A question about a locution used by the "girlfriend" of Trayvon Martin

[Damien Hall]

Forwarding a message from Hal Schiffman (U. Pennsylvania), about which I thought members of this list might have some useful reflections.  Please reply both to the list and to Hal (<haroldfs at gmail.com>), as he's not a subscriber here.  Thanks!

Damien

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All:

I have some questions about a locution used by the "girlfriend" of Trayvon Martin
during their phone conversation just before he was shot and killed. My question is
what does it mean?

She says:

“When he say [sic] this man behind him again, he come and say,
this look like he about to do something to him,” the girl told ABC News.
“And then Trayvon come and said the man was still behind him,
and then I come and say, ‘Run!’ ”

I heard this on TV and looked for it on-line and found the above at:

http://kalamu.posterous.com/action-trayvon-martinkeep-it-real-background-38116

I have never heard this locution before--it looks like a way to indicate that
it's in the past tense, but does it also mean something else?  Or is it a kind of narrative
past?  Sometimes it's "come and say" and other times it's "come and said". I realize
that the transcription of this  by the ABC network may have resulted in some editing by them, since
transcribing non-standard lgs. can result in some "correcting".  Needless to say, I
have very little first-hand experience with AAVE, never having done any research on
it, but just experience in hearing it, mostly in overheard conversations.

Anybody have any hard data on this?  I'd like to know more.

Hal Schiffman

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 Harold F. Schiffman

Professor Emeritus of
 Dravidian Linguistics and Culture
Dept. of South Asia Studies
University of Pennsylvania
Philadelphia, PA 19104-6305

Phone:  (215) 898-7475<tel:%28215%29%20898-7475>
Fax:  (215) 573-2138<tel:%28215%29%20573-2138>

Email:  haroldfs at gmail.com<mailto:haroldfs at gmail.com>
http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~haroldfs/<http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/%7Eharoldfs/>

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