Date:  Tue, 23 Jan 1996 22:38:00 -0400

From:  "E. Wayles Browne" <ewb2[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]CORNELL.EDU>

Subject: Re: cheap folks



>    Did any other people grow up hearing the pronunciation

>    /chIn'-chi/ for the word "chintzy," meaning 'stingy', rather than

>    /chIn(t)-si/?

>    I'm not sure how to represent this without IPA, and I apologize for the

>    eye-dialect. I say it with the obvious assimlatory process of two

>    affricates and I swear I've heard other people say it that way.

>    Although I have now (since this event happened) gotten corrected for my

>    pronunciation!

>

>    I know that "chintzy" is in Webster's, but I was curious

>    about how widespread the usage is. This was a very common word when

>    I was growing up in the northern part of rural Louisiana, but

>    others in my age cohort (mid thirties) don't seem to use it.



I say chinchy. It means stingy. It's not the same as chintsy, which means

low-quality, cheap (about things). I'm from New England, near Boston, born

1941.

I always felt this was a New England word. However my father was originally

from Shreveport, LA, and it is barely conceivable that I heard the word from

him rather than from New Englanders.





>

>    "tight as Dick's hatband"

>    "poor as Job's turkey" (which was always weird to me because

>        turkeys are New World animals)

>    "handy as a pocket on a shirt"

Never heard any of these.



>    "sword of Damocles" (and don't anybody try and tell me *this* is

>        a quaint regionalism)

>

This is a frequent literary allusion.





Wayles Browne, Assoc. Prof. of Linguistics

Morrill Hall, Cornell University

Ithaca, New York 14853, U.S.A.

tel. 607-255-0712 (o), 607-273-3009 (h)

fax 607-255-2044 (write FOR W. BROWNE)

e-mail ewb2[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]cornell.edu (1989 to 1993 was: jn5j[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]cornella.bitnet //

jn5j[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]cornella.cit.cornell.edu)