I’ve lived in Kentucky for nearly a quarter-century, and I’ve never known for sure how to pronounce Appalachia. Half the time, I say apple-LATCH-a, with a short A in the middle. The rest of the time, I blurt out apple-LAY-cha, with a long A.
Now I finally know why I can’t seem to make up my mind. Both pronunciations are correct.
Also, both are wrong.
We often think of Appalachia as Kentucky and West Virginia. But the word Appalachia has its roots much farther South. In 1527-28, the Spanish attempted to colonize the Florida peninsula. In the process, they came upon a Native American village with a name pronounced Apalachee by the local people. The tribe used what seemed like a short A in the middle: Apple-LATCH-ee. The Spanish soon adopted it as the name of both the people and the region, including the southern portion of what is now the Appalachian Mountains.
The name spread north along with the Europeans. Gradually, Appalachia became the moniker of the entire 1,500-mile mountain range running from Florida to Maine. Along the way, however — some say it happened near the West Virginia-Pennsylvania border — the middle A went from short to long, from LATCH-a to LAY-cha. Today, most people in Pennsylvania, New York and points north use LAY-cha.
While most dictionaries allow for both pronunciations, Northerners seem set on LAY-cha. They don’t want to be confused, it seems, with southern Appalachia, which gets a lot of bad press. Likewise, don’t try the long A in eastern Kentucky, West Virginia, Tennessee and other Southern states. Why not?
Novelist Sharyn McCrumb, who is from the North Carolina mountains, says Appalachia with a long A, is “the pronunciation of condescension, the pronunciation of the imperialist, the pronunciation of people who do not want to be associated with the place.” If you pronounce it Apple-LATCH-a, she adds, “that means you’re on the side that we trust.”
Neil Chethik, aka the Grammar Gourmet, is executive director of the Carnegie Center for Literacy and Learning (www.carnegiecenterlex.org). Contact Chethik at neil@carnegiecenterlex.org or (859) 254-4175.