[1] This variety is both influential upon and influenced by the Southern U.S. regional dialect, which has become predominant in central and southern Appalachia today, while a Western Pennsylvania regional dialect has become predominant in northern Appalachia,[2] according to the 2006 Atlas of North American English (ANAE).

The ANAE identifies the "Inland South", a dialect sub-region in which the Southern U.S. dialect's defining vowel shift is the most developed,[3] as centering squarely in southern Appalachia: namely, the cities of Knoxville and Chattanooga, Tennessee; Birmingham, Alabama; Greenville, South Carolina; and Asheville, North Carolina.

Accusative case personal pronouns are used as reflexives in situations which, in American English, do not typically demand them (e.g., "I'm gonna get me a haircut").

[27] The possessive absolutive forms, Standard yours, his, hers, theirs, and ours appear as yourn, hisn, hern, theirn, and ourn.

[32] Divergence from standard English conjugation of the verb "to be" occurs with the highest frequency in the past tense, where grammatically plural subjects also take the singular form "was" rather than "were".

Examples include "All of a sudden a bear come a-runnin'," "He just kep' a-beggin'," and the song lyric "A froggie went a-courtin' and he did ride.

"[38] Phonological rules and restrictions apply to a-prefixing; for example, it can only occur with verbs accented on the initial syllable: a-fóllowin but not a-discóverin or a-retírin.

[44] A-prefixing can be traced back to the 16th century: The construction reached its height from 1500 to 1700 and developed out of using the preposition "on" and a verbal noun ending in -ing.

[45] Montgomery (2009) argues that a-prefixing developed from the preposition "an"/"on" in Early Middle English and suggests that it arose from the loss of the -n from "on" in examples like "hee set before his eyes king Henrie the eight with all his Lordes on hunting in his forrest at Windsore" (Thomas Nashe, "Unfortunate Traveller", 1594).

[84] Beliefs about Appalachia's isolation led to the early suggestion that the dialect was a surviving relic of long-forgotten forms of English.

[86] However, many aspects of this theory have been questioned by linguists, with Michael Ellis (1992) arguing that the dialect is difficult to attribute to a single source.

[87] Montgommery (1991, 1995) identifies 18 characteristics of Appalachian grammar, including the use of might could for might be able to, the use of "'un" with pronouns and adjectives (e.g., young'un), the use of "done" as a helping verb (e.g., we done finished it), and 22 words such as airish ("airy") as being derived from the Scotch-Irish, Scottish and Northumbrian dialects of English.

[86] Montgommery also identified several features, such as the use of the "a-" prefix (e.g., "a-goin'" for "going") and the attachment of "-ed" to certain verbs (e.g., knowed), as originating in Southern and Midland English dialects.

The phrase fell out of use in England sometime in the early 1800s; however, it remained in use in the Appalachia region of North America until the mid-to-late twentieth century.

[92][93] A few items characteristic of Appalachian grammar originate, via British English and Scots dialects, in the Old Norse language, having taken root in Britain with Scandinavian settlement there during the Viking Age (c. 800–1050 CE).

[95] Some pronunciation features reminiscent of those in the Scottish Lowlands and Ulster can also be heard, such as the pin-pen merger and goose fronting, the Scotch-Irish and English settlers had a strong influence on the Appalachian dialect,[8] linguistic analyses suggest that Appalachian English developed as a distinctive dialect among English-speaking people in North America.

[96] Native American influences in the Appalachian dialect are virtually nonexistent except for place names (e.g., "Appalachia", "Tennessee", "Chattahoochee River", "Cheoah Mountains").

[36] The traditional Appalachian dialect spread to the Ozark Mountains in northern Arkansas and southern Missouri.

Ozark and Appalachian English have been documented together as a single Southern Mountain dialect of the United States.

[97][1][98] Appalachian terms found in Ozark English include fireboard, tow sack, jarfly, and brickle and similar speech patterns also exist, such as epenthetic h (hit instead of it), the use of the "a-" prefix ("a-goin'" for "going"), and the d-stop in place of certain "z" sounds (e.g., "idn't" for "isn't"), all of which is seen in other dialects of older Southern American English.

The origins of Appalachian English can be traced back to Scottish-Irish ancestors, and include unique grammatical and lexical differences[87] Appalachian English can be found in the following states: Ohio; West Virginia; Kentucky; North Carolina; Northern Georgia; Northern South Carolina; western Virginia; Alabama; and Tennessee.

[108] In addition to the linguistic boundary debates, Appalachian English is surrounded by stereotypical views of the area and the people living in it.

[109] Furthermore, easier access to social relations via the internet has expanded the quantity of negative beliefs associated with individuals from Appalachia.

[109] Despite all of the debates surrounding this dialect and whether or not its boundaries are legitimate and correct, to the people of Appalachia, their variety of English is central to their identities regardless of how it is seen by linguists, as well as outsiders.