I recently watched the Amazon original movie “Troop Zero”. It’s a cute little movie set in rural Georgia circa the late 1970s. It’s an OK movie with some cute parts, though it does require one to suspend their disbelief to a ridiculous degree.
I rely heavily on closed captioning when watching TV. I find it very helpful for understanding dialogue in general, but especially certain accents. Like, I cannot fully enjoy episodes of Downton Abbey if I don’t have subtitles. Ditto for Game of Thrones. British and Australian accents can be hard for me understand sometimes.
So I was watching “Troop Zero” with the closed captioning on just out of habit. The over-the-top faux Southern accents dripping out of the characters’ mouths was a bit eye-rolly, but the dialogue was not difficult for me to understand. However, I’m nonetheless glad that I had the captions on because they captured a word I’ve never heard in my whole life.
“Funna”
Now, I was born and raised in Georgia and have spent most of my life in the South. I thought I knew every variation of the “fixing to” theme out there. “Finna”. “Fit’na.” “Fin’ta.” But I ain’t never heard of no “funna” before.
The word “funna” was uttered at least fifty-billion times in this movie. At first I thought they were saying “gonna” and that the closed captions were just confused. But then I heard Viola Davis clearly say “funna”. We funna be Birdies, y’all!
Now, I’m certainly no linguist. The word is in the Urban Dictionary, so it isn’t totally made up. But still, I’m skeptical that this word exists in any real sense. I’m thinking it is a gag.
New one on me, too, y’all! Trying to imagine a “sound like” is getting me nowhere fast. I can’t even imagine “funnel” fitting in a sentence where “funna” would go as well.
The closest I can make my mind get to a possibility would be “foreigner” (of the “furriner” type).
But you have my curiosity up to a 10, so I want to know the real answer, too!
No chance “fauna” would be the intended word, is there?
Okay, I have Amazon Prime and looking at the trailers it looked like a funny movie, but OMG! does anyone from the South actually speak with such a fake heavy accent and doesn’t clearly enunciate their words? I figured I’d give it a try running on the TV above my monitor but I had to turn on the CC to make out what was being said.
As for *funna *, its definitely not *fun of *, but it seems to be a contraction of for sure enough, fo [sure] na[nuff], here’s the sceneon Youtube. Not in the Youtube video, later as they’re choosing the Birdies guidebook, the guy says “Hey. If I make that dance we funna win” and the girl says “We funna win.” Further confirmation that’s it’s fo [sure] na[nuff].
“Funna” is definitely “fixing to” and I have heard it many times. It’s a little lazier sounding than “finna”. I have not seen this movie, to be clear. I’ve just heard “funna” for 50 years here in Tennessee, although this movie is set in Georgia.
Urban dictionary has an entry from 2003. Funna: action of doing something. also known as finna. also look for evolution of this word which makes it a slang of a slang example: Funsa or Finsa meaning the same thing.
yo I’m Funna roll to the store wanna ride.
I live in the deep south. Never heard ‘funna’
I’ve heard ‘tryna’(trying to) and ‘fixin’(fixing) and ‘prolly’(probably) and ‘gwana’(going to).
It amazing how southernism get twisted in media. Even without media the language spoken down here is bad.
Still, I have never heard ‘funna’
Okay I had the pleasure of seeing this wonderful movie today. They are definitely saying “fixing to”. At the food fight when Christmas was going to make her cake “Hell-No” said “we funna win. We funna get on that record”. This is what I’ve heard all my life. It’s just a slight variation of “finna” and I think it’s always been more commonly pronounced that way by African-Americans but I’ve heard this all my life in Memphis, TN.
I don’t say it, but I’ve heard it used while growing up in Florida even moreso than finna, and definitely more than fitna and finta. In fact, I dont think I’ve ever heard either of the last two; absolutely never the last one, finta.
“funna” is common enough to me that I recently watched Zero Troop and noticed nothing strange about their word choices. Though I’ve never used it in my own speech, I always knew people who did. It just means the same thing as finna and gonna. It’s a merger of those two words.
I’ve never heard it as “funna” but then again I’ve only heard it a few times as “finna” and it was indeed from people from Georgia. I immediately understood it as equivalent to “fixin’ to”. I’m not sure if I would have done so had it been “funna”.
I grew up in Los Angeles (born here in 1973) and I heard funna for years before I ever heard the word finna. It was more like saying gonna, not fixing to. We wasn’t “country” out here like that. So when you heard “I’m funna kick your ass!” Or “you ain’t funna do shit!”…it had the same meaning as I’m Fuckin’ gonna, or you ain’t fuckin gonna. Nobody in L.A. was fixing to do shit, unless they came from the country somewhere. ������ There was an older black guy that used to go to the liquor store where we would play video games and every time he would come buy a bottle when his chick was coming over and tell everyone in the store, “I’m funna do me my ghost tonight!!” (Translates to I’m fucking gonna fuck me my white girl tonight!!") That’s my two cents. Thank you. ������
