Sweaters

[Amy Speed]

I'm 23, and that is definitely a sweater. Our British counterparts may call
it a "jersey," but it isn't a sweatshirt. A sweatshirt has the fleece on the
inside and knit fabric on the outside.

Amy

-----Original Message-----
From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU]On Behalf
Of Aaron E. Drews
Sent: Friday, October 29, 1999 2:30 PM
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject: Sweaters


Hello All,

I've enclosed a picture of an item of clothing.  What I'm wondering is:
would anybody call this item of clothing a sweatshirt?  If you don't call it
a sweatshirt, do you think younger people do, or your colleagues and peers?

The reason I ask is because I'm noticing quite a few people calling this a
sweatshirt in my data, where I would expect either sweater or jumper.  What
I want to know is if "sweatshirt" is a legitimate variant in any variety of
American English, or if my subjects are finding a way of avoiding having to
say either sweater or jumper, or if my subjects just plain can't tell the
difference from this picture.

Thanks for any help!

Aaron


________________________________________________________________________
Aaron E. Drews                               The University of Edinburgh
http://www.ling.ed.ac.uk/~aaron      Departments of English Language and
aaron at ling.ed.ac.uk                    Theoretical & Applied Linguistics

 "MERE ACCUMULATION OF OBSERVATIONAL EVIDENCE IS NOT PROOF"
  --Death