prescriptivism, conventions, irony, and could(n't) care less

[Mark A. Mandel]

Lynne quoth:

>>>>>
Yes, but 'fast' has long been considered to be an adverb in its own right,
in the UK as well as the US.   I agree with my British interlocutors that
you often hear adjectives doing adverbial work in US English--but that
their evidence is 'ya done good' makes me think that they're
misinterpreting a set phrase with some humorous affect (that UK English
doesn't have) as a part of a more general pseudo-standard pattern that they
therefore interpret to be foreign to UK English.  I'm neither convinced
that 'ya done good' is only found in adv/adj-conflating varieties, nor that
adjectives-as-adverbs are unheard of in UK non-standard dialects (which my
interlocutors seemed to be claiming--that it's only Americans who would say
things like "I walked slow" or "I feel good").
<<<<<

"I feel good" is a different case. It is semantically distinct from "I feel
well", which is a statement of perceived health, while "I feel good" is
focused more on emotion. You can say "I feel good/*well about X". (Pace the
theoretical reference to tactile ability, as in the Beatles' film _A Hard
Day's Night_:
     Reporter:      How do you feel?
     Ringo(?): I used to use my hands.)
This adjectival, health-related use of "well" as an adjective is less
common than its use as the adverb of "good".

   Mark A. Mandel : Dragon Systems, a Lernout & Hauspie company
          Mark_Mandel at dragonsys.com : Senior Linguist
 320 Nevada St., Newton, MA 02460, USA : http://www.dragonsys.com