[Ads-l] Heard: _perspirate_

[Margaret Lee]

Similar to the back formation, 'conversate' for 'converse.'

--Margaret Lee

 
      From: Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
 To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU 
 Sent: Sunday, January 29, 2017 5:50 PM
 Subject: Heard: _perspirate_
   
Color-guy, U Washington vs. U Arizona basketball game:

"He sweats - *perspirates* - more than any other guy I've ever seen. Maybe
he ought to think about seeing a doctor."


That's a strange hypercorrection in more ways than one. Why did he decide
that "sweats" wasn't good enough? A sudden attack of P.C. because he
realized that he was talking about a black player?

Youneverknow.

-- 
-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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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org