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From: aawest@CritPath.Org (Anthony West)
Subject: Re: Uh-huh, uh-uh was Re: Cross cultural mumblings (was Pause filling particles)
Message-ID: <Dn7KDF.Fx@CritPath.Org>
Date: Fri, 23 Feb 1996 03:00:50 GMT
References: <DMvq28.GGu@logic.uc.wlu.edu> <rte-2102961306200001@mac-118.lz.att.com> <4gi3ol$9ed@ss1.cam.nist.gov>
Organization: Critical Path Project
Lines: 34

In article <4gi3ol$9ed@ss1.cam.nist.gov> koontz@cam.nist.gov (John E Koontz) writes:
>In article <rte-2102961306200001@mac-118.lz.att.com>, rte@elmo.lz.att.com (Ralph T. Edwards) writes:
>|> Umm, but you did.  Uh-huh means yes or I see; uh-uh means no.
>
>What interests me about these forms - I have the impression they are widely
>used in English - is that they resemble forms for 'yes' in a number of 
>Native American languages, e.g., OP a~ha~, a~hau and so on, 'yes'.
>I'm assuming that this reflects some sort of human language universal
>tendency, not borrowing in either direction.  
>
>----
>John E. Koontz (koontz@bldr.nist.gov)
>
Exactly the question that has haunted me! In Cherokee, "vhv" means
yes, "?v?v" means no ("v" is a nasalized schwa /~@/, "?" is a glottal
stop). These exactly parallel the positive and negative grunts that
every American uses.

One might attribute these to borrowings from English -- but Cherokee
literally doesn't have any. The structure of the language is almost
impervious to Anglicisms. It certainly would be odd if these were
the _only_ borrowings of common lexical items.

So were the borrowings in the other direction?

Do non-American English speakers use these words? Are they felt as
native in Scotland or New Zealand, or are they recent imports from
the States?

I have not noticed them among French speakers, either European or
North American natives.

-Tony West

