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

[Jonathan Lighter]

Some months ago I purchased a spade whose manufacturer's label described at
as a "garden shovel."

In disbelief, I consulted the label on the real shovel. It said "square
shovel."

Perhaps "spade," like "paddy wagon," is now thought offensive.

JL

On Mon, Jul 31, 2017 at 10:44 AM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu>
wrote:

> > On Jul 31, 2017, at 3:42 AM, Barretts Mail <mail.barretts at GMAIL.COM>
> wrote:
> >
> > 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
>
> For me, “spade" is a hyponym of “shovel”.  If it’s got a pointed end, it’s
> a spade (and also a shovel), if not, it’s a shovel (but not a spade).  I
> have three snow shovels in my garage (different materials and shapes) but
> no snow spade, but there’s a spade for digging in/up the garden with a nice
> pointy end.
>
> LH
> >
> >> 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
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>



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