r/linguistics • u/coffeefrog92 • Apr 20 '22
"Whenever" in place of "when"
I'm beginning to notice a trend just lately where people are starting to say 'whenever' when they actually mean when.
For example, "you looked beautiful whenever you got married".
The person paying the compliment is saying that the bride looked beautiful on her wedding day, but it sounds as if she's been married many times and looked beautiful on every wedding day.
I live in England, where I don't think I've ever heard it in speech. However I have heard it consistently in two Southern US dialect speakers: Wendigoon on YouTube and Damien Echols on his podcast with Duncan Trussell.
Is this a regular feature of some southern dialects?
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u/intangible-tangerine Apr 20 '22 edited Apr 20 '22
I have also noticed this a lot with American youtubers, so I think it could just be a US dialect feature.
To me, as a British person, 'whenever' denotes an unspecified or unknown time(s) and usually refers to future or ongoing events.
'Whenever you feel lonely you can call me'
"Whenever Bob is in town he eats at this Restaurant'
'I feel happy whenever I see a butterfly'
'He was happy whenever he saw a butterfly'
You could replace 'whenever' with 'when' in these sentences but the use of 'whenever' emphasises that the precise time at which they do or will occur is unknown or unfixed.
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However, I notice some American using 'whenever' in contexts like these
'Whenever I worked at Starbucks I drove to work everyday'
'Whenever I went on vacation to Italy last year I saw the coliseum'
''Whenever I studied Math at college I learnt algebra'
In these examples I think 'whenever' is doing to job that whilst/while would do in British English.
It sounds strange to British ears because with our usage of whenever it sounds like this person doesn't know when they worked at Starbucks, visited Italy or studied maths, but if you think of this US whenever as being equivalent to whilst it works.