An Alabama listener says her grandmother would express astonishment with the phrase They! My goodness! This exclamation, which is common in her grandmother’s native Appalachia, is probably an R-less pronunciation of There! as in Look there! This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “”They!” Exclamation”
Hello, you have A Way with Words.
Hi, good afternoon.
Thank you for taking my call.
This is Melissa calling from Alabama.
Hi, Melissa in Alabama.
Welcome to the show.
What’s on your mind?
Okay, I have this question.
My family is from East Tennessee, the Appalachian regions, the hills, mountains of East Tennessee.
And my grandmother, she would always use this expression growing up.
And sometimes it would be used in astonishment.
Sometimes it would be used in praise.
But I’ve never heard anyone else use it.
And I’m wondering, is this an old folk kind of language?
Is it antiquated that used to be very popular?
What happens?
So the phrasing sounds like this.
And the tone, the intonation is part of it.
She would say, they, my goodness.
It was so funny.
Oh, yeah, it was so funny.
This is your grandmother from Appalachia?
She is also from the East Tennessee area.
And so she would say that.
You would tell her a story, and if she was just amazed by it, she would go, they, my goodness.
Or she would say, wish you would listen to this, they.
Sometimes she would shorten it, and she would just say, they, like that.
Where does this come from?
And so it sounds like the pronoun they, T-H-E-Y.
That’s the way it sounded.
-huh.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Oh, this is wonderful.
Yeah.
And you know what?
Our best guess is that this they, as an exclamation, is a variant of the word there.
You know, T-H-E-R-E, like look there.
My grandmother was from East Tennessee, and she talked that way.
D, they, Lord, hush your mouth.
Yes.
Yes.
Yeah, so as far as we know, it’s particularly common in North Carolina, Georgia, East Tennessee, and it may have some Scottish influence.
So it’s like an R-less pronunciation of there.
Right.
So it’s used more like a directive to call one’s attention to what has just been said or what is occurring.
Like there, look there, listen there.
That kind of thing?
Yes, exactly.
So, Melissa, are you feeling surprised at our answer and have an exclamation you want to share with us about it?
I am.
I am surprised.
And I’m so thankful to hear this because I grew up all the time listening to this.
And I knew how she used the word, but I didn’t understand where it came from in the history.
And so that makes so much sense that it would be localized to that area, that it would be localized to kind of that, I don’t want to say time period because, you know, this was current all the way up through now that she uses this language.
Melissa, I think Martha was angling to get you to imitate your grandmother again.
They, I just didn’t understand that.
Thank you.
Oh, that’s delightful. I can hear the inflection in your voice as you do it, too.
Oh, she was wonderful.
Well, dear, it was lovely talking with you.
Take care, Melissa. We appreciate it. Bye-bye.
Very appreciated. Bye-bye.
We should clarify that you come by the Southern accent honestly, Martha.
Oh, I do.
It’s not just after Martha. It’s authentic.
Oh, yeah, yeah. I melt when I hear an East Tennessee accent because that is exactly how my grandmother talked.
She would ask me about my gentleman callers.
Little did she know.
Think Amanda Wingfield.
Yeah, right.
Martha and I are delighted to hear your stories and memories of the way people used to talk or your memories of the way people that you loved talked, that thing they said that you just can’t let go.
Share those with us.
We’d love to appreciate them with you.
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