African-American expressions from August Wilson

[Herb Stahlke]

Looks like I replied to the wrong message.


On Sat, Dec 22, 2012 at 7:53 PM, Herb Stahlke <hfwstahlke at gmail.com> wrote:

> Is this becoming a snowclone "like {denom. adj.] on [noun]"?  I've also
> heard "like stink on shit."
>
> Herb
>
>
> On Sat, Dec 22, 2012 at 7:08 PM, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>> -----------------------
>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Poster:       Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
>> Subject:      Re: African-American expressions from August Wilson
>>
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> On Thu, Dec 20, 2012 at 6:52 PM, Dan Goncharoff <thegonch at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>> > "Closeness" doesn't seem relevant.
>>
>> "Closeness" in the sense that "white" is so close to "rice" that the
>> former can't be separated from the latter. It's the whole point of the
>> expression. Rice can't get away from white, because white is all over
>> rice like, well, white on rice.
>>
>> BTW, does this discussion mean that it's the case that "like white on
>> rice" is *not* standard American English? If it does mean that, then I
>> haven't been so surprised since I found out, back in 1960, that "fuck
>> over (someone)" wasn't a casual obscenity known to every red-blooded
>> American male and not just to the black ones.
>>
>> As it happens, even today, I've seen only a single, documented
>> instance of "fuck over somebody" - as opposed to "fuck somebody over"
>> - used by a white person.
>>
>> FWIW, IME, "white" in this expression has nothing whatsoever to do
>> with any aspect of race. If you can't make a rhyme, then assonance
>> will just have to do.
>>
>> --
>> -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
>>
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>>
>
>

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