How do I break him of this?

How about a simple “That word really bothers me.  Could you please not say it?”  That usually works for us.  They’ll slip up, but it’s usually quickly followed by an “Oh oops!  Sorry, I forgot!” 

From somone who doesn’t use it but whose husband does, I find your comment to him that it makes him sound like he doesn’t have any sense to be very unkind. Would you really say that to anyone else who says it? I mean, someone who uses it so effortlessly they probably don’t realize they say it? Do you really want your son to think anyone who uses the word “ain’t” has no sense?

If that is your desired outcome, then I guess continue that method. As for him saying it, I don’t really have any great advice. It doesn’t bother me though anymore than hearing our relatives in western PA, who make fun of DH for saying “ain’t” and for all of us saying “y’all” to say “you-uns”. Yes, I think that sounds weird but it doesn’t bother me. It is no more or no less incorrect grammatically than aint or y’all.

I agree with Shannon.  He will probably eventually drop it.  Just tell him that you would prefer him not to say it and then gently remind him when he does.  When we were kids, my Mom didn’t like my brother and I saying “ain’t”.  We did go through a phase where we used the word.  She told us it wasn’t a word and we weren’t to use it.  I looked it up in the dictionary (and, yes, it is there) and showed it to her.  My brother came up with a little thing he would say: “Ain’t ain’t a word, so don’t say ain’t.”   Mom just kept reminding us not to use the word and eventually we quit.

I feel like in the past few months we just did another thread on this… I did a search for “ain’t”, but I got an error message back that said I was using an “invalid argument” – so perhaps you could just tell him that you won’t answer him until he uses a “valid argument”. 

As someone who is also from the South (and proud of it!), I don’t personally use the word nor does my family, but it doesn’t bother me when others say it. Along the lines of what daybydaymama said, I think certain words that reflect the traditions or culture of a certain area are actually quite charming. Although our family doesn’t say ain’t, we do say y’all, fixin’ to, get around to it, as well as cutting the g sound off of ing words (goin’, makin’, havin, etc.). To us, it’s so second nature we don’t really think about it. I’m a pretty proper person, but in the South, I don’t think it means you’re an uneducated back woods hillbilly just because we don’t use “correct” terminology all the time. It’s part of our culture, just like the Brits have their own slang/cultural terms and New Englanders have theirs. If if bothers you, just tell him you’d appreciate it if he would use “I’m not” instead and then remind him every time he does use it. Growing up, we had a quarter jar. My dad was convicted of his foul mouth, so we got a jar for the center of our table which my dad would have to place a quarter in every time he cussed. It got pretty full, but he did clean up his language. 😉 Maybe this could work as a way to break this habit, if you’re really set on breaking it.

Take care now (said in my fairly thick Texas accent),

Lindsey

Dh just found this, and it’s a pretty accurate list of things we Southerners say. We were reading through it, and saying, “Wow, we really do say this!”

http://www.gagirl.com/southern/how_to_speak_southern.html

It’ll give the non-Southerners a good laugh too.

I can tell you that if you walked around using correct language all the time where I’m from, people would be asking you where you were from. If you were to say “you all” instead of “y’all”, people would naturally assume you “ain’t from ’round here”. Like Robin, if I am speaking publicly or at an important meeting or event, I try to watch my accent and syntax. But in everyday life, this is how we are and no one around us thinks there’s anything wrong with it.