Did you know that the words you use can give away where you were born and raised? It’s true. It was the Unabomber, Ted Kaczynski’s brother David, who recognized the prose style when his Industrial Society and its Future was published in the Washington Post in September 1995.

Ok. Maybe it doesn’t have to be that serious. Regional Linguistics can be examined with something as simple as pop versus soda.

Do you say soda or pop? I am originally from Ohio. Us Buckeyes say pop. My wife’s ex-husband was from Jersey, he taught her to say soda (which kinda makes me mad – it’s pop!). But it makes sense, those from the Northeastern United States, most of Florida, California and pockets in the Midwest around Milwaukee and St Louis call it soda.

The correct word, pop (In My Humble Opinion), is used in most of the Midwest and in the West.

Further fractioning the country, a lot of folks in the South will call it a Coke, even if it isn’t a Coca-Cola product.

Taking a deep dive on the subject, it was Jason Katz, the Graphic Artist, who wrote, “Speaking American: How Y’all, Youse, and You Guys,” who stated there are even more regionalisms. There are 6% of Americans who simply call them soft drinks, especially here in North Carolina and in Louisiana.

And get this. Up in Boston, there are still a decent amount of older folks that grew up saying tonic, though, they are apparently dying out now.

Here’s what I found interesting while researching for this story. I conducted a highly unscientific poll by going to the social media giant, Facebook. Perhaps you saw it. On a few of the Outer Banks local groups I asked this very question; pop or soda? To say I was shocked at the results is an understatement! Within 20 minutes I had close to 1,000 responses. Weeks later, I’m still getting comments. Enough for me to toss my phone out the window because of all the notifications ringing in. Apparently we all have strong opinions on this subject.

In breaking down the results, it matched exactly what the information above bore out. Those in the midwest, do in fact say pop. North-easterners say soda. And when we relocate here to the Outer Banks, we hold onto our regionalism. Ohioans still say pop. New Yorkers still say soda. But those indigenous to the Outer Banks are likely to call it a Coke or a drink. So what does that mean? Like I said earlier, this was a highly unscientific study so I can only hazard a guess. And that guess is that you can take the boy out of Jersey, but you can’t take the Jersey out of the boy.

Well, there you go. The words we use can help determine our backstories. Hey, pass me a Dr. Pepper!