[Ads-l] "Big ask"

Tue Jan 22 13:56:15 UTC 2019

I take a deep-ish dive into the phrase on my Not One-Off Britishisms blog, including a quote from Peter Reitan on this list, and the 1975 Australian use I mentioned here a couple of weeks ago.

http://notoneoffbritishisms.com/2019/01/21/big-ask/

Ben

> On Jan 21, 2019, at 11:00 PM, ADS-L automatic digest system <LISTSERV at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU> wrote:
> 
> There are 3 messages totaling 191 lines in this issue.
> 
> Topics of the day:
> 
>  1. Difficulty with new BYU corpora search syntax
>  2. Fixing "ng" and "nk" endings (2)
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> 
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> Date:    Mon, 21 Jan 2019 09:11:44 -0600
> From:    Jordan Smith <tjordans at IASTATE.EDU>
> Subject: Re: Difficulty with new BYU corpora search syntax
> 
> Hi Neal,
> 
> You can still use the old search syntax in the current interfaces for the
> BYU corpora. My guess is that the problem you're seeing might stem from
> mixing the simplified all caps POS tags with the old tags in the same
> search. When I searched COCA in the current interface using only the old
> search syntax (witness_v* _p* _v*g), I got the type of results I think
> you're looking for (e.g., "witness you doing", "witness them fighting",
> etc.)
> 
> Hope that helps.
> 
> Jordan
> 
> On Sun, Jan 20, 2019 at 10:48 PM Neal Whitman <nwhitman at ameritech.net>
> wrote:
> 
>> OK, I've found one workaround: You can access the pre-May 2016 interface
>> by adding "/old" to the URL, like this:
>> 
>>    https://corpus.byu.edu/coha/old/
>> 
>> However, I'd still like to know if there's a way to use the new
>> interface and still be able to do a search like the one I'm describing.
>> 
>> 
>> On 1/20/2019 11:20 PM, Neal Whitman wrote:
>>> I've discovered to my dismay that the BYU Corpora's latest
>>> simplifications to their search syntax have decreased their
>>> functionality...at least as far as I can tell. I'm hoping someone here
>>> will know the proper workaround.
>>> 
>>> I'm looking into the frequency of the verb 'witness' taking a
>>> participial complement ('witnessed them doing') versus a base-form
>>> complement ('witnessed them do'). To ask for the verb 'witness' plus a
>>> pronoun is now done like this:
>>> 
>>>   WITNESS_v PRON
>>> 
>>> To ask for a following verb, you do this:
>>> 
>>>   WITNESS_v PRON VERB
>>> 
>>> To ask for a specific form of a verb, such as a gerund/participle, you
>>> used to be able to do it like this:
>>> 
>>>   WITNESS_v PRON _v?g*
>>> 
>>> or like this if you wanted the base form:
>>> 
>>>   WITNESS_v PRON _vv0*
>>> 
>>> However, when you use these POS tags preceded by an underscore,
>>> instead of the all-caps POS tags--even if you put a space before the
>>> underscore--the search engine interprets it to mean a restriction on
>>> the previous element. So in this case, it would be looking for
>>> pronouns that are also gerund/participles or base-form verbs, and find
>>> nothing. So what I need is one of those all-caps versions of the parts
>>> of speech, like maybe VERBING or something, but as far as I've been
>>> able to tell so far, they don't exist.
>>> 
>>> Thanks for any suggestions!
>>> 
>>> -Neal
>>> 
>>> 
>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>> 
>> 
>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Jordan Smith
> PhD candidate
> Rhetoric and Professional Communication (co-major)
> Applied Linguistics and Technology (co-major)
> Iowa State University
> 206 Ross Hall, Ames, IA 50011
> 801-599-1028
> tjordans at iastate.edu
> 
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> 
> ------------------------------
> 
> Date:    Mon, 21 Jan 2019 20:21:37 -0500
> From:    Herb Stahlke <hfwstahlke at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject: Re: Fixing "ng" and "nk" endings
> 
> We've discussed this before.  Both forms exist in spoken American English.
> In my Inland Northern speech, the vowel is short.
> 
> Herb
> 
> On Fri, Sep 14, 2018 at 6:59 PM Tom Zurinskas <truespel at hotmail.com> wrote:
> 
>> There is a common dictionary error showing a short vowel prior to "ng" and
>> "nk" word endings when they actually are pronounce "long"
>> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0hyN-0Z5ic    The free converter at
>> truespel.com fixes this.
>> 
>> 
>> Tom Zurinskas,
>> Originally SWConn 20 yrs,  college Tenn 3,  work NJ  33,  now FL 16
>> truespel phonetics free converter and  tutorials - http://truespel.com
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>> 
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> 
> ------------------------------
> 
> Date:    Mon, 21 Jan 2019 20:59:27 -0500
> From:    Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
> Subject: Re: Fixing "ng" and "nk" endings
> 
>> On Jan 21, 2019, at 8:21 PM, Herb Stahlke <hfwstahlke at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
>> 
>> We've discussed this before.  Both forms exist in spoken American English.
>> In my Inland Northern speech, the vowel is short.
>> 
>> Herb
> 
> Ditto in my New York speech. As Herb says, we’ve discussed this in the past, and most of us agree that the vowel in question being given as [I] is not an “error”, although I’ll take it on credit that the [i] pronunciation is also possible for some.
> 
> LH
>> 
>> On Fri, Sep 14, 2018 at 6:59 PM Tom Zurinskas <truespel at hotmail.com> wrote:
>> 
>>> There is a common dictionary error showing a short vowel prior to "ng" and
>>> "nk" word endings when they actually are pronounce "long"
>>> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0hyN-0Z5ic    The free converter at
>>> truespel.com fixes this.
>>> 
>>> 
>>> Tom Zurinskas,
>>> Originally SWConn 20 yrs,  college Tenn 3,  work NJ  33,  now FL 16
>>> truespel phonetics free converter and  tutorials - http://truespel.com
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>> 
>> 
>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> 
> ------------------------------
> 
> End of ADS-L Digest - 20 Jan 2019 to 21 Jan 2019 (#2019-21)
> ***********************************************************

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