I guaran-god-damn-tee it

[Wilson Gray]

Since only God damns, no emphasis on _God_ is required, in any case.

Well, Catholically speaking, the Pope can damn. But only because God
has gone out of His way to *let* Popes do that, in His stead. ;-)

-Wilson

On Sat, Jun 26, 2010 at 11:21 AM, Damien Hall <djh514 at york.ac.uk> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Damien Hall <djh514 at YORK.AC.UK>
> Subject:      I guaran-god-damn-tee it
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Jon: 'Some may also enjoy _irregoddamnless_.'
>
> Randy: 'Shouldn't that be "irre-goddamn-gardless"?'
>
> Jon: 'Should be but ain't.'
>
> By the usual phonological rules of 'fucking'-insertion (_pace_ the other
> words which can also be inserted), Randy is of course right: insertion
> usually happens before the main-stressed syllable, though I don't think
> this is absolutely exceptionless. In any case, I think this case is
> different because it's not straightforward insertion - obviously there's a
> syllable missing from 'irregoddamnless'.
>
> I think that what this is, is a play on the similarity of pronunciation
> between 'god' and 'guard' in American English: essentially, they differ in
> that 'guard', /gard/, is just 'god', /gad/, with an /r/ in it - so, in the
> r-less dialects of some areas, they are pronounced the same, /gad/. (This
> particular similarity was exploited by Labov as long ago as the 60s, when
> he used the potential confusion of pairs like 'god'~'guard' and
> 'sauce'~'source' to see whether there was in fact any phonetic difference
> between the pairs when they were pronounced with no /r/ - in other words,
> when speakers hear the r-less versions of both, are they absolutely the
> same or can speakers still tell the difference?)
>
> But I digress.  So:
>
> - if the 'gard' syllable of 'irregardless' is pronounced [gad] - and most
> speakers of American English would be familiar with the pronunciation, even
> if they did not use it themselves
>
> - it could be interpreted not as 'gard' but as 'god'
>
> - and, when used as an imprecation, one way to emphasise 'God' is to say
> 'GodDAMN!'
>
> Thus we have irre-gard-less > irre-god-less > irre-godDAMN-less.
>
> Damien
>
> --
> Damien Hall
>
> University of York
> Department of Language and Linguistic Science
> Heslington
> YORK
> YO10 5DD
> UK
>
> Tel. (office) +44 (0)1904 432665
>     (mobile) +44 (0)771 853 5634
> Fax  +44 (0)1904 432673
>
> http://www.york.ac.uk/res/aiseb
>
> http://www.york.ac.uk/depts/lang/people/pages/hall.htm
>
> DISCLAIMER: http://www.york.ac.uk/docs/disclaimer/email.htm
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>



--
-Wilson
–––
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"––a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
–Mark Twain

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org