Utahn or Utahan? A proposed bill aims to settle the debate

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KEY TAKEAWAYS

A proposed Utah bill aims to establish "Utahn" as the state's official demonym not Utahan.
The bill, sponsored by Sen. Dan McCay, passed its first legislative committee unanimously.
A 2021 survey found 90% of locals prefer "Utahn," highlighting strong local support.

SALT LAKE CITY — What is Superman without Lex Luther? Coke without Pepsi? Or Kendrick Lamar without Drake?

One of the biggest beefs in Utah might be over whether to carry an extra letter in the word to describe someone from the state. However, a new bill going through the legislative process aims to settle that score once and for all.

SB230 — perhaps the less-catchy legislative version of "Not Like Us" — seeks to name "Utahn" as the state's official demonym, over "Utahan." It cleared its first hurdle in the Utah Legislature on Thursday, sailing through the Senate Economic Development and Workforce Services Committee with a unanimous vote.

If passed this year, it would be included in the long list of official Utah symbols.

"While it might seem trivial, I think how we're known and how people see Utahns is important," said Sen. Dan McCay, R-Riverton, the bill's sponsor. "We want to make sure they spell it correctly."

It's not clear when Utah ended up with two spellings of the same demonym, but that's far from the only oddity in the word. The Deseret News reported in 1994 on the dispute among historians over the meaning of the word "Utah," when it became a U.S. territory in 1850.

"Utahn" dates back to at least the 1890s, appearing in an 1898 Lehi Banner article about people from Utah partaking in the Alaska gold rush. "Utahan" does appear earlier, in an 1881 Silver Reef Miner article, from a southern Utah correspondent. That's based on newspapers that have been digitalized and uploaded to Utah Digital Newspapers, so it's likely both were used before that.

There's very little consistency in how it's spelled overall today, says Quin Monson, a professor of political science at BYU specializing in public opinion. Yet, the largest difference seems to be between locals and out-of-staters.

"There is a very strong preference among, especially native Utah residents and long-time residents, to spell it U-T-A-H-N," he said. "There are other places across the country that spell it differently, and they add an extra A."

For what it's worth, KSL.com's stylebook uses Utahn. Monson says that's common with how many local news outlets spell it out.

Regardless of what came first, "Utahn" eventually won out in local news over time. Search results for "Utahn" or "Utahns" far exceed "Utahan" or "Utahans" within Utah Digital Newspapers.

It also appears to be the preferred option among locals. Monson led a Y2 Analytics survey in 2021 that found 9 in 10 people preferred "Utahn" over "Utahan" among people surveyed. What's more, the spelling was about the same across all voting and religious demographics.

Deseret News essentially replicated the study's results last week by asking people roaming around the Utah Capitol to spell the word.

In short, it could be the most unifying subject among locals in a polarizing world of opinions. Monson joked in the 2021 report's findings that "Utahn" might be more agreeable among locals than rooting for the Utah Jazz or listening to the Tabernacle Choir at Temple Square.

It's certainly less polarizing than another Utah symbol bill that McCay recently championed. The senator was behind the state's new flag, which nearly polled evenly between those for and against it months after the final flag design was narrowly adopted.

Despite its popularity locally, many national outlets either lean toward "Utahan" or use it frequently, while dictionaries like Merriam-Webster accept both spellings.

In a committee hearing on Thursday, McCay displayed a 2023 New York Times crossword puzzle that used "Utahan" as an answer to prove his point, adding he struggled "for hours" to determine the answer because of the spelling. SB230, he says, would lead the fight toward one spelling: U-T-A-H-N.

"It's a very simple bill and — unlike other issues — this one has over 90% support ... so I'm going ride this wave of popular public support for one of my bills," he said.

Committee members agreed, voting to advance the bill without debate. It must be approved by the Senate and House of Representatives by March 7 before "Utahn" becomes the official demonym in state code.

Should that be the case, it could be the knockout blow in the feud between the two spellings.

The Key Takeaways for this article were generated with the assistance of large language models and reviewed by our editorial team. The article, itself, is solely human-written.