Mamet

[J. Eulenberg]

Now, what surprises me about this is that up until a recent British film,
I had always associated the phrase "innit" with Native American language
patterns in written materials (see Sherman Alexie, for example).  I was so
excited one day when I heard one Native American say to another, "Innit?"
Now I shall have to listen to the "over" accent, or stare, to be certain
of the speaker's background!

Julia Niebuhr Eulenberg <eulenbrg at u.washington.edu>

On Wed, 10 Sep 2003, Peter A. McGraw wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       "Peter A. McGraw" <pmcgraw at LINFIELD.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: Mamet
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> I noticed a few years ago that an English friend (an academic who teaches
> at Lancaster University) used "innit" as an all-purpose prompt for
> confirmation, a la the German "nicht wahr?"  I.e., not merely "That's
> funny, innit?" but e.g., "He's crazy...innit?"  There didn't even have to
> be a form of "be" in the sentence, though I can't think of a
> plausible-sounding example just now.
>
> Peter Mc.
>
> --On Tuesday, September 9, 2003 11:24 AM -0400 sagehen
> <sagehen at WESTELCOM.COM> wrote:
>
> > I frequently heard "innit" for "isn't it" in England thirty years ago,
>
>
>
> *****************************************************************
> Peter A. McGraw       Linfield College        McMinnville, Oregon
> ******************* pmcgraw at linfield.edu ************************
>