[Ads-l] Heard on Corrupt Crimes: _to put on_ "to pretend, to fake it"

[Jonathan Lighter]

Intrans. familiar to me from E TN whites:  common, I'd say.

"But he was just putting on," i.e. pretending.

JL

On Thu, Mar 29, 2018 at 9:05 AM, Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at gmail.com> wrote:

> John, the OED3 entry for "put" has *transitive* examples of "put on"
> (meaning "to affect, feign, pretend", as in "put it on") back to 1625, but
> that's different from the intransitive usage Wilson was asking about.
>
> DARE doesn't have an entry for "put on" as a verb, but a cite from 1909 for
> the noun "put-on" also includes the relevant intransitive:
>
> 1909 _DN_ 3.361 eAL, wGA, Put on. . . To act consciously, show off. Put-on.
> . . A person who puts on. . . "He's a regular put-on."
>
> That's from L.W. Payne Jr.'s "Word-List From East Alabama" in _Dialect
> Notes_, on Google Books here:
>
> https://books.google.com/books?id=waAVAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA361
>
> Green's Dictionary of Slang includes the 1909 cite in its entry for "put
> on", which lumps together transitive and intransitive uses under the sense
> "to affect airs". Here are more cites for the intransitive from GDoS:
>
> 1911 S. Ford _Torchy_ 166: Don't send a cab; the folks in the block might
> think I was putting on.
> 1933 C. McKay _Banana Bottom_ 262: But fer all you ejication an' putting on
> you nuttin' more'n a nigger gal.
> 1949 'Hal Ellson' _Duke_ 53: But putting on that way. It'd be all right if
> she could pass, but she can't.
> 1962 C. Clausen _I Love You Honey, But the Season's Over_ 143: She was
> always puttin' on like she just fell off a Christmas tree. So refined, the
> girls said.
> 1971 B. Malamud _Tenants_ (1972) 79: I like to bullshit with you, Lesser,
> you don't put on.
>
>
> On Wed, Mar 28, 2018 at 12:48 PM, Baker, John <JBAKER at stradley.com> wrote:
>
> > Is this a regional term?  It’s certainly familiar to me as a white
> > Kentuckian, but I was unaware of any limitation in its use (not that that
> > proves anything).  The OED has it from 1625.
> >
> > If it is a term used primarily by African-Americans and Southern whites,
> > it wouldn’t be the first time.  I’m still getting over my surprise at
> > hearing the term “triflin’,” familiar to me only from my parents’ use,
> in a
> > song by Destiny’s Child.
> >
> >
> > John Baker
> >
> >
> >
> > From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On Behalf
> > Of Wilson Gray
> > Sent: Tuesday, March 27, 2018 7:40 PM
> > To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> > Subject: Heard on Corrupt Crimes: _to put on_ "to pretend, to fake it"
> >
> > External Email - Think Before You Click
> >
> >
> > "If he [J. T. Lundy] was _putting on_ [that he was heart-broken over the
> > injury to his horse, Alydar], then he was doing a great job of it!"
> > - Tom Dixon
> > Insurance-adjuster
> > Lexington, Kentucky
> >
> > As hard as it may be to believe, I have misplaced the relevant volume of
> > DARE. So, I suppose that this intransitive _put on_ is cited in DARE,
> but I
> > don't know that it is. IAC, I've been familiar with it since I learned to
> > talk - e.g. a child pretending to be sick or hurt in order to get the
> > attention of its parents is said to be "putting on":
> >
> > That child is just putting on. Don't pay it no mind.
> >
> > The use of the term by a white Kentuckian, IAC, is an indication that its
> > use is not peculiar to black East Texans.
> >
> > AFAIK, this intransitive _put on_ has no connection with the transitive
> > hippie-ism, _put someone on_. I first heard that from a fellow-GI from
> > Darien, Connecticut, back in 1959. Unfortunately, he's had a stroke. It
> > would be interesting to know whether he learned that in Darien or at
> > Stanford, out of which he had dropped before joining the Army.
> >
> >
> >
>
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