Sapphire's Japanese

[Zhen Lin]

It should be readily apparent that Sapphire does not speak orthodox standard Japanese. The question is - what dialect is she speaking then?

Considering Hoenn is based on Kyūshū, it ought to be a Kyūshū dialect.

Some features of Sapphire's speech:

• Use of おる instead of いる -- Western Japanese.
• Use of 〜ん instead of 〜ない -- Western Japanese.
• Ending sentences with ったい (and almost as often as Haruka with かも) -- a Kyūshū feature, according to 大辞林
• Sometimes ending with け instead.
• Use of 言うて、思た、〜てしもて、〜てもうた instead of 言って、思って、〜てしまって、〜ちゃった -- as with Western Japanese conjugation.
• Use of や instead of だ -- Western Japanese, primarily Kansai.
• Use of ば -- a contraction of をば I assume -- instead of を.

(I really ought to be getting on with the summaries of the November & December Shō5 episodes, but this is distracting...)

 

[Transfinite]

I asked Karasu on PsTK's boards and he says it's Kyushu dialect. And I'm pretty sure she uses ttai instead of da or ya. She uses ya in place of ja/dewa, though.

 

[Zhen Lin]

(っ)たい is an intensifying particle, not a replacement for だ. や is though:
「…ゆうことやね？」
「…になっとったんやって…。」
「口ばっかりで中身のない男やと。」
「でも、なんでやろ…。」
「この人の強さは本物やって…」
「あれは、その男の子のことやったんよ。」
「…好きやった。」

And you get the idea. Though interestingly... I don't think I've ever seen (っ)たい with や either.

Also... I just noticed that she does occasionally lapse into more orthodox Japanese - 「前にヒマワキで今も好きであこがれてる人がいるって言いかけたの覚えてる？」 - compare with 「あたし前から好きな人がおったとよ。」 and 「…思っとるとよ。」