[Ads-l] How prevalent is "to upstream"?

Tue May 30 00:07:38 UTC 2017

> On May 29, 2017, at 5:39 PM, Dan Goncharoff <thegonch at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
> 
> I note that this NY times article from 2010 does not use any variant of
> "upstream":
> 
> https://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/07/23/complaint-box-that-was-my-cab/
> ?_r=0
> 
> But this article in the Village Voice a year later refers to "upstreaming"
> in an episode of "Curb Your Enthusiasm":
> 
> https://www.villagevoice.com/2011/09/06/how-to-react-when-someone-steals-your-cab/

A couple of the other Google hits I found for “upstreaming” and “being upstreamed” also mentioned Curb Your Enthusiasm, which perhaps, even if as we know it didn’t invent the concept or term, had the same impact on the trajectory of “upstream”, v. that the Martin “Old Kinderhook” Van Buren presidential campaign had on the spread of “O.K.”

LH
> 
> On May 29, 2017 4:44 PM, "ADSGarson O'Toole" <adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> 
>> Laurence Horn wrote:
>>> Perfect.  So it’s been around longer than I thought—and it’s NYC-based,
>>> which supports my hunch.
>>> 
>>>> Garson O'Toole wrote:
>>>> Below is an instance of "upstreamed" with the desired sense that
>>>> probably appeared in a 1976 book.
>>>> 
>>>> Year: 1976
>>>> Title: The blood-red dream
>>>> Author: Michael Collins
>>>> Publisher: New York: Dodd, Mead
>>>> Series: A Red badge novel of suspense
>>>> Database: Google Books Snippet; data may be inaccurate and should be
>>>> verified on paper
>>>> 
>>>> [Begin excerpt]
>>>> He walked toward Lexington, turned south waving for a taxi. He was no
>>>> New Yorker. Going downstream was no way to get a cab at any time, and
>>>> never in the rain. I upstreamed him, got my taxi, and had it follow
>>>> him slowly down the avenue.
>>>> [End excerpt]
>> 
>> Here is a citation in a recent book about manners (or lack thereof).
>> The word "upstream" is used in the domain of taxi interception, but it
>> is not used as a verb. Yet, the passages below suggest how the verb
>> was constructed.
>> 
>> Year: 2012
>> Title: Would It Kill You to Stop Doing That: A Modern Guide to Manners
>> Author: Henry Alford
>> Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
>> Database: Google Books Preview
>> 
>> [Begin excerpt]
>> To wit, it is my belief that if indeed you are in great need of a
>> cab—you're late for an appointment, or it is raining, or it is two in
>> the morning and you are standing on a dicey part of Flatbush—then it
>> is permissible to walk upstream of another party that is also hailing
>> a cab, as long as you walk far enough upstream that that party cannot
>> see you. Well, at least not glare at you.
>> [End excerpt]
>> 
>> [Begin excerpt]
>> Hail Caesar
>> 
>> Toward the end of my interview with Miss Manners in the lobby of my DC
>> hotel, I mentioned that I'd been teaching foreigners how to steal a
>> cab.
>> "I can never get a cab in New York," she told me. "How do you get the
>> cab to stop?'
>> "They're not seeing you?"
>> "Yes. Or something. I think they can tell who's not a New Yorker."
>> "Are you standing out far enough in the street? You've got to be out
>> in the traffic."
>> "Out in the traffic, but not run over."
>> "Right," I said. "But you've got to be a little brazen. And the rule
>> for stealing a cab is that you've got to walk at least a block
>> upstream."
>> [End excerpt]
>> 
>> Garson
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>>>> 
>>>> On Mon, May 29, 2017 at 3:52 PM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu>
>> wrote:
>>>>> …or in the passive, “to be upstreamed”, as employed in this NYT
>> Metropolitan Diary item a couple of weeks ago:
>>>>> 
>>>>> Dear Diary:
>>>>> 
>>>>> On a cold Friday night on West End Avenue at 83rd Street, an older man
>> and woman hailed a cab that flashed its lights in response. As the cab
>> waited for the light to change, a young man grabbed it. The older man could
>> be heard saying to his wife that being “upstreamed” was part of New York
>> City life and to be accepted. The young man unexpectedly jumped from the
>> cab, approached the couple, apologized and turned toward Broadway to find
>> another cab. The older man saw a second cab and hailed it, calling out to
>> the younger man, who happily climbed in. Only in New York can being
>> upstreamed create an encouraging circle of good citizenship.
>>>>> 
>>>>> https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/17/nyregion/metropolitan-
>> diary-upstreamed-hailing-a-cab-on-west-end-avenue.html
>>>>> 
>>>>> It seemed as though everyone involved, and several commenters, were
>> familiar with the term (as well as the practice, advertent or in-), but I’m
>> pretty sure I’d never previously encountered the lexical item, despite
>> growing up in and around NYC. True, I've very rarely taken taxis and you
>> can’t be upstreamed by someone at a bus or subway stop.   Is this a
>> particularly NYC expression?  Googling, I do find a number of examples
>> (it’s not new) but not all *that* many, once you filter out the irrelevant
>> homonym from the tech world.  Well, I suppose not entirely irrelevant since
>> the software expression ultimately employs the same metaphor (upstream is
>> ‘closer to the source’), so maybe it involves polysemy rather than homonymy.
>>>>> 
>>>>> The dictionaries I consulted (OED, AHD, Urban) don’t include an entry
>> for the (active or passive) verb.
>>>>> 
>>>>> LH
>>>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>>> 
>>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>> 
>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>> 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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