(neither) nor

[Laurence Horn]

At 12:21 PM -0400 5/8/07, Charles Doyle wrote:
>And if, instead of "nor," it said "neither" (or "nother") alone in
>that position ("Kent Smith neither anyone [else] . . ."), it would
>be good Middle English. For late-modern times, the OED ("neither"
>adv. [conj.] 2a) gives only Caribbean uses of "neither" sans "nor."
>
>I'm not sure about "neither," but I have heard black speakers in
>Texas use "either" in a parallel way: "We're going to serve ham
>either chicken" (where ME would most often have "other").
>
and then there's "or either", used by many speakers (I'm sure DARE
has a relevant entry on which ones) where I can only use "or else".
The one that always bothers me, for some reason, is the British use
of "and nor" where a simple "nor" would seem to suffice.  I cringe
every time the narrators of the British mystery novels I listen to on
tape begin a sentence with "And nor did X" instead of "Nor did X."
(I suppose it's no different from the perfectly fine "And X didn't
either", but it still strikes me as somehow redundant.)

LH

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