.
posted by adamg at 7:29 PM on March 25, 2016 [2 favorites]


It's in TFA but the word "jontz" gets used in the DC area. It's the kind of word that ought to have a "z". "I'm cised for that new jontz."
posted by 3urypteris at 7:41 PM on March 25, 2016


I'd never heard of the word jawn until I saw Creed. Growing up in SoCal (OC by way of ELA) we used the word chingadera in what I think means roughly the same thing.
posted by dorkydancer at 8:43 PM on March 25, 2016


I have always felt that jawn was the offspring of "the Jimmy " and "the jam (sometimes" the jambrowsk" i < jam-BROW-ski>) Both positive $things.

A great regionilism, and like SansPoint, this adoptee loves seing his city get some lovin'.
posted by djrock3k at 9:09 PM on March 25, 2016


This shit is my shit.
posted by bleep at 10:44 PM on March 25, 2016


That jawn was fascinating. I love the idea of an all-purpose noun. Also, buried way down in the article is a link to a totally brilliant piece that appeared, under the title "Academic Ignorance and Black Intelligence", in The Atlantic in 1972 from Bill Labov (who is mentioned in the article) about some parts of academia's total failure to grasp the complexity of African American vernacular, and the problems this brings.

The whole thing is worth a read, but his conclusion is as follows:
There is no reason to believe that any nonstandard vernacular is in itself an obstacle to learning. The chief problem is ignorance of language on the part of all concerned. Our job as linguists is to remedy this ignorance: Bereiter and Engelmann want to reinforce it and justify it. Teachers are now being told to ignore the language of black children as unworthy of attention and useless for learning. They are being taught to hear every natural utterance of the child as evidence of his mental inferiority. As linguists we are unanimous in condemning this view as bad observation, bad theory, and bad practice.

That educational psychology should be strongly influenced by a theory so false to the facts of language is unfortunate; but that children should be the victims of this ignorance is intolerable
posted by Len at 1:03 PM on March 26, 2016 [2 favorites]


We used ish a lot in college (UMass Amherst) as a freefloating noun or adverb or adjective. As in, 'that ish is kinda ish.'
posted by es_de_bah at 9:09 PM on March 27, 2016


« Older Red Lake County, Minnesota   |   An odd disturbance at the head end Newer »


This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments