"and nor" -- British, or foot-in-mouth?

Joel S. Berson Berson at ATT.NET
Wed Aug 17 22:31:06 UTC 2011


Thanks, Arnold.  You've told me there is a
community, and where it is (not local to me).

(I was being slightly facetious in referring to
"and nor" and "incidence" as foot-in-mouth, since
I had a suspicion that "incidence" was British
usage.  And foot-in-mouth -- er, "-and-" --
disease was seriously present in the UK only a
few years ago.  Not to mention among politicians.)

Joel

At 8/17/2011 06:00 PM, Arnold Zwicky wrote:
>On Aug 17, 2011, at 2:33 PM, RonButters at AOL.COM wrote:
> >
> >
> > This is just a trivisl slip of the tongue or
> pen, not worth anyone's consideration. Most
> likely he actually said (or meant to) say
> "and/or"--just as you mistakenly wrote "and not" and "too."
> >
> > On Aug 17, 2011, at 4:55 PM, "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET> wrote:
> >
> >> Andy Coulson ("editor of the News of the World, 2003-07") is quoted
> >> by the NYTimes, Aug.17, page A3 New England Edition, as having said
> >> in July 2009 to Parliament:
> >>
> >> "I have never condoned the use of phone hacking, and nor do I have
> >> any recollection of incidences where phone hacking too place."...
> >>
> >> As Jon L. would ask, is there a community of speakers who use "and [nor]"?
> >>
> >> I vote for foot-in-mouth, ...
>
>you should probably vote for british.  from my files:
>
>Contrast Sarah Boseley, "Prozac, used by 40m
>people, does not work say scientists", The Guardian, 2./26/2008
>   >Prozac, the bestselling antidepressant taken
> by 40 million people worldwide, does not work
> and nor do similar drugs in the same class,
> according to a major review released today.<
>  http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/005420.html
>
>He did not consider it appropriate for society
>to be run by or for ‘merchants and
>manufacturers’, and nor did he accept that the rich and powerful, ...
>www.adamsmithslostlegacy.com/
>
>Nowhere on the packaging does it state that I'd
>picked up an arabic version and nor did your
>distributors in Bahrain care to mention it.
>www.htcwiki.com/thread/808844/P4350+Operating+System+Lanaguage
>
>[thousands more ­ 3/1/08]
>
>(somewhere i have examples from Geoff Pullum.)
>this is reinforcement: the "and" conveys
>(emphatic) coordination, the "nor" a negative
>supplement to the main clause; the combination
>drives things home.  it does seem to the
>british, but i see no reason to treat it as an
>inadvertent error (any more than "and so" is an inadvertent error).
>
>arnold
>
>------------------------------------------------------------
>The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org



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