LL-L: "Grammar" LOWLANDS-L, 25.JAN.2001 (06) [E/S]

[Lowlands-L]

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From: Sandy Fleming [sandy at fleimin.demon.co.uk]
Subject: "Grammar"

> From: Reuben Epp [repp at silk.net]
> Subject: LL-L: "Grammar" LOWLANDS-L, 24.JAN.2001 (03) [E]
>
> > From: john feather [johnfeather at sceptic1.freeserve.co.uk]
> > Subject: Grammar
> >
> > I don't recall anybody mentioning adjectives in relation to the "dill"
> > problem.
> >
> > John Feather johnfeather at sceptic1.freeserve.co.uk
>
> I understand the following sayings to be approximately synonymous:
>
> 1.  Ain't that just peachy.
>
> 2.  Ain't that just dandy.
>
> 3.  Ain't that just dilly.

I haven't heard this third expression before, but I'd be
surprised if this "dilly" is anything to do with dill. I
might tentatively suggest that it's taken from a nonsense
word in some nursery rhyme, eg in English:

Lavender blue, dilly dilly, lavender green,
When I am king, dilly dilly, you shall be queen.

Or the "Nurse's Sang" in Scots:

Hey dan dilly dow,
How den dan,
Rich were yer mither,
Gin ye were a man.

Ye'd hunt an ye'd hawk,
An keep her in gemme,
An watter yer faither's horse
In the mill-dam.

Hey dan dilly dow,
How den flooers,
Ye'll lie in yer bed
Till eleeven oors.

If at eleeven oors
Ye list tae ryce,
Ye'll get yer denner
Dicht in a new guise.

Laverock's leg,
An titlin's tae,
An a' sic dainties
Ma mannie sall hae.

I must say that although the loss of sounds from consonant
clusters may be a universal phenomenon in English, the free
use of the -ed ending with nouns seems to me to be a feature
of American English rather than any British Englishes.
Similarly, the free participling of nouns seems to me to be
an American phenomenon, extremed in Nancy Sinatra's song,
"These Boots are Made for Walkin'":

You keep lyin' when you oughta been truthin'
You keep losin' when you oughta been winnin'
You keep samin' when you oughta been changin'...

While none of this may come naturally in American English,
I do think Americans are more apt to spot and extend
analogies in English than we British are. This in turn
would suggest that linguistic conservatism/liberality can
be culturally conditioned rather than arising from the
current morphological state of the language itself. As
Stefan said, the rate of change varies greatly - perhaps
it's going faster in America than in Britain?

Sandy

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