Finally!

Dennis Preston preston at MSU.EDU
Tue Sep 25 14:29:06 UTC 2007


But then you are using a preposition, not a particle.
I can also "look over him" if he is short, but I have not examined him at all.

dInIs

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>-----------------------
>Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>Poster:       Sarah Lang <slang at UCHICAGO.EDU>
>Subject:      Re: Finally!
>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>Agreed. If I "fuck over [personal pronoun]," I'm talking about where
>I am physically located whilst fucking.
>
>Interestingly, why *does* the pronoun frak it to gorram hell?
>S.
>
>On Sep 25, 2007, at 8:09 AM, Dennis Preston wrote:
>
>>  ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>>  -----------------------
>>  Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>  Poster:       Dennis Preston <preston at MSU.EDU>
>>  Subject:      Re: Finally!
>>  ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>>  ---------
>>
>>  I am a 'fuck over' speaker since the mid to late 1940's (which does
>>  not at all challenge its perhaps earlier greater frequency in the
>>  AfrAmer community). But if I had been in Wlson's barracks, I would
>>  not have freaked.
>>
>>  I do not accept "fuck over him" any more than I would accept "looked
>>  over him" (for eyeball, investigate, assess). "Fuck over N" or "fuck
>>  N over" are both OK by me; It's the pronoun that fucks up it.
>>
>>  dInIs
>>
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>>>  Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>>  Poster:       Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
>>>  Subject:      Re: Finally!
>>>  ---------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>  ----------
>>>
>>>  What Jon said.
>>>
>>>  As for my claim that there's a relationship to race, "fuck over" has
>>>  been a BE street (and, in some households, a home) colloquialism that
>>>  I've been familiar with since the beginning of time. But this, in my
>>>  experience, is not the case among white speakers. As an example the
>>>  racial bit, in 1960, I once used the term in the barracks at the Army
>>>  Language School. I asked, "Have you guys heard about the way that the
>>>  First shirt fucked over Lupow?" And my barracks-mates, all of whom
>>>  were white (during the time that I was at the Language School, among
>>>  approximately 400 students in the Russian Division, there were only
>>>  two black GI"s: your humble correspondent and a WAC with a big butt),
>>>  freaked. Not a single one had ever heard the phrase, "fuck over,"
>>>  before. I was stunned, since I know it like I know my own name.
>>>  Naturally, they thought that it was really cool and wanted to learn
>>>  it. (I had to teach some people that you say "FUCK over" and not
>>>  "fuck
>>>  OVER"). I first heard the expression, "fuck someone over" ca.1970
>>>  and,
>>>  from that time to the present, I've never heard it used by blacks
>>>  under any circumstances, despite any literary evidence to the
>>>  contrary, possibly because I've never been a fan of Louis Armstrong,
>>>  etc., not to mention that no such record would ever have been played
>>>  on the radio and it's doubtful that it would have been sold in any
>>>  black record shop, back in the day, any more than a black store or
>>>  shop would have sold pornography. Till at least the 'Seventies, the
>>>  most erotic material freely available in black-operated stores was
>>>  Playboy, Jet magazine, and the Jet girlie calendar. I went to grade
>>>  school with Lamont McLemore, Jet's longtime girlie photographer -
>>>  since ca.1950 - and also a member of the Fifth Dimension, the
>>>  formerly
>>>  well-known Saint Louis singing group. He was a Renaissance man, I
>>>  reckon. It must have been a hard life, since Lamont, though he was
>>>  younger than I am, died several years ago.
>>>
>>>  -Wilson
>>>
>>>  As for the syntax, saying "He fucked over me," etc., sounds
>>>  completely
>>>  natural to me. OTOH, "He fucked me over"
>>>
>>>
>  >> On 9/24/07, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>>>>   ---------------------- Information from the mail header
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>>>>   Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>>>   Poster:       Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at YAHOO.COM>
>>>>   Subject:      Re: Finally!
>>>>
>>>>  --------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>  -----------
>>>>
>>>>   Though skin pigmentation is irrelevant per se, HDAS suggests (and
>>>>  I believe) that "to fuck over X"
>>>>
>>>>     a. was indeed the original form in the sense in question,
>>>>
>>>>     b. has been vastly more prevalent among speakers of AAVE - so
>>>>  much so as to sugget the idiom's origin there,
>>>>
>>>>     c. was not much used in white speech before the mid '70s,
>>>>
>>>>     d. still sounds rhythmically or positionally "wrong" to me as a
>>>>  speaker of WAVE.
>>>>
>>>>     Earliest HDAS ex. is from 1961, but the context suggests it was
>>>>  around for a while.
>>>>
>>>>     The form "fuck X over" undoubtedly owes something to "work X
>>>>  over."  I believe this is becoming the general form.
>>>>
>>>>     JL
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>     Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
>>>>     ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>>>>  -----------------------
>>>>  Sender: American Dialect Society
>>>>   Poster: Wilson Gray
>>>>   Subject: Finally!
>>>>
>>>>  --------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>  -----------
>>>>
>>>>   The correct usage has appeared in print! From Slashdot:
>>>>
>>>>   "... [G]ranting corporations the right to _fuck over_ other
>>>>   corporations who come up with rather ordinary improvements ..."
>>>>
>>>>   Lest the point be missed, for those of us old enough (and/or
>>>>  black enough?),
>>>>
>>>>   "... [G]ranting corporations the right to _fuck_ other corporations
>>>>   _over_ who come up with rather ordinary improvements ..." is
>>>>   ungrammatical.
>>>>
>>>>   That is, [fuck NP over] is absolutely *not* a viable or a
>>>>  grammatical
>>>>
>>>>   alternative to [fuck over NP]. Unless, of course, you speak a
>>>>   different dialect.
>>>>
>>>>   There are 215,000 raw Google hits that include uses such as "get
>>>>  the
>>>>   fuck over it." So, sorting out the various usages would take ten
>>>>  men
>>>>   and a boy. But the Urban Dictionary, at least, has it right. Well,
>>>>   sort of. The second definition defines _fuck over_ as a Briticism
>>>>   meaning "fuck over," with examples ambiguous as to dialect. And
>>>>  either
>>>>   UD doesn't have "fuck NP over" (unlikely?) or I don't know how
>>>>  to find
>>>>   it (likely?).
>>>>
>>>>   -Wilson
>>>>
>>>>   -Wilson
>>>>   --
>>>>   All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange
>>>>  complaint to
>>>>   come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
>>>>   -----
>>>>   -Sam'l Clemens
>>>>
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>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
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>>>>
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>>>
>>>
>>>  --
>>>  All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange
>>>  complaint to
>>>  come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
>>>  -----
>>>                                                -Sam'l Clemens
>>>
>>>  ------------------------------------------------------------
>>>  The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>
>>
>>  --
>>  Dennis R. Preston
>>  University Distinguished Professor
>>  Department of English
>>  Morrill Hall 15-C
>>  Michigan State University
>>  East Lansing, MI 48864 USA
>>
>>  ------------------------------------------------------------
>>  The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>
>------------------------------------------------------------
>The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org


--
Dennis R. Preston
University Distinguished Professor
Department of English
Morrill Hall 15-C
Michigan State University
East Lansing, MI 48864 USA

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