Y'all (/jɑːl/ yahl)) is a contraction of you and all (sometimes combined as you-all). It is used as a (usually plural) second-person pronoun. The exclusive usage of y'all as a plural pronoun is a subject of perennial discussion. Y'all is strongly associated with Southern American English, and appears in other English varieties, including African American Vernacular English and South African Indian English.
Y’all arose as a contraction of you-all. It first appeared in the Southern United States in the early nineteenth century, with an earliest citation of 1824. Many aspects of the word's derivation are unknown; for example, no one knows if its use began with southern blacks or with white immigrants. One supposition is that the term evolved from the earlier Ulster Scots term ye aw.Scots-Irish immigrants to the Southern United States frequently used the term ye aw. Some evidence suggests that y'all could have evolved from ye aw due to the influence of African slaves who may have adapted the Scots-Irish term. An alternative theory is that y'all is a calque of Gullah and Caribbean creole una via earlier dialects of African-American English.Y'all is an original form, deriving from indigenous processes of grammar and morphological change, not from input from other English dialects.