Learn to Speak Southern
Before heading south for a vacation, it may be a good idea to learn the language of our southern brothers and sisters. And we're here to help... Hah Tu Spek Suthun: BARD - verb. Past tense of the infinitive "to borrow." JAWJUH - noun. A highly flammable state just north of Florida. Usage: "My brother from Jawjah bard my pickup truck." MUNTS - noun. A calendar division. ALL - noun. A petroleum-based lubricant. FAR - noun. A conflagration. BAHS - noun. A supervisor. TAR - noun. A rubber wheel. TIRE - noun. A tall monument. RETARD - Verb. To stop working. RATS - noun. Entitled power or privilege. FARN - adjective. Not local. JU-HERE - a question. HAZE - a contraction. VIEW - contraction: verb and pronoun. GUMMIT - Noun. An often-closed bureaucratic institution.
Usage: "My brother bard my pickup truck."
Usage: "My brother from Jawjuh bard my pickup truck, and I taint herd from him in munts."
Usage: "I sure hope my brother from Jawjuh puts all in my pickup truck."
Usage: "If my brother from Jawjuh doesn't change the all in my pickup truck, that things gonna catch far."
Usage: "If you don't stop reading these Southern words and git back to work, your bahs is gonna far you!"
Usage: "Gee, I hope that brother of mine from Jawjuh doesn't git a flat tar in my pickup truck."
Usage: "Lord willing and the creeks don't rise, I sure do hope to see that Eiffel Tire in Paris sometime."
Usage: "My granpaw retard at age 65."
Usage: "We Southerners are willing to fight for out rats."
Usage: "I cudnt unnerstand a wurd he sed ... must be from some farn country."
Usage: "Juhere that former Dallas Cowboys' coach Jimmy Johnson recently toured the University of Alabama?"
Usage: "Is Bubba smart?" "Nah ... haze ignert."
Usage: "I ain't never seed New York City ... view?"
Usage: "Great ... ANOTHER gummit shutdown!"
Originally published November 14, 2002.
