People are often quite aware of variation in word choice. Good-natured
arguments about who says tennis shoe and who says sneaker are not
uncommon. In Southeast Michigan, there are often classroom discussions
on the use of pop (the variant most likely found farther West) versus soda
(the variant found to the East) versus coke (the South). Michigan would
seem to be on the boundary (or isogloss) between soda and pop; thus the
spirited discussions. Such distinct variants over space are generally referred
to as isoglosses; a bundle of isoglosses is a strong indicator that people on
one side of the bundle consider themselves different (at least linguistically)
from people on the other side of the bundle. The individual isoglosses seen
in Figure 2.9 are primarily lexical. These include Dutch cheese (North of the
bundle) and its equivalent, cottage cheese (South of the bundle) and
(similarly) whinny (North) versus whicker or nicker (South).
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