Conversion by truncation (Wa Re: No "damage"?)

[Tom Zurinskas]

At the recent US Open Tennis match the chair would say "Please";   Meaning "all you people in the audience please settle down and let play continue."

Tom Zurinskas, first Ct 20 yrs, then Tn 3, NJ 33, Fl 9.
Learn the alphabet and sounds of US English at justpaste.it/ayk


 
 


> 
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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Neal Whitman <nwhitman at AMERITECH.NET>
> Subject:      Conversion by truncation (Wa  Re: No "damage"?)
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Arnold Zwicky" <zwicky at STANFORD.EDU>
> To: <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Sent: Monday, September 12, 2011 11:48 AM
> Subject: Re: No "damage"?
> 
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> > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster:       Arnold Zwicky <zwicky at STANFORD.EDU>
> > Subject:      Re: No "damage"?
> > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > On Sep 11, 2011, at 10:59 PM, Wilson Gray wrote:
> >
> >> "Possible discriminatory effects on non-speakers of Welsh are
> >> justified as acceptable collateral."
> >>
> >> Should be "collateral _damage__," right?
> >>
> >> Or maybe I've missed the point. The context is a discussion - in
> >> English, of course! - of ways and means to increase the "pro-active,"
> >> so to speak, use of Welsh among ethnic Welsh in Wales.
> >
> > we can exclude the financial sense of "collateral" here, which would make
> > this an instance of "nouning by truncation":
> >
> >  Very commonly, adjectival modifiers are converted to nouns by truncation,
> > with the Adj in an Adj + N phrase treated, at least historically, as a
> > noun with (roughly) the meaning of the whole phrase.
> > http://arnoldzwicky.wordpress.com/2010/01/06/conversion-by-truncation/
> >
> > (and mentioned in many other postings).  i have dozens of examples in my
> > files, and i haven't been systematically looking for them.  "attending"
> > for "attending physician", "viral" for "viral video" (reported on ADS-L a
> > while back), "Indian" for "Indian restaurant", and many many more.
> >
> Including "full frontal" to mean a "full frontal nudity scene":
> http://literalminded.wordpress.com/2007/08/03/from-happy-meals-to-root-canals/
> This involves truncation twice: Once to allow "full frontal" to mean nudity;
> another time to allow "full frontal (nudity) scene" to be shortened to "full
> frontal". (Other examples, some linked to other blog posts, included.)
> 
> Neal
> 
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