"wear" and "put on"

[Östen Dahl]

What Steve says is correct, but there are cases where there is a difference.
"The teddy bear wore pink pyjamas" does not imply "The teddy bear put on
pink pyjamas". That is, the relation between "put on" and "wear" is
different from that between "fall asleep" and "sleep", in that there is an
intentional (agentive) component in "put on". 
- Östen Dahl

 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: funknet-bounces at mailman.rice.edu 
> [mailto:funknet-bounces at mailman.rice.edu] On Behalf Of 
> Salinas17 at aol.com
> Sent: den 11 maj 2005 16:04
> To: funknet at mailman.rice.edu
> Subject: Re: [FUNKNET] "wear" and "put on"
> 
> In a message dated 5/11/05 7:22:32 AM, oesten at ling.su.se writes:
> << But "put on" and "wear" differ in that "putting on" 
> denotes an action which is rather the starting-point of 
> "wearing". It is true that "put on" is telic, but you cannot 
> simply state that it is the telic counterpart of "wear". 
> Perhaps "put on" could be said to be inchoative or 
> ingressive, but if you look closely at it "put on" is not 
> quite synonymous to "start wearing" either. >>
> 
> In the sense of the story, "put on" does seem to be 
> synonymous to "start wearing".  The brother-in-law's 
> command/request jumped the inchoative step.  In the usage 
> described, there appears to be no way that his wife could wear the 
> dress without putting it on.   Both putting on and wearing 
> are future events.  In 
> English, the two words can be used alternatively to convey 
> the same intended result -- "put on that red dress, mama, 
> 'cause we're going out tonight", "wear that tonight"
> 
> Steve Long
>