Make X born

[Joel S. Berson]

At 8/16/2013 05:28 PM, Benjamin Barrett wrote:
>"Be born [in some manner]" doesn't strike me as odd.

But when the "manner" is omitted, as in "make [X = person]
born"?  Which strikes me as odd, whereas "be born gay" is in my
dialect.  And only God can make a tree be born (to paraphrase someone).

Joel

>I looked through the lyrics at
>http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/ladygaga/bornthisway.html and didn't
>see anything odd, though "born" is not used causatively.
>
>Benjamin Barrett
>Seattle, WA
>
>Lean Ainu! Learn Ainu! https://sites.google.com/site/aynuitak1/videos
>
>On Aug 16, 2013, at 2:09 PM, "Baker, John" <JBAKER at STRADLEY.COM> wrote:
>
> >
> > Do you have any issues with the Lady Gaga song, Born This Way?
> >
> > The clip has been taken down from YouTube, but I presume can be
> found somewhere on the Colbert Nation website, http://www.colbertnation.com/.
> >
> >
> > John Baker
> >
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On
> Behalf Of Benjamin Barrett
> > Sent: Friday, August 16, 2013 2:32 AM
> > To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> > Subject: Make X born
> >
> > Starting about 6:50 in the video at
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Yy1sCJn5_q4
> from the Colbert Report yesterday, an Appalachian man uses the
> construction "makes X born [that way]" in reference to god creating
> people so they are gay at birth. He uses it more than once.
> >
> > This construction is not allowable for me. If I had to use
> "born," I might say, "makes X be born," but there is still
> something odd to me about this.
> >
> > It occurs to me that "That blouse needs washed" might be involved
> (I can't say that, either), but something else seems to be at play.
>
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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org