Kalleh's "debris" query engendered one of my own. I was born in South Carolina, and there heard "pecan" pronounced "PEE-can." I was surprised when I moved to the west coast and heard it pronounced "p'cahn." I've since heard most folks north of the Mason-Dixon line saying it "p'cahn." Recently a man from Georgia (the US one) came to work where I do, and he pronounces it "PEE-can." Where did the "p'cahn" affectation arise?

Th A-H lists three pronunciations: /pɪ'kɑːn/, /pɪ'kæn/, and /'piːkæn/. The etymology is interesting: North American French pacane < Illinois pakani. Illinois, as far as I know, is north of the Mason-Dixon line. As the word traveled south its pronunciation changed. The first time I visited Texas I was convinced that people spoke slowly so that I could understand what they were saying, but then I noticed that they spoke that way with one another, too. When I went to San Antonio and asked some historical information about Bexar county, I was corrected from my /'bexar/ to their /'bɛr/.

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Originally posted by zmježd:
Illinois, as far as I know, is north of the Mason-Dixon line.

True, but the Illinois (the native people) came from the Mississippi river valley, and it's the people to which your citation refers, I think.

the Illinois (the native people) came from the Mississippi river valley

They're from the northern part of the valley: Illinois, Missouri, Indiana, Ohio (link).

How about almond? My wife and I are both from RI but she pronounces it All-mund while I say Ahl-mund. The dictionary says it can be A-mond, Am-mond and Ol-mond. I know MY way is correct, no matter what you may say.

It seems that the Cajuns picked it up from the Indians while traveling to Louisiana after the Great Expulsion from Nova Scotia. The earliest reference I could find in Google Books was a letter from Thomas Jefferson in 1786 from Paris (link). He uses the alternate (earlier) spelling paccan, which he mentions is the name for it south of the Potomac and among Indians and Spaniards, while it is known elsewhere as the Illinois nut.

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she pronounces it All-mund while I say Ahl-mund

I don't understand the difference.

I've heard the word pronounced in all the ways you list. I haven't noticed any pronounced regional or social differentiation.

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I haven't noticed any pronounced regional or social differentiation.

Exactly. Why isn't there only one or two ways to say the word instead of at least five?

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Originally posted by zmježd:
it is known elsewhere as the Illinois nut.

In Arizona the Illinois nut is known as Obama, or so says the Senator from AZ.

In Arizona

That pretty much says it all ...

quote:

Originally posted by Asa Lovejoy:
I was born in South Carolina, and there heard "pecan" pronounced "PEE-can."

Peecan is what we use when there ain't no tree around. We don't drink from it. Y'all from So' Carolina is kinda peekyuliar.

Y'all don't be aggravatin' me none, Tiyunmayun, ar A'll let onea mah hownds liyuft hiz leig on ya an' rust ya all up!

I say "PEE-cahn" and "AHL-mund."

I was recently at our annual meeting, which of course has people from all across the U.S. and our territories. That Rhode Island accent is one of the most distinctive, I think. It always amazes me because it's such as small state.

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Exactly. Why isn't there only one or two ways to say the word instead of at least five?

This thread might interest you.

No l for me in almond /'æmənd/. It varies with the other pronunciation I commonly hear 'round here /'amənd/. Pronunciations with the l sound regional to me. Maybe back east in the Midwest.

I remember being told by Californians to call them amuhns, because to harvest them you have to shake the ‘ell out of ‘em.

In less careful speech, I tend towards /'æmənz/ for almonds.

quote:

Originally posted by stella:
I remember being told by Californians to call them amuhns, because to harvest them you have to shake the ‘ell out of ‘em.

And you believe Californians? Harummmpfff!!!

Before all the Californians moved to Oregon, nuts form the genus Corylus maxima were called Filberts. Now one only sees "hazlenut." Maybe Dilbert's boss had something to do with it. He's a Californian nut, you know.

Filberts

My grandmother, who was born in California, always called them filbert nuts. It wasn't until years later that I discovered she was talking about hazelnuts. (The only hazel I ever heard her talking about was witch hazel.) I've never cared for much filberts. Oregon and Oregonians could be the topic of another thread. As I spent a year in Denio, NV (link), my view of Oregon, just across the border, was different than most Californians. I couldn't understand why everybody characterized Oregon as a rainy place. It was pretty much dry high desert in my experience. Since having visited Western Oregon, I have reassessed that state's wetness. (My favorite city up there is Portland one of whose founding fathers was the supsiciously named Asa Lovejoy.)

I remember once looking all over the grocery store for hazelnuts for a cake I was making. This is store has everything, and I was shocked that they didn't carry them, but I went home without them.

Little did I know they were there all the time...labelled "filberts."

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My grandmother . . . . always called them filbert nuts. It wasn't until years later that I discovered she was talking about hazelnuts.

Mistaken identity?
http://www.thenutfactory.com/kitchen/facts/facts-filberts.html

Awwww, what do they know - they're in Spokane, Washington! Really, though, I did not hear the term, "hazlenut" until the massive influx from the south was well underway in the 1980s. I'll have to do some research on which nut is the more prevalent.

And Zmj, you're right; we Portlanders are all wet!
Like California, which has several climate zones, Oregon has at least four.

From Proofreader'slink

quote:

Filberts, hazelnuts and cobnuts all belong to the family Corylus...

Filberts, hazelnuts and cobnuts all belong to the genus Corylus. Corylus is in the Betulaceae, the birch family.

I've never heard of cobnuts before.

Witch-hazels (Hamamelis species) are in the witch-hazel family, Hamamelidaceae .

The article in that link states, "...Hazelnuts and Filberts are the same nut.
Technically, the Hazelnut is raised in Oregon and Washington on a bush the produces the nuts in late October. Hazelnuts are also grown as a crop in British Columbia, Canada, along the Fraser River:
No where else on earth is a commercial Hazelnut crop grown.

The Filbert is a cousin of the hazelnut. ..."

Which seems contradictory. Either Filberts are hazelnuts or they're not hazelnuts.

And they are grown commercially in England, frequently in coppiced woodlands http://www.coppicing.com/

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Like California, which has several climate zones, Oregon has at least four.

)
Moist, watery, saturated, waterlogged, flooded (US Weather Bureau)

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Originally posted by Proofreader:

Moist, watery, saturated, waterlogged, flooded (US Weather Bureau)

During the rainy season it feels that way! The coast mountains get HUGE rainfalls; the Willamette Valley gets a lot, the high desert gets little, and it's usually in the form of snow, and the alpine-like northeast gets snow and rain.

It's always fun to watch new move-ins try to drive their fancy Jeep clones (SUVs) during their first Portland ice storm. Portland is hilly, and one can't see black ice, soooo... pinball with cars!

I've written to the OSU (Oregon, not Ohio) extension service asking for some clarification regarding filberts, hazlenuts, and cobnuts. Will post the reply.

quote:

Originally posted by Asa Lovejoy:

It's always fun to watch new move-ins try to drive their fancy Jeep clones (SUVs) during their first Portland ice storm. Portland is hilly, and one can't see black ice, soooo... pinball with cars!

I grew up in central British Columbia, where we got a lot of snow every winter and learned how to drive in it.
I spent about 12 years in Kamloops, which is much further south in B.C. They get snow there every year, although not as much as Prince George. You wouldn't know snow was an annual event, though, if you watched drivers on the first day it fell.
And yes, Asa, there were hills there which quite often had to be closed the first day it snowed because there were so many cars against the curb on both sides no one could get through.

Filbert, hazelnut, and cobnut are all common names for the same thing: Corylus species. They're synonyms.

Read what Seattle author Arthur Lee Jacobson says about it:

• Hazels and Filberts in Seattle
  
• Nuts

Sometimes these posts are so timely. Just tonight Shu and I went to the Original Pancake House for dinner. He ordered p-CAHN pancakes, and the waitress looked at him and said, "PEE-can?"

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He ordered p-CAHN pancakes

We all have our ideosyncracies about food and this brought back memories of my father.

My mother was hospitalized for several weeks and my father had to make our breakfast. We awoke one morning to an unbelievable stench emanating from the kitchen. Upon investigating, we found my father busily frying pancakes but the most odoriferous and discolored pancakes imaginable.

"What is in those pancakes?" we asked.

"It's my favorite," he said. "Peanut butter pancakes."

Peanut butter cookies, yes, but pancakes!?!?!?

My thoughts, exactly!

I got a reply from Jeff Olsen of the OSU Extension Service. Here it is: "Filberts and hazelnuts are the same. In earlier days in the industry we used the term filberts to distinguish our product from the rest of the world as Oregon filberts. In more recent times the people marketing the nuts noticed that the confusion of filberts versus hazelnuts was causing more harm than good. So, the industry decided to align themselves with the rest of the world and call them hazelnuts. If you talk with some of the veteran nut growers they will joke that 'they grow filberts and sell hazelnuts'".

Thus one may use "filbert" as a shibboleth to identify move-ins from old-time Oregonians, just as southerners can use "PEE=can"

Asa, apparently the PEE-can goes way beyond the south. As I said above, our waitress in Chicago corrected our pronunciation of the word. While she could be from the south, I do hear PEE-can a lot.

I heard it in a movie shot in New York recently, but can't remember its name. I think it was Ben Stiller who said it. So, yeah, some yankees DO say it right!

quote:

Originally posted by Proofreader:

quote:

He ordered p-CAHN pancakes

We all have our ideosyncracies about food and this brought back memories of my father.

My mother was hospitalized for several weeks and my father had to make our breakfast. We awoke one morning to an unbelievable stench emanating from the kitchen. Upon investigating, we found my father busily frying pancakes but the most odoriferous and discolored pancakes imaginable.

"What is in those pancakes?" we asked.

"It's my favorite," he said. "Peanut butter pancakes."

Did he eat them?

Did you?

I can assure you I put as much distance between us as possible. He definitely ate them but he was the only one.

While I consider that an atrocious meal, he disliked my own creation for lunch a few days later: A bologna sandwich with grape jam. Excellent! I think it is found in one of Julia Child's French cooking books.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: <Proofreader>,