A new use of "duh?"

[Jeff Prucher]

--- Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM> wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: A new use of "duh?"
>
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>
> No shit? "Well, no shit your product isn't selling" is grammatical for you
> in an environment devoid of context? Different strokes, I guess. In its
> original site, which I'm not interested in going to the effort to track
> down, again, the environment was something like:
>
> "Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah? Well, no duh your product isn't selling like
> hotcakes."
>
> Try this one, also found in the wild, with a little more context, from
> XGenStudios Forums:
>
> "Well, no duh you're gonna party like it's your birthday when it is your
> birthday."
>
> I have a hard time getting "no shit" to fit here, too.

Funny, I have harder time getting "no wonder" to fit here than the other one.

> Of course, if we all had the same internal grammar, today's English might b=
> e
> be a lot more like Chaucer's.
>
> And I don't have a problem with "Well _no wonder_ your product isn't sellin=
> g
> [you idiot -- your product sucks]."

Seeing it written out, I don't really have a problem with it, but it probably
wouldn't have occured to me a possible gloss.

> The passage of time probably explains everything. No shit (Sherlock) / no
> shit (Shinola) dates to the late '40's - early '50's in speech. That it
> should have precisely the same meaning a half-century later is not to be
> expected.

True 'nuff.  Did "no shit (Sherlock)" mean something other than "of course"
back in the day?

Jeff Prucher

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