[Ads-l] From the annals of compound verbification...

Laurence Horn laurence.horn at YALE.EDU
Tue Jan 10 15:45:18 UTC 2017


Just heard on the radio that Derrick Rose, point guard of the New York Knicks, “no-showed” for the team game against the New Orleans Pelicans.  Here it is in print:

http://www.foxsports.com/nba/story/report-derrick-rose-no-showed-monday-nights-game-knicks-wont-reveal-010917 <http://www.foxsports.com/nba/story/report-derrick-rose-no-showed-monday-nights-game-knicks-wont-reveal-010917>
http://nesn.com/2017/01/derrick-rose-no-showed-for-game-vs-pelicans-and-the-knicks-dont-know-why/ <http://nesn.com/2017/01/derrick-rose-no-showed-for-game-vs-pelicans-and-the-knicks-dont-know-why/>

To “no-show” isn’t so much not to show but more specifically not to show up (with the suggestion that it was an instance of AWOL in that supervisors hadn’t been forewarned).  Some headlines do declare “Rose a no-show” for the game, but the verification is more economical in a full clause by two morphemes/words/syllables:

Rose no-showed for the Pelicans game.
Rose was a no-show for the Pelicans game.

An even more economical version is to transitive “no-show”:
http://fansided.com/2017/01/09/derrick-rose-no-shows-knicks-game-reason-uncertain/ <http://fansided.com/2017/01/09/derrick-rose-no-shows-knicks-game-reason-uncertain/>

Don’t know if any dictionaries have “no-show” as a transitive verb...

LH
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