dropped 's

[Laurence Horn]

At 3:13 PM +0000 4/27/11, Tom Zurinskas wrote:
>In the below passage the 's is not pronounced
>three times (she's, mother's, she's).  Where
>that from?
>
>"She my mother sister and I used to call her
>'Auntie [Ejn.ti < [An.ti]Rainey,' (sounded like
>"ANE teeRAINY") but now, since she suing me,
>Ijust call her 'Lorraine'."
>

If you're asking seriously (or even if you're
not), these are separate phenomena. There's no
general case of "not pronouncing 's".  The first
and third are zero copula, Ø corresponding to
"standard" 's or (less often) 're.  The second is
zero-marked (or word-order marked) possessive (or
genitive).  Both are characteristic of, but not
limited to, AAVE.

LH

>
>
>>
>>  ---------------------- Information from the
>>mail header -----------------------
>>  Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>  Poster: Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
>>  Subject: Heard on Judge Mathis
>>
>>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>>  Fifty-ish, black female speaker from Chicago:
>>
>>  "My niece called me up and aksed for me to _co-sign for her a car_."
>>
>>  "I have me a good, government job. I couldn't afford to get up one
>>  morning, go out, and find my car _stapled to the sidewalk_ [i.e.,
>>  booted]."
>>
>>  Twenty-ish, black female speaker from Chicago:
>>
>>  "She my mother sister and I used to call her 'Auntie [Ejn.ti < [An.ti]
>>  Rainey,' (sounded like "ANE teeRAINY") but now, since she suing me, I
>>  just call her 'Lorraine'."
>>
>>
>>  Sixty-ish, black male speaker from Cincinnati:
>>
>>  "I'm a recovering addict, your honor. I been clean for six years."
>>
>>  Judge Mathis:
>>
>>  "What were you addicted to?"
>>
>>  Speaker:
>>
>>  "Hehra-wawn [hE.r at wOn], uh, I mean, 'heroin,' your honor."
>>
>>
>>  Given that "heh-rawn' and "hehra-wawn" have long - ten years? - been
>>  the currently-hip, BE pronunciations and are used regularly by Judge
>>  Mathis himself, it was strange that the speaker felt that he needed to
>>  correct himself to the standard pronunciation, especially before a
>>  black judge. But, of course,
>>
>>  Youneverknow.
>>
>>  --
>>  -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
>
>------------------------------------------------------------
>The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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