_everybody didn't know_

[Wilson Gray]

>From a TV ad:

"Did you get all up in that"?

Now, that's something that's hard to understand. Presumably, what the
ad-men have in mind is,

"Did you get [=understand] that?"

with _all up in_ intended to be understood as an intensifier. That's
my WAG, IAC.

But, in BE, it's a fixed phrase,

_get all up in that [ass]_

It's not anything that would occur in a question, clearly. If a stud
is going to be bragging of his sexual prowess, he's going to announce
to his friends/handlers/bruz/aces/boons/partners, etc.:

A, "Y'all, I got all up *in* that [ass]!"

He's not going to drop a hint and then coyly wait to be asked whether
he swung a heavy hammer.

--
-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.
-Mark Twain

On Sat, Oct 8, 2011 at 3:54 PM, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender: Â  Â  Â  American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster: Â  Â  Â  Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject: Â  Â  Â Re: _everybody didn't know_
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> On Sat, Oct 8, 2011 at 10:03 AM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu> wrote:
>> Doesn't nobody like Sara Lee.
>
> It'd have to be either "doesn't anybody" or "don't nobody."
>
> --
> -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.
> -Mark Twain
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>

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