Mencken's relative "what"

[William Salmon]

I couldn't help passing on this example from Mencken's American
Language. A quadruple negative, which also happens to contain relative
'what' (among other things).

You don't know nobody what don't want nobody to do nothing for 'em, do
you? (4rth ed, p.469)

ws


Quoting Beverly Flanigan <flanigan at OHIO.EDU>:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Beverly Flanigan <flanigan at OHIO.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: SWAE relative "what"
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Really, Wilson?  I've never heard it, in lower or higher orders (a horrible
> phrase, btw, even though I know you're implying a smiley face).  But I do
> hear it from foreign-born English speakers often, including those who have
> lived here a long time.  I doubt the blend theory though; let's not get
> carried away with blending as an explanation.
>
> Beverly
>
> At 08:35 AM 8/17/2006, you wrote:
>> "What" as a relative is quite common, here in the Colonies. It's a
>> well-known feature of Southern English and especially of Black
>> English, at least among the lower orders.
>>
>> -Wilson
>>
>> On 8/17/06, Lynne Murphy <m.l.murphy at sussex.ac.uk> wrote:
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>>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>> Poster:       Lynne Murphy <m.l.murphy at SUSSEX.AC.UK>
>>> Subject:      Re: SWAE relative "what"
>>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>
>>> --On Wednesday, August 16, 2006 11:22 pm -0500 Greg Pulliam
>>> <pulliam at IIT.EDU> wrote:
>>>
>>> > The T and the W are three keys apart--doesn't seem like a typo to me.
>>> > Maybe some other type of error, though.
>>> >
>>> > Still, relative "what" is so common in so many dialects, it seems
>>> > likely to penetrate SWAE sooner, not later.
>>>
>>> I don't think the distance of the keys determines whether it's a typo or
>>> not.  I frequently type 'ing' when I mean to type 'ion' at the end of a
>>> word, just because it's a familiar typing pattern.  One's probably more
>>> likely to do such things at the end of a word rather than the beginning,
>>> but I wouldn't rule out the typo explanation.
>>>
>>> It could also be a blend error:
>>> Write down one thing a week that you're thankful for.
>>> Write down once a week what you're thankful for.
>>>
>>> Relative pronoun 'what' (or 'wot') strikes me as really, really British--I
>>> didn't know it was found in US dialects.  But here it's so far from
>>> standard that it would only be used humorously in a newspaper.  There's a
>>> discussion of it on one ESL forum where it's described as "very council
>>> estate"
>>> <http://www.englishforums.com/English/RelativePronounDefinitionRuns/brprl/Post.htm>
>>>
>>> Lynne
>>>
>>>
>>> Dr M Lynne Murphy
>>> Senior Lecturer in Linguistics and English Language
>>> Arts B133
>>> University of Sussex
>>> Brighton BN1 9QN
>>>
>>> phone: +44-(0)1273-678844
>>> http://separatedbyacommonlanguage.blogspot.com
>>>
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>>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>
>>
>> --
>> Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you have
>> found out the exact measure of injustice and wrong which will be
>> imposed upon them.
>>
>> Frederick Douglass
>>
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~Will Salmon

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