go missing

[Arnold Zwicky]

On Jun 7, 2009, at 7:32 AM, Mark Mandel wrote:
>
>
> Do they also rage against "The eggs have gone bad" and "The bread
> has gone
> stale" ... and for that matter, "My brother got into rough company
> and went
> bad"?
>
> m a m
>
> On Sun, Jun 7, 2009 at 10:07 AM, Arnold Zwicky <zwicky at stanford.edu>
> wrote:
>
>> it's astonishing how much passion this idiom raises in americans.
>> we've seen Robert Hartwell Fiske's contempt for it.  it was Grammar
>> Girl's Pet Peeve of 2008 --
>> ...

of course not.  people don't rage against expressions (however
idiomatic) which are familiar to them and which they use themselves.
they rage against expressions that strike them as innovations (and
expressions that they believe to be used primarily by suspect groups,
like kids, or primarily in suspect contexts, like advertising).

but you knew that.

arnold

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