[Ads-l] ADS-L Digest - 28 Jun 2021 to 29 Jun 2021 (#2021-32)
Michael J. Sheehan
000000e73f3db4b1-dmarc-request at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Wed Jun 30 20:07:44 UTC 2021
And that, my friends, is why you shouldn't end a sentence with a
preposition.
Because you may very well end up with a dangling participle.
Michael J. Sheehan
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Subject: ADS-L Digest - 28 Jun 2021 to 29 Jun 2021 (#2021-32)
There are 3 messages totaling 178 lines in this issue.
Topics of the day:
1. Crooked number
2. Antedating of "Field Work" (OED sense 4)
3. Authorship correction: "Up with Which I Will Not Put"
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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
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Date: Tue, 29 Jun 2021 02:57:09 -0400
From: ADSGarson O'Toole <adsgarsonotoole at GMAIL.COM>
Subject: Re: Crooked number
Bill Mullins wrote:
> When I was a kid, my mom taught me how to spell "Mississippi":
>
> Em Eye Crooked Letter Crooked Letter Eye
> Crooked Letter Crooked Letter Eye
> Humpback Humpback Eye
In 1902 a grandchild of Mary B. Henderson used that type of spelling
according to a newspaper anecdote. The excerpt below seems to contain
a misprint. The term "crookeded" probably should be "crooked".
Date: August 13, 1902
Newspaper: The Decatur Herald
Newspaper Location: Decatur, Illinois
Article: A Hint in Spelling
Quote Page 8, Column 5
Database: Newspapers.com
https://www.newspapers.com/clip/80467393/spelling-mississippi/
[Begin excerpt]
Mrs. Henderson is justly proud of the fact she is a grandmother, and
it is with one of these youngsters the incident has to do. This child,
every time she receives a severe fall, immediately begins to spell
some word. If she gets through all right she is convinced that her
brains are not dashed out.
The child's favorite word is Mississippi, and as she is a little shy
on the alphabet her spelling goes like this: "M-i-crooked
letter-crookeded letter-i-crooked letter-crooked letter-i-humpback,
humpback-i."
Which most of us will admit is rather an innovation.
[End excerpt]
Below is a book excerpt showing "s" described as a "crooked letter".
The Google Books year is 1874, but I was unable to find a year listed
within the book.
Year: 1874
Book Title: The Book of the "Alphabet" in Words, (On the Principles of
Contrast and Rhyme)
Series: Dr Morell's Primary Series
Publisher: Longmans, Green, Reader & Dyer, London
Quote Page 33
Database: Google Books Full View
https://books.google.com/books?id=AfgIAAAAQAAJ&q=%22crooked+letter%22#v=snippet&
[Begin excerpt]
THE ALPHABET CONTRASTED IN WORDS.
(Let the child describe his words in the following way.)
CONSISTS OF
is a straight stroke with a dot, and a crooked letter.
it a straight stroke with a dot, and a straight stroke with a stroke
through it.
at a crooked letter with a dot, and a straight stroke with a stroke
through it.
in a straight letter with a dot, and a short straight letter with two legs.
ox a round letter and a cross letter.
[End excerpt]
Garson
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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
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Date: Tue, 29 Jun 2021 23:50:22 +0000
From: "Shapiro, Fred" <fred.shapiro at YALE.EDU>
Subject: Antedating of "Field Work" (OED sense 4)
field work (OED, 4., 1887)
Then in the mid-1860s you start seeing geologists using the term “field-work” in the familiar modern sense. For instance, here’s Bigby (1867 Proc Roy Soc Lond 15:372-385<http://www.jstor.org/stable/112654>), introducing his “general view of Silurian life”:
I have been further encouraged by the great accumulations of the last few years, through the establishment in North America and elsewhere of numerous colleges, each of them having become the centre of more or less field-work.
And from there, you soon see the term cropping up in other disciplines. For instance, here’s the first use of the term in Am Nat, in 1870, in a review of a guidebook for naturalists:
Mr. Maynard writes of what he himself knows…His notes of the proper times and places to look for birds – of the pleasures and difficulties of taking them – and his pictures of field-work, are true to the life.
Fred Shapiro
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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
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Date: Wed, 30 Jun 2021 00:32:16 +0000
From: James Landau <jjjrlandau at NETSCAPE.COM>
Subject: Re: Authorship correction: "Up with Which I Will Not Put"
Harry is getting along in years and finds that he is
unable to perform sexually. He finally goes to his
doctor, who tries a few things but nothing seems to
work. So the doctor refers him to an American Indian
medicine man.
The medicine man says, "I can cure this." That said,
he throws a white powder in a flame, and there is a
flash with billowing blue smoke.
Then he says, "This is powerful medicine. You can only
use it once a year. All you have to do is say '123'
and it shall rise for as long as you wish!"
The guy then asks, "What happens when it's over, and I
don't want to continue?" The medicine man replies:
"All you or your partner has to say is 1234, and it
will go down. But be warned -- it will not work again
for another year!"
Harry rushes home, eager to try out his new powers and
prowess. That night he is ready to surprise Joyce. He
showers, shaves, and puts on his most exotic shaving
lotion. He gets into bed, and lying next to her says, "123."
He suddenly becomes more aroused than anytime in his life ... just as
the medicine man had promised. Joyce,
who had been facing away, turns over and asks,
"What did you say 123 for?"
And that, my friends, is why you shouldn't end a sentence with a
preposition.
(source unknown)
Neither "hunky" (i.e. literary) English nor Black English allow for two prepositions in a row, so "up with which" is simply not allowed in any variety of English. (I can hear Wilson Gray mercury fulminating "I thought Whitey knew how to use proper White english grammar!")
Then how do we parse "up" and "with"?
"Up" can be more than a preposition: "Up, Up," said the hunter to his faithful dog Up as they climbed up the hillside and continued up along the mountain trail to the hunter's favorite duck blind, where he intended to up his score of eider ducks that he had downed for their down. But his luck was not up to his usual today. His shotgun was down.
Then how do we parse "which I will not put up with"?
Easy. "Put up with" is a transitive "phrasal verb", i.e. it is derived from the infinitive "to put up with".
The structure is OSV "which (direct object) I (subject) with not put up with (verb).
James Landau
jjjrlandau at netscape.com
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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
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End of ADS-L Digest - 28 Jun 2021 to 29 Jun 2021 (#2021-32)
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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
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