misdemeanant

[Laurence Horn]

On Apr 1, 2012, at 12:59 PM, Joel S. Berson wrote:

> At 4/1/2012 12:11 PM, you wrote:
>> Wonder if when it's pronounced in a courtroom setting it gets
>> secondary stress on the last syllable, the way "defendant" does on
>> the "(d)ant", as we've discussed in prior threads.  (I would
>> pronounce both with essentially no stress and a schwa, but it's
>> definitely pronounced with an aesh, in the latter case at least.  Of
>> course "misdemeanant" would come up a lot less in court than "defendant".
>
> mis-de-mean-ANT?

No, mis-*DE*-mean-ANT.  Secondary stress, as I hear with de-*FEND*-ANT.  The key is that the vowel is not reduced to schwa. Since I've never actually heard "misdemeanant" pronounced, this is all speculation.

LH


> Not likely -- "Miss Demean, Aunt"?  More likely
> mis-de-MEAN-ant, to stress the culpability of the de-fen-DANT.
> :-)
>
> I note that the OED has "misfease", but no "misfeasant", just
> "misfeasor".  For "mal-", there is no "malfease" -- nor any other
> verb!  But there is the "-ant" -- "malfeasant" (n.).
>
> Joel
>
>
>> LH
>>
>> On Apr 1, 2012, at 11:58 AM, Arnold Zwicky wrote:
>>
>> > came across this useful counterpart to "felon" a little while ago
>> ("felon" : "felony" = "misdemeanant" :  "misdemeanor").  new to me,
>> but far from new: as 'a person convicted of a misdemeanor or guilty
>> of misconduct', it's in NOAD2; AHD5 has a similar entry, and OED3
>> (June 2002) has cites going back to 1819 (and marks the word as
>> "now chiefly U.S."). OED3 also has an etymology tracing the noun
>> back to a verb "misdemean" 'to misbehave, misconduct oneself' (with
>> cites from the 16th century and the label "now rare").
>> >
>> > arnold
>> >
>> > ------------------------------------------------------------
>> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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