I had to google but “ope” is apparently midwestern slang for “oops” that Walz recently used. So they are riffing on the old Obama “Hope” poster
It’s a more flexible interjection than a mere ‘oops,’ in my Midwestern opinion. It can function like oops, if you turn the corner in the grocery store and almost run into someone, ope is perfectly acceptable.
But it’s also used in other contexts, like when you find something you’re looking for. Ope, there it is. Or when you’re trying to, say, thread a screw in a tight spot. Ope, there it goes.
It’s a really weird word and kind of hard to explain. Respect my culture, people!
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If you have to ask it’s too hard to explain.
I’ll leave it at “It’s a Midwest thing; you wouldn’t understand.”
I just assumed Midwesterners dropped their “h”s.
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Also, until I read one of those “you might be from the Midwest if…” things I was completely unaware that I had ever uttered the word or that it even existed.
But one of them was “you use the word ‘ope’ daily.”
I was like “oh well I don’t do that; what is ‘ope’? I don’t use that word daily.” Then I was suddenly aware of the fact that OMFG yes I do, I really really do and I cannot stop no matter how hard I try.
I had been blissfully unaware that the word existed prior to that day, let alone that it was an integral part of my vocabulary.
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No… it means a lot of things, but not “hope”.
We should meet and discuss this word, I’ll bring a hotdish.
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in context of the poster
positive (down to earth)
negative (he is a big Ope) or
neutral (just a play on words, little more)
Oh, so it’s an interjection, with interchangeable uses.
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I have a coworker with a very thick midwestern accent. When I apply her voice to that word, it makes perfect sense.
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Can you narrow that down? Minnesotans say it, and it works very well in that accent. But people in, say, Oklahoma have a very different accent, I’d say closer to southern I guess.
And then there are lots of midwesterners like me who speak really neutral English. I’ve had people tell me it’s weird that I have almost zero accent.
The coworker in question is from Wiscooooooonsion. I also have a friend with a pretty thick accent from Michigan, who might have something to say on this.
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I read this book last year but have forgotten most of the things the author wrote. I’ll have to check it out of the library again and see if he mentioned “OPE”. It’s a funny book. By the way, Ranch IS my favorite dressing.
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Ok. My Cockney ancestors said “ope” rather than “hope” and they generally dropped their h’s before a hard o. And, of course, the French drop their h’s so the h is MIA frequently this side of the border.
My favourite mid-western accent is the one found in some northern states from folks with Scandinavian ancestry. I remember talking to this Minnesota woman on the train from Seattle to Chicago who was indignant that no one from Minn spoke like Marge in the movie Fargo. My wife and I could hardly keep from laughing as she sounded exactly like Marge.
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I also have almost zero accent – at least that’s what I tell myself (Detroit).
It’s interesting that none of the major network news anchors came from the Northeast – no Boston, NY, NJ or Philly accents on the evening news. They were from Montana, SD, Chicago, Virginia, North Carolina, and TX (at least for the set that I Googled).
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That’s what we all think about ourselves until someone who speaks differently from us tells us otherwise.
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Got the book from the library. Yup, he has 3 pages on OPE, what it means, how to pronounce it, when to use it, sample conversations, etc. I guess I’ve forgotten about it. Oops! I meant OPE.
I’ll have to re-read this book in case there will be more Midwestern jokes about Tim Walz.
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When someone asks me what kind of accent I have, I say “what accent? I don’t have an accent. You have an accent.”
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You have several accents, IIRC.
Best one is the French one.
I kinda like my (former) Texan accent. We used to live in Texas. Y’all come back now, ya’hear.
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