Cut us a break!

[Jonathon Green]

Benjamin Zimmer wrote:

>
>---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
>Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>Poster:       Benjamin Zimmer <bgzimmer at RCI.RUTGERS.EDU>
>Subject:      Cut us a break!
>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>On his "Literal-Minded" blog, Neal Whitman reports on a website put up by
>Kutztown, Pa. high-schoolers accused of felonies called CutUsABreak.org:
>
>http://literalmind.blogspot.com/2006/08/on-cutting-of-breaks.html
>
>Neal calls "cut (s.o.) a break" an idiom blend, combining "cut (s.o.) some
>slack" with "give (s.o.) a break". But shouldn't this simply be considered
>a regional variant of the latter idiom? I note that early examples on
>N-Archive come from Pennsylvania newspapers:
>
>-----
>Indiana Evening Gazette (Indiana, Pa.), Jan 22, 1972, p. 15/1
>Debbie Steffey, we'll cut you a break this time!
>-----
>Bucks Co. Courier Times (Levittown, Pa.), Feb 19, 1974, p. 2/4
>If you cut me a break you can have it.
>-----
>Bucks Co. Courier Times (Levittown, Pa.), Jan 4, 1976, p. D5/2
>Come off it fellas. Cut us a break.
>-----
>
>Later cites come from PA, OH, MD, and NY (Syracuse).
>
>Any further data on this? I don't see anything in HDAS.
>
>
>--Ben Zimmer
>
>
>
>
It's in Connie Eble's Campus Slang:

1988 Eble _Campus Slang_ March 3: cut someone a break - ease up on
someone [...] Oh, cut me a break, will you?

She of course is in NC, but the student informant may have been from
Pennsylvania. That said I have always assumed that Campus Slang
reflected more than one person's usage.

JG