[Ads-l] what happens in X stays in X

[Ben Zimmer]

On Thu, Sep 27, 2018 at 11:49 AM Arnold M. Zwicky <zwicky at stanford.edu>
wrote:

> > On Sep 27, 2018, at 7:30 AM, Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
> >
> > On Thu, Sep 27, 2018 at 5:43 AM Stephen Goranson <goranson at duke.edu>
> wrote:
> >
> >> Variants of this have been discussed in various places, of course.
> >>
> >> I seem to have heard versions involving a particular prep school, a
> >> particular law school, and a bus, lately, from someone.
> >>
> >> (I haven't done serious research, but, apparently, so far, Las Vegas
> does
> >> not own [[own up?]] to it.)
> >>
> >
> > I assume you're referring to Brett Kavanaugh's reported statement from
> > 2015, "What happens at Georgetown Prep, stays at Georgetown Prep."
> >
> >
> https://www.politico.com/story/2018/09/18/kavanaugh-what-happens-geogetown-prep-828420
> >
> > For the general "snowclone" (phrasal template), see Mark Liberman's 2008
> > Language Log post:
> >
> > http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=227
> >
> > The Vegas version dates to 2003, but there are earlier variants along the
> > lines of "What goes on tour, stays on tour."
>
> further discussion on my blog:
>
> 6/3/18 What happened in vagueness?
> https://arnoldzwicky.org/2018/06/03/what-happened-in-vagueness/
> section on the Happens In, Stays In snowclone
>

Also pertinent is this discussion, which includes the three versions that
Stephen alluded to with reference to Kavanaugh (prep school, law school,
bus):

https://qz.com/1395809/brett-kavanaugh-christine-blasey-ford-and-americas-code-of-silence/


--bgz

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