How Capicola Became Gabagool: The Italian New Jersey Accent, Explained →

Dan Nosowitz, writing for Atlas Obscura:

“Don’t eat gabagool, Grandma,” says Meadow Soprano on an early episode of The Sopranos, perhaps the most famous depiction of Jersey Italian culture in the past few decades. “It’s nothing but fat and nitrates.” The pronunciation of “gabagool,” a mutation of the word "capicola," might surprise a casual viewer, although it and words like it should be familiar to viewers of other New Jersey-based shows like the now-defunct Jersey Shore and The Real Housewives of New Jersey, where food often drives conversation. The casts are heavily Italian-American, but few of them can actually speak, in any real way, the Italian language. Regardless, when they talk about food, even food that’s widely known by the non-Italian population, they often use a specific accent.

And it’s a weird one.

A pesky kid, I learned the answer to where all the end vowel-dropping came from a long time ago, but I’m glad the rest of the Atlas Obscura-reading world gets to know now too.