[Ads-l] W:pedia: "Carry on, Sergeant" is a normal expression for an Army officer to use; ...

[Dave Wilton]

Perhaps things have changed a bit, but when I was the US Army in the late 80s the command "at ease" wasn't used when an officer walks into room. That command would be "attention." (And generally the convention is that in an office or other work environment you don't pop to attention when any officer walks into the room; that would be too disruptive. Only the commander or an officer senior to the commander gets a command of "attention," and the commander only gets it the first time he walks into the building in the morning. In a barracks, the command is given for any officer who outranks those present.)

Both "carry on" and "as you were" are commonly used. My impression is that "carry on" tends to be used when the soldiers have been working and are interrupted, while "as you were" tends to be used when they've been lounging about. Both commands mean 'go back to what you were doing before I came along.'

Movies and pop culture often get "at ease" wrong too. It doesn't mean 'lounge about' or 'do as you please.' It means stand with your right foot planted, no talking or smoking (back when you could smoke), and pay attention to me. It is only "easy" in comparison to "attention" or "parade rest." The command of "rest" allows you talk (and there used to be "rest, smoke 'em if you've got 'em"), but you still stand with one foot planted. You also never use these commands to raise to the level of attention. You first command "attention" and then bring them down to "at ease."

Another one they screw up is the difference between "fall out" and "dismissed." "Fall out" means 'we're done here, get to work.' "Dismissed," when addressed to a formation of soldiers, means 'go home.' When an individual reports to an officer, however, that officer will use "dismissed" when the audience is over and the soldier should go back to work.



-----Original Message-----
From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On Behalf Of Wilson Gray
Sent: Sunday, May 10, 2015 8:01 PM
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject: Re: W:pedia: "Carry on, Sergeant" is a normal expression for an Army officer to use; ...

On Wed, May 6, 2015 at 11:23 PM, Dave Hause <dwhause at cablemo.net> wrote:

> Agree, the normal U.S. Army usage is "Carry on."


Yet, I have to admit that *I* know this only because I've been in the Army.
In fact, most, if not all, of the other recruits in my class were also under the impression that "As you were!" was the U.S. "equivalent" of "Carry on!" and finding out that it wasn't triggered as much conversation as the expression, "Fuckin' A!," did.

IIRC, my first post on this topic was triggered by a scene in a movie in which an officer walks into a room of EM and civilians working at desks, someone calls "Attention!," and both the EM and the civilians leap to their feet, at attention, until the officer casually comments, "As you were."

In fact, what would have happened is that someone would have shouted "At ease!," the officer would have the next best thing to simultaneously shouted, "Carry on!," the EM wouldn't have moved much beyond a twitch, and the civilians would have ignored the whole thing.
'


--
-Wilson
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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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