[Ads-l] back-formed verb form of the day

[Betty Birner]

The mailer won't let me attach it here (though it's findable online), but there's a wonderful "Frazz" comic from July 10, 2015, with the following exchange between Frazz and his young friend Caulfield:

C: Have you ever...um... hang glided? Hung glid? Hang glider flied?
F: And loved it!
C: Why would they make something so memorable so hard to say in the past tense?
F: I've also scuba diven!

--Betty



-----Original Message-----
From: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU> On Behalf Of Herb Stahlke
Sent: Sunday, December 19, 2021 7:22 PM
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject: Re: back-formed verb form of the day

I've heard "I've dove," but never "doven/diven."  I forgot about "clumb."  Thanks for citing it.  It's faux too.  So much for the velar guess.  We could still go with [+grave], I suppose.

On December 19, 2021, at 7:46 PM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu> wrote:

And there's "dove", at least for the preterite. Less frequent for the participle, I'd wager.  Is "clumb" a relic past or a faux-ablaut past?

On Sun, Dec 19, 2021 at 7:12 PM Herb Stahlke <hfwstahlke at gmail.com> wrote:

> Two weak verbs that I can think of have developed faux-ablaut forms:
> sneak/snuck/snuck and drag/drug/drug.  Both behave like weak verbs in 
> that their preterite and participle forms are the same.  And they both 
> go to the same central vowel not widely found in strong verbs for 
> those two forms, aside from dig/dug/dug, which could be the analytical 
> model for them since they all end in velar stops.
>
> On December 19, 2021, at 4:21 PM, Laurence Horn 
> <laurence.horn at yale.edu>
> wrote:
>
> Tony Romo, announcer on Steelers-Titans game, Steelers have the ball 
> on the Titans' 1 yard line.  Romo and co-announcer Jim Nantz agree 
> that a quarterback sneak by Ben Rothlisberger is unlikely:
>
> "Ben hasn't *quarterback-snuck* all year. Does he do it here?"
>
> (In fact, he quarterback-snuck twice in a row, unsuccessfully and then
> successfully.)
>
> "To quarterback-sneak" is not that uncommon itself, but I don't think 
> I've encountered the strong (ablaut) past participle before.
>
> 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