Northeast Pennsylvania English

Hayna Valley English is a regional dialect of the English language spoken in Northeastern Pennsylvania. It is highly concentrated in the Wyoming Valley area, which includes Wilkes-Barre and Scranton, Pennsylvania.

The word "Hayna" in "Hayna Valley English" is one of the dialect's most prominent and distinctive words. Hayna (variant "heyna") is a linguistic particle meaning "Isn't it so?" Most often, the word "hayna" is coupled with "or no", creating the phrase "Hayna or no?" (variant "Heynit or no?"), and is a request for affirmation. Another variation of the spelling of Hayna is "Hainna." Also, people say "Henna" which has basically the same meaning as "Hayna." E.g. "Henna or no?"

The Wyoming Valley has many other differences from standard American English:

• The letter "H", when read aloud as a standalone letter, is not pronounced "aiych" but rather "haiych".
• Because of the large influx of Polish and other Slavic immigrants in the early 1900's, many Hayna Valley speakers omit the "th" sound in words and replace it with a "t" sound. For example, the word "cathedral" would be pronounced "cateedral", "three" becomes "tree", "without" becomes "widout" etc.
• Native speakers of Hayna Valley English have a tendency to overpronounce words. "Athlete" becomes "Ath-a-lete", "Mine" becomes "my-un".
• When referring to a small group of objects, the phrase "A couple, two three" is used. Due to the common changing of "th" sounds to a "t" sound and the relative speed the phrase is said, the resulting phrase is "A couple two tree". Example: This project won't take very long; just a couple two tree days.
• The word "you" is commonly pluralized. The plural form would be spelled "yous". The phrase "yous guys" is commonly used to refer to a group of people, usually a smaller group (larger groups are referred to as "all yous guys").
• Another form of the plural "you" is heard in adressing groups of people. One might say "yez" instead of "you" to a group of people. An example is "I'll see yez later," or "How are yez?"
• Instead of saying "Going to," as in "I am going to the mall," Wyoming Valley Natives often say "I'm going up da mall."
• The non-Standard English irregular past-tense verb "bet" is used as a past form of the verb "to beat". For example, instead of saying "I beat up some guys last night", valley natives would say "I bet up some guys last night, a couple two tree."
• When using the phrase "Wouldn't have," Wyoming Valley natives invariably replace the "have" with "of." For example: "I wouldn't of left yous guys if you were going up da mall instead of da movies." This feature is found in other non-Standard English dialects.
• The word "disere," a contraction for "this here," is commonly used to stipulate something indefinite(i.e., "If we go to the movies, we can see disere.")
• "Lookit", meaning "look here" or "look at that" is often used.
• "Hiya doin'", meaning "Hi, How are you doing?" is also often used by valley natives.
• Flapping, found in many dialects of English, is also quite common in the Wyoming Valley, whereby matter=madder, metal=medal, grater=grader, etc.

The Hayna (or Heyna) 500 refers to the people cruising around Public Square in Wilkes-Barre in their cars.