So I'm 54% Met?

[avram]

The Yankee or Dixie linguistic quiz has me at 46% Yankee. Which is fair — “Yankee” is a moving target.

Outside of the US, a Yankee is an American.
In the southern US, a Yankee is a northerner.
In the rest of the north, a Yankee is someone from New England. As a New Yorker, I’m therefore not a Yankee.
In the rest of New England, a Yankee is someone from Vermont.
In Vermont, a Yankee is someone who eats apple pie with cheddar cheese on it.

On the other hand, Wikipedia’s entry on the word suggests that it might have originated in a nickname the Dutch had for English settlers in New York’s early days: Jan Kees, or “John Cheese”.

I got the quiz from immlass, whose definition of “Yankee” will soon be shifting a slot down that list.

Comments

[gentlyepigrams]

When I lived in England, someone called me a Yankee. My immediate response was something to the effect of "them's fightin' words".

I think a necessary but not sufficient part of the definition of "Yankee" is "someone else".

[bugsybanana.livejournal.com]

I learned the end of that joke as "in Vermont, a Yankee is someone who eats pie for breakfast."

I'm 45% Yankee, which I don't buy. "Hero" is not just a Maine-ism, it's the original designation for that kind of sandwich in New York AFAIK. And who in our neck of the woods doesn't usually pronounce "route" like "root" instead of "rout"? Or "pa-jah-mas"?

Now that I see the rationale for the scoring system, though, I feel a little differently. 0% is pure Yankee, 100% pure Dixie. So that means both you and I actually come out mildly favoring Yankee over Dixie, which is probably fair.

Remember, the Mets are more lovable than the Yankees. I'd rather snuggle you than U.S. Steel any day.

[camwyn]

I come out 48%; I need to work harder to erase my origins...

Old joke: Texan travels to South America on business and is being shown around town by one of the locals. They pass a wall on which the graffiti is scrawled: YANKEE GO HOME! His guide, horribly embarrassed, starts apologizing to him.

The Texan smiles and benevolently shakes his head. "Son," he says, "where I come from, we don't like 'em either."

[kent-allard-jr.livejournal.com]

OK, it says I'm 57% Dixie. Considering I'm an honest-to-Ghawd Mayflower-descended Bostonian, I think there's something wrong with the test. (I've heard Yankee used particularly for WASPy New Englanders; don't know if that's typical, though.)

[scottscidmore.livejournal.com]

I scored 41% Yankee. As the family name ancestor came to the Boston area in 1630 or so, and most of my branch of the family has lived in the northern US or southern Canada, the test does seem to be a bit out of wack. But then perhaps having spend most of my walking life in WA, CA, and NW has skewed my choices.