'Jawn' Could Be Added To Merriam-Webster Dictionary

PHILADELPHIA – The Liberty Bell. Cheesesteaks. Angry, no, passionate sports fans. Mummers. Jawn. These are just a few things Philly is known for, and one is getting some serious press from one of the world's largest dictionary companies.

Merriam-Webster recently announced Philly's own slang term "jawn" is on its "Words We're Watching" list.

According to the linguists and lexicographers at the dictionary company, jawn is a "Philadelphia all-purpose noun" which "can refer to a single thing... a collection or class of things... a situation... or a person."

We don't need a dictionary telling us what we already know to be true: Jawn is a versatile jawn. https://t.co/M5VltwAjlY
— City of Philadelphia (@PhiladelphiaGov) October 4, 2017

In its Words We're Watching blog post, the company said jawn is a great example of "regionalisms," linguistic features such as words or phrases that are limited to regional dialects.

In the same post, we learn the theory behind jawn's etymology.

According to experts, "jawn" is likely the result of "joint" being said a Philadelphia accent.

"It's likely because of the phonetics of Philadelphia, and possibly because the way that the word joint changed as it moved south," Merriam-Webster says. "The further north you get, the more /oi/ you tend to hear in joint. In Washington DC, this joint sounds more like jaunt; in Memphis, users report the spelling of this particular joint as junt to match its pronunciation. In Philly, that final -t was dropped, giving the city jawn."

Will jawn be included in Merriam-Webster dictionaries at some point? Maybe, but it must meet the company's criteria for entry, which includes tracking the word's use and citing that usage.

Do you think our word should be included in the dictionary? Let us know in the comments.

Image via Michael Righi, Flickr Commons