"For" all intents and purposes
South Louisiana's favorite chronological preposition
Let’s say my wife and I were going on a dinner date and we needed to park at 5:45 in order to walk to the restaurant to make our dinner reservation by 6 pm.
In most places you might say it…
“If you have dinner for 2 at 6, you should be there by 5:45.”
One of my favorite things about South Louisiana language is that ANY of the prepositions in the previous sentence could be replaced with the word “for”.
“If you have dinner FOR 2 FOR 6, you should be there FOR 5:45”
I like this little colloquial quirk because it doesn’t matter the accent, the word “for” is just much more dynamic down here. I have wondered if it is some remnant of the French language or way of speaking. I welcome anyone to explain this to me.
I first took note of this phenomenon while I still lived in Mississippi. Two of the students on our leadership team were from south Louisiana. I noticed it in the girl from New Orleans and thought it must just be her thing. It was not long however, until it showed up again. I suggested that we have a team meeting at 7 pm. Our student from Zachary suggested that we have “dinner for 6 and then start our meeting after that”. I briefly wondered which 2 of the team of 8 she would be leaving out.
She must have seen the puzzled look on my face because she quickly said, “…or 6:30?”
That was the first time that I said something about it. I realized that it must be a regional thing. Like Soda, Pop, Coke, Soft Drink.
Maybe you remember the NY Times dialect quiz1 that could tell with some accuracy where you were from based on the words that you use for different things.
Frontage Road or Service Road,
18 Wheeler or Semi or tractor trailer,
kitty-corner or caddy-corner, and does it mean next to or across diagonally?
I have alway liked these things. I think that by the time I left Ole Miss I could tell if someone was actually from The Delta by the way that they said “Senatobia.” We all know the way that people from Tupelo say “Tupelo” and the people from Brookhaven say “Brookhaven”, right?
Have you ever heard someone from South Georgia say “water”?
But this use of “FOR” is my favorite. I like noticing it so much that I have tried very hard not to use it that way. Not because I think its wrong, but in the same way that it feels like I would trying too hard to sound like I am from Lincoln county if I say “brook-HAY-ven.”
My wife does it now, and I like knowing that I need to have Henry at soccer for 4 and Missye at Tumbling for 5:15. It makes perfect sense, it works.
I think another reason that I don’t want to start using it, is because I don’t want to stop noticing it. It’s part of what I love about the way that people talk here.
I look forward to the day when I hear it out-in-the-wild, somewhere else and am able to say, “Hey, you grew up in a parish not a county, didn’t you?”
If anyone has theories on why this is the case, I would love to hear them.
It is now behind a paywall, sorry.