$ perl -Mstrict -Mwarnings -e ' use Data::Dumper; $Data::Dumper::Deepcopy = 1; my @maintainers = qw/ worker@company.com manager@company.com /; my %services = ( service1 => { email => \@maintainers }, service2 => { email => \@maintainers }, ); print Data::Dumper->Dump( [ \%services ], [qw/*services/] ); ' %services = ( 'service1' => { 'email' => [ 'worker@company.com', 'manager@company.com' ] }, 'service2' => { 'email' => [ 'worker@company.com', 'manager@company.com' ] } );