Bring vs. Take

[ronbutters at AOL.COM]

Depends on where the mother was when the thing was carried home.

Sent from my iPad

On Feb 11, 2011, at 5:39 PM, George Thompson <george.thompson at NYU.EDU> wrote:

> So the consensus here is that mother-in-law was quite right to despair of what her daughter had brought home -- or should it be taken home?
>
> GAT
>
> George A. Thompson
> Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern Univ. Pr., 1998, but nothing much lately.
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "David A. Daniel" <dad at POKERWIZ.COM>
> Date: Friday, February 11, 2011 3:16 pm
> Subject: Re: Bring vs. Take
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>
>> At 5:48 PM -0200 2/11/11, David A. Daniel wrote:
>>> This is typical of New York and extended environs. Ex: other day,
>> during an
>>> episode of TAAHM, my daughter said "I wonder where Chuck Lorre is
>> from". I
>>> told her, "Gotta be New York because he always has Charlie and the others
>>> saying bring instead of take." Sure enough, he's from Long Guyland. Anyway,
>>> the anecdotals are legion and I've never seen it fail. Family and friends
>> in
>>> places like Chicago, Houston, San Francisco and L.A. don't get it
>> wrong (I
>>> listen for this sort of thing), even those who tend to make other mistakes
>>> of the "should of went" sort. Hint to George: If you can't say the word
>>> "here" in the sentence, as in "bring it here" you should probably be
>> using
>>> "take". For example, Charlie, at home, and being from California, would
>>> never say to Allan, "I have to bring my Mercedes to the shop." (But
>> that is
>>> exactly what a New Yorker would say.) However, the mechanic on the
>> phone at
>>> the shop would say, "You have to bring your Mercedes [here] to the shop,"
>>> which we know is correct because "here" fits into the sentence.
>>> DAD
>>
>>> How about us eclectic folks who can say "I gotta bring this here
>>> Chevy to the shop"?  (If you have a Mercedes, you can't use "here";
>>> register clash.)
>>
>> LH
>>
>> Ya got me there, pard. Thanks for taking it to my attention.
>> DAD
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On
>> Behalf Of
>>> George Thompson
>>> Sent: Friday, February 11, 2011 3:11 PM
>>> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>>> Subject: Bring vs. Take
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Wilson:
>>> "(One my wife's pet peeves is the loss of the distinction between
>>> _bring_ and _take_.)"
>>>
>>> Is this a Pennsylvania thing?
>>> One of the many things my defunct mother-in-law found objectionable
>> in me
>>> was my inability to use" bring" and "take" properly.  Many a time did
>> she
>>> explain to me that one would always bring something to a place and then
>> take
>>> it back -- unless one took something to a place and then brought it
>> back --
>>> it was one or the other -- I could never keep it straight -- so I would
>>> alternate between the two, figuring that that would make her happy
>> half of
>>> the time.
>>> Not how she worked, however -- I succeeded in making her unhappy half
>> of
>> the
>>> time.
>>>
>>> She was from western Pennsylvania, a prescriptivist high-school English
>>> teacher.
>>>
>>> Fondly remembered, of course.
>>>
>>> GAT
>>>
>>> George A. Thompson
>>> Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern
>> Univ.
>>> Pr., 1998, but nothing much lately.
>>>
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>>>
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>>
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>>
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>
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