7.1286, Disc: "Sitting on the fence"

[The Linguist List]

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LINGUIST List:  Vol-7-1286. Sat Sep 14 1996. ISSN: 1068-4875. Lines:  69
 
Subject: 7.1286, Disc: "Sitting on the fence"
 
Moderators: Anthony Rodrigues Aristar: Texas A&M U. <aristar at tam2000.tamu.edu>
            Helen Dry: Eastern Michigan U. <hdry at emunix.emich.edu> (On Leave)
            T. Daniel Seely: Eastern Michigan U. <dseely at emunix.emich.edu>
 
Associate Editor:  Ljuba Veselinova <lveselin at emunix.emich.edu>
Assistant Editors: Ron Reck <rreck at emunix.emich.edu>
                   Ann Dizdar <dizdar at tam2000.tamu.edu>
                   Annemarie Valdez <avaldez at emunix.emich.edu>
 
Software development: John H. Remmers <remmers at emunix.emich.edu>
 
Editor for this issue: dizdar at tam2000.tamu.edu (Ann Dizdar)
 
---------------------------------Directory-----------------------------------
1)
Date:  Wed, 11 Sep 1996 16:13:01 CDT
From:  Mark at dragonsys.com (Mark Mandel)
Subject:   fence-sitting
 
2)
Date:  Wed, 11 Sep 1996 19:12:34 BST
From:  lou at vax.ox.ac.uk (Lou Burnard)
Subject:  RE: 7.1258, Sum: "Sitting on the fence"
 
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1)
Date:  Wed, 11 Sep 1996 16:13:01 CDT
From:  Mark at dragonsys.com (Mark Mandel)
Subject:   fence-sitting
 
Bert Peeters quoted one of his respondents thus:
 
<<<
Peter Daniels: Why would failure/refusal/inability to make a choice
ever be regarded favorably? I.e., do you have any proverbs or
catch-phrases that consider vacillation a virtue?
>>>
 
Sitting on the fence is more about hesitation ("I will not choose
either A or B yet") than about vacillation ("I like A... no, B... no,
A... well, B has its benefits..."). How about "Look before you leap"?
(Mandel's Law: "For every proverb there is an equal and opposite
proverb.")
 
                Mark A. Mandel : mark at dragonsys.com
    Dragon Systems, Inc. : speech recognition : +1 617 965-5200
 320 Nevada St., Newton, MA 02160, USA : http://www.dragonsys.com/
 
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2)
Date:  Wed, 11 Sep 1996 19:12:34 BST
From:  lou at vax.ox.ac.uk (Lou Burnard)
Subject:  RE: 7.1258, Sum: "Sitting on the fence"
 
I missed the earlier question about sitting on the fence... for the
record, there are about 30 instances of sitting on the fence in the
British National Corpus, of which just a few (about six) are literal
fences being sat on, and the rest are all synonymous with vacillation,
and have a generally negative aura. If anyone's interested, I can post
a full list, but not till next week!
 
Lou
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