[Ads-l] Have others noticed...

Dennis During dcduring at GMAIL.COM
Wed Dec 9 22:11:07 UTC 2020


Searching for "charge|charges|charging|charged for
murdering|robbing|stealing|assualting|abusing|haarboring|endangering|hijacking"
generates plenty of hits from newspapers. That construction is not
obsolete, archaic, or dated. It is easy to imagine someone saying "for" but
then not finding the proper verb -ing-form and inserting a noun.

But, in addition, there are plenty of instances in print newspapers of
"[charge] for assault|murder|endangerment|theft" and even
"drugs|weapons|armed robbery|robbery|mutilation".

On Wed, Dec 9, 2020 at 3:48 PM Baker, John <JBAKER at stradley.com> wrote:

> I don’t think I’ve seen “charged for” (a crime).  If it is in use, it has
> not penetrated legal usage.
>
>
> John Baker
>
>
> From: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU> On Behalf Of
> Dennis During
> Sent: Wednesday, December 9, 2020 12:35 PM
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> Subject: Re: Have others noticed...
>
> External Email - Think Before You Click
>
>
> I think both are acceptable. At Wiktionary we label definitions (more
> rarely constructions) "obsolete", when most speakers no longer recognize
> the definition, "archaic" when a definition is widely understood, but
> rarely used in contemporary speech and writing, and "dated" when the
> definition is understood, but the users are generally of the older portion
> of the population. "Charged with" does seem to me to even be "dated" yet,
> but I might have missed that. My inner grammar nazi doesn't like "charged
> for".
>
> On Wed, Dec 9, 2020 at 3:15 AM Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com<mailto:
> hwgray at gmail.com>> wrote:
>
> > the replacement of "charged _with_ (a crime)" by "charged _for_ (a
> crime)"?
> > Or has language-change rendered yet another aspect of my internal grammar
> > obsolete?
> >
> > --
> > - 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<
> http://www.americandialect.org>
> >
>
>
> --
> Dennis C. During
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org<
> http://www.americandialect.org>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>


-- 
Dennis C. During

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



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