"barbecue pit" (UNCLASSIFIED)

[Charles Doyle]

If y'all can stomach one more note on the subject:  My Northern inlaws commonly say something like, "I'll just throw some burgers on the barbecue"--using "barbecue" to designate the portable grilling device. Perhaps "barbecue" in that sense represents a clipping of (northern) "barbecue pit"--the kind that may be wielded as a weapon?  Or just a metonomy in its own right.

BTW: I believe that in the South, "hamburger" is seldom clipped to "burger" (though national restaurant chains are probably altering that situation). Also, in the Southern dialects that I'm fluent in, the seared fleshly disk inserted into a bun (with mayonaise, lettuce, etc.) to constitute a hamburger would never itself be called a "hamburger" (much less a "burger").  Sort of like "hotdog" being the entire sandwich, not just the wiener.

--Charlie
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---- Original message ----
>Date: Fri, 15 Aug 2008 12:08:25 -0400
>From: Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
>Subject: Re: "barbecue pit" (UNCLASSIFIED)
>
>Ain't *that* the truth?!
>
>-Wilson
>
>On Wed, Aug 13, 2008 at 10:32 AM, Mullins, Bill AMRDEC
><Bill.Mullins at us.army.mil> wrote:
>>
>> Having grown up on Southern cooking, and having eaten Northern cooking at various times (travel, cafeterias run by Yankees, etc), it seems to me that anything that helps differentiate the former from the latter is a good thing.
>>
>> I hate getting stuck with corned beef hash when I could have had fried
>> chicken.
>>
>>
>>> Poster:       Charles Doyle <cdoyle at UGA.EDU>
>>> Subject:      Re: "barbecue pit"

>>> It's always perplexed me, though. In the American South, countless restaurants prominently feature their "Southern cooking."  Must have something to do with the apparent defeat in that war . . . .
>>>
>>> --Charlie

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