[Ads-l] A spade is not a shovel.

[Barretts Mail]

What would be interesting to know is whether people who regularly use both types of tools use the distinction, in which case “spade” might remain in the US as jargon. 

When I’m shoveling dirt, I usually use a spade because: 1) it’s lighter, 2) shovels are more common, and 3) it doesn’t occur to me that there is an advantage to using the squarish type.

BB

> On 30 Jul 2017, at 23:08, Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
> 
>> “shovel” is US for “spade.”
> 
> Is that true of all 320,000,000 Americans, except for me, do you think? Of
> course, you are relying upon the authority of the Web and there's no
> arguing with that. Perhaps the distinction will die with me, in about five
> years.
> 
> On Mon, Jul 31, 2017 at 12:05 AM, Barretts Mail <mail.barretts at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> 
>> Despite my mom teaching me the difference about four decades ago, they’re
>> all shovels to me. Wiktionary (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/shovel <
>> https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/shovel>) says that “shovel” is US for
>> “spade.” BB
>> 
>>> On 30 Jul 2017, at 19:36, Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
>>> 
>>> A bunch of guys on TV with spades are calling them "shovels." Aren't you
>>> supposed to call a spade a "spade"? Or is the distinction between a spade
>>> and a shovel being lost, at least among city-folk, since no one uses
>> spades
>>> to dig ditches or uses shovels to shovel coal, anymore?
>>> 
>>> --
>>> -Wilson
>> 
>> 
>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>> 
> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> -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
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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