| Author |
Message |
Robert Lieblich
Guest
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| Posted: Tue Oct 25, 2005 6:06 am
Post subject: Re: Positive "anymore" [was: Re: Stress and articulation [wa |
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Steve Hayes wrote:
| Quote: |
On Mon, 24 Oct 2005 15:49:57 GMT, "Maria Conlon" <maria.c-b@sbcglobal.net
wrote:
|
[ ... ]
| Quote: | That "alot" business is well-known, but I don't think it's actually seen
that much. So much is made of it that those who were once guilty of
using it have seen the error of their ways. (My comment doesn't include
chat rooms or phone text messages or similar venues.)
If that can happen, perhaps unskunking is possible!
|
Sorry, no.
--
Pepe le Pew
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Maria Conlon
Guest
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| Posted: Tue Oct 25, 2005 6:30 am
Post subject: Re: Positive "anymore" [was: Re: Stress and articulation [wa |
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Robert Lieblich wrote:
| Quote: | Steve Hayes wrote:
Maria Conlon wrote:
[ ... ]
That "alot" business is well-known, but I don't think it's actually
seen that much. So much is made of it that those who were once
guilty of using it have seen the error of their ways. (My comment
doesn't include chat rooms or phone text messages or similar
venues.)
If that can happen, perhaps unskunking is possible!
Sorry, no.
|
So, do you encounter lots of "alots"? I don't, not these days, and never
really did see more than a relatively small number of instances of "a
lot" written as "alot." The thing that surprised me when I did see
"alot" was the people who spelled it that way -- people who should
certainly have known better. Some even seemed surprised to find out that
"alot" was supposed to be "a lot."
Anyway: Perhaps unskunking is *not* possible, but I still think the case
of "alot" was exaggerated.
ICBW, of course.
--
Maria Conlon |
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Maria Conlon
Guest
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| Posted: Tue Oct 25, 2005 7:01 am
Post subject: Re: Positive "anymore" [was: Re: Stress and articulation [wa |
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Robert Lieblich wrote:
| Quote: | Maria Conlon wrote:
Robert Lieblich wrote:
Steve Hayes wrote:
Maria Conlon wrote:
[ ... ]
That "alot" business is well-known, but I don't think it's
actually seen that much. So much is made of it that those who
were once guilty of using it have seen the error of their ways.
(My comment doesn't include chat rooms or phone text messages or
similar venues.)
If that can happen, perhaps unskunking is possible!
Sorry, no.
So, do you encounter lots of "alots"?
Shame on you for trimming the sig, reproduced here in quotes but sans
dashes:
"Pepe le Pew"
[...] |
I guess the original had to be sans dashes, too.
Didn't you read the comments about my own sig lacking dashes (actually
dash dash space) and about my habit of leaving certain sigs intact in my
repies? (Or something like that.) Now, here I am, trying to comply with
the wishes of others, and you Pepe on up and and say Pew.
Sob. I can't win.
As for the rest of your post, I've got to think about it. Right now I'm
just too upset. ALOT upset, and that's the first time I've ever used
that ugly, stupid term -- unless someone wants to count typos. And even
with typos, it's possible that I've never written "alot" before when I
meant to write "a lot."
No dashes.
Maria Conlon
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Charles Riggs
Guest
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| Posted: Tue Oct 25, 2005 7:01 am
Post subject: Re: Positive "anymore" [was: Re: Stress and articulation [wa |
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On Mon, 24 Oct 2005 13:33:52 +0200, Steve Hayes
<hayesmstw@hotmail.com> wrote:
| Quote: | On Mon, 24 Oct 2005 08:07:57 +0100, Charles Riggs <chriggs@éircom.net> wrote:
On Mon, 24 Oct 2005 00:26:41 GMT, Tony Cooper
tony_cooper213@earthlink.net> wrote:
And from another poster who managed to jam three "anymore"s in one
post:
"This is why I am not going to anymore SCI-Con’s. I don’t want to meet
anymore people who turn out to be nice and I can’t abuse them on SCI
anymore."
The word anymore can be used correctly. All three uses of it by your
friend are blatant errors. A correct use of it is "I don't get into
town much anymore".
I don't see anything wrong with the third one.
|
Right you are. I was only two-thirds correct.
| Quote: | The other two would be better
with a space between "any" and "more", but perhaps that's just one of those
regional variations like the US usage of "alot" to mean "a lot". Perhaps these
are examples of amore general trend towards conjunctive writing.
|
No, they were simply mistakes.
--
Charles Riggs |
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Robert Lieblich
Guest
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| Posted: Tue Oct 25, 2005 7:01 am
Post subject: Re: Positive "anymore" [was: Re: Stress and articulation [wa |
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Maria Conlon wrote:
| Quote: |
Robert Lieblich wrote:
Steve Hayes wrote:
Maria Conlon wrote:
[ ... ]
That "alot" business is well-known, but I don't think it's actually
seen that much. So much is made of it that those who were once
guilty of using it have seen the error of their ways. (My comment
doesn't include chat rooms or phone text messages or similar
venues.)
If that can happen, perhaps unskunking is possible!
Sorry, no.
So, do you encounter lots of "alots"?
|
Shame on you for trimming the sig, reproduced here in quotes but sans
dashes:
"Pepe le Pew"
| Quote: | I don't, not these days, and never
really did see more than a relatively small number of instances of "a
lot" written as "alot." The thing that surprised me when I did see
"alot" was the people who spelled it that way -- people who should
certainly have known better. Some even seemed surprised to find out that
"alot" was supposed to be "a lot."
Anyway: Perhaps unskunking is *not* possible, but I still think the case
of "alot" was exaggerated.
|
In fairness, I think unskunking does occur, but only when the old
generation dies out and the meaning fully changes. An example is
"nauseous," which has meant "nauseated" for so long that you have to
be in your sixties -- or a usage fanatic -- to think there's anything
wrong with using it that way. In another couple of decades, no one
will remember the controversy. Another example is "data," so far
along the road to being singular that soon no one will remember or
care that it began life as a plural.
Contrast this completion of the transition to a new usage with a
retreat from the new to the original. I can't think of a single
example; by the time a word is skunked, it's too late to walk the
skunk back. Sooner or later the word emerges from transition, but
before that it's skunked. It can't go back to what it was. What are
the chances, for example, that "media" (for means of communication)
will again ever become a plural in near-universal usage, as once, long
ago, it was? Who wants to bet that "refute" will ever again be
clearly used and understood to mean "prove the contrary" as opposed to
simply "deny"? It follows that I think "alot" will eventually
conquer. Alright, already?
So, okay, Tootsie, Pepe wasn't complete right. But I think he figured
out what you really meant to say, and from that perspective he's
gotcha. The river of usage doesn't reverse its course.
Please, someone, prove me wrong.
--
Bob Lieblich
Subbing for Pepe |
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nancy13g
Guest
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| Posted: Tue Oct 25, 2005 7:01 am
Post subject: Re: Positive "anymore" [was: Re: Stress and articulation [wa |
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Maria Conlon wrote:
| Quote: | So, do you encounter lots of "alots"? I don't,
not these days, and never really did see more than
a relatively small number of instances of
"a lot" written as "alot."
|
Search Google Groups for instances of it. Sort by date. You'll find it
occurs on the order of hundreds of times per day.
I see it *very* often in certain groups -- usually the support or
parenting subject areas, rather than the more "intellectual" topics,
for whatever that's worth. |
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Steve Hayes
Guest
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| Posted: Tue Oct 25, 2005 3:40 pm
Post subject: Unskunking |
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On Mon, 24 Oct 2005 21:45:35 -0400, Robert Lieblich
<robert.lieblich@verizon.net> wrote:
| Quote: | In fairness, I think unskunking does occur, but only when the old
generation dies out and the meaning fully changes. An example is
"nauseous," which has meant "nauseated" for so long that you have to
be in your sixties -- or a usage fanatic -- to think there's anything
wrong with using it that way. In another couple of decades, no one
will remember the controversy. Another example is "data," so far
along the road to being singular that soon no one will remember or
care that it began life as a plural.
Contrast this completion of the transition to a new usage with a
retreat from the new to the original. I can't think of a single
example; by the time a word is skunked, it's too late to walk the
skunk back. Sooner or later the word emerges from transition, but
before that it's skunked. It can't go back to what it was. What are
the chances, for example, that "media" (for means of communication)
will again ever become a plural in near-universal usage, as once, long
ago, it was? Who wants to bet that "refute" will ever again be
clearly used and understood to mean "prove the contrary" as opposed to
simply "deny"? It follows that I think "alot" will eventually
conquer. Alright, already?
|
How long ago was it?
The first time I encountered "media" as singular was on notices printed on
mini-floppy disks, around 15-20 years ago. It jarred on me then, and still
does.
Of course people who are under 20 may have grown up hearing both, and for them
it has been skunked. Singular phenomena has been around longer, and ceriteria
too, though not as long as phenomena. Alot has been around about the same time
as singular media.
--
Steve Hayes from Tshwane, South Africa
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/7734/stevesig.htm
E-mail - see web page, or parse: shayes at dunelm full stop org full stop uk |
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Jordan Abel
Guest
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| Posted: Tue Oct 25, 2005 4:29 pm
Post subject: Re: Positive "anymore" [was: Re: Stress and articulation [wa |
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On 2005-10-25, Mike Lyle <mike_lyle_uk@REMOVETHISyahoo.co.uk> wrote:
| Quote: | Maria Conlon wrote:
Robert Lieblich wrote:
[...]
Shame on you for trimming the sig, reproduced here in quotes but
sans
dashes:
"Pepe le Pew"
[...]
I guess the original had to be sans dashes, too.
Didn't you read the comments about my own sig lacking dashes
(actually
dash dash space) [...]
One word I'd dearly love to see unskunked is "dash". 'Let your hyphen
be "hyphen", and your en- and em-rules "dashes"', as the Bible wisely
says (Lamentations 29:3).
|
The particular "dash" he was speaking of, though, is actually the ascii minus -
which, like a number of other ascii punctuation characters has a history of
compromises leading to several overloaded meanings. The unicode name for it is
HYPHEN-MINUS for this reason. [a proper hyphen is at U+2010, and a minus sign
at U+2212 - along with a "figure dash" at 2012, "en dash" at 2013, and
non-breaking hyphen at 2011.] |
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Donna Richoux
Guest
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| Posted: Tue Oct 25, 2005 5:47 pm
Post subject: Re: Positive "anymore" [was: Re: Stress and articulation [wa |
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Robert Lieblich <robert.lieblich@verizon.net> wrote:
| Quote: | Contrast this completion of the transition to a new usage with a
retreat from the new to the original. I can't think of a single
example; by the time a word is skunked, it's too late to walk the
skunk back. Sooner or later the word emerges from transition, but
before that it's skunked. It can't go back to what it was. What are
the chances, for example, that "media" (for means of communication)
will again ever become a plural in near-universal usage, as once, long
ago, it was? Who wants to bet that "refute" will ever again be
clearly used and understood to mean "prove the contrary" as opposed to
simply "deny"? It follows that I think "alot" will eventually
conquer. Alright, already?
|
Some misspellings have persisted for decades without taking over. I
remember that some turn-of-the-century children's book made a point
about separate/seperate.
| Quote: |
So, okay, Tootsie, Pepe wasn't complete right. But I think he figured
out what you really meant to say, and from that perspective he's
gotcha. The river of usage doesn't reverse its course.
Please, someone, prove me wrong.
|
Well, it's not proof, but one data point. On March 25, 2001, the
question of "a lot" vs. "alot" was raised (by Steven Hayes), and Evan
Googled these figures:
"a lot" 5,570,000
"alot" 1,060,000
Ratio 5:1
When I redo that search now, I get:
"a lot" 357 million
"alot" 16 million Ratio 22:1
If that has any validity (maybe in 2001, Google was not indexing "a"
consistently?), that means the situation is improving. Not necessarily
that individuals are fixing their own spelling mistakes, but at least
that as more material is posted to the Web and indexed by Google, the
more the correct spelling shows up.
To check to see if irrelevant uses of those words are contaminating the
results, I also tried, just now:
"a lot of" 267 million
"alot of" 10 million Ratio 27:1
However,
"does it a lot" 15,800
"does it alot" 2,540 Ratio 6:1
"do it a lot" 120,000
"do it alot" 16,200 Ratio 7:1
Adverbial differs from quantifier...
--
Best -- Donna Richoux |
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Matti Lamprhey
Guest
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| Posted: Tue Oct 25, 2005 6:56 pm
Post subject: Re: Positive "anymore" [was: Re: Stress and articulation [wa |
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"Donna Richoux" <trio@euronet.nl> wrote...
| Quote: | Robert Lieblich <robert.lieblich@verizon.net> wrote:
[...] The river of usage doesn't reverse its course.
Please, someone, prove me wrong.
Well, it's not proof, but one data point. On March 25, 2001, the
question of "a lot" vs. "alot" was raised (by Steven Hayes), and Evan
Googled these figures:
"a lot" 5,570,000
"alot" 1,060,000
Ratio 5:1
When I redo that search now, I get:
"a lot" 357 million
"alot" 16 million Ratio 22:1
If that has any validity (maybe in 2001, Google was not indexing "a"
consistently?), that means the situation is improving. Not necessarily
that individuals are fixing their own spelling mistakes, but at least
that as more material is posted to the Web and indexed by Google, the
more the correct spelling shows up.
To check to see if irrelevant uses of those words are contaminating
the results, I also tried, just now:
"a lot of" 267 million
"alot of" 10 million Ratio 27:1
However,
"does it a lot" 15,800
"does it alot" 2,540 Ratio 6:1
"do it a lot" 120,000
"do it alot" 16,200 Ratio 7:1
Adverbial differs from quantifier...
|
Food for thought a plenty.
Matti |
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Mike Lyle
Guest
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| Posted: Tue Oct 25, 2005 8:11 pm
Post subject: Re: Positive "anymore" [was: Re: Stress and articulation [wa |
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Maria Conlon wrote:
| Quote: | Robert Lieblich wrote:
[...]
Shame on you for trimming the sig, reproduced here in quotes but
sans
dashes:
"Pepe le Pew"
[...]
I guess the original had to be sans dashes, too.
Didn't you read the comments about my own sig lacking dashes
(actually
dash dash space) [...]
|
One word I'd dearly love to see unskunked is "dash". 'Let your hyphen
be "hyphen", and your en- and em-rules "dashes"', as the Bible wisely
says (Lamentations 29:3).
--
Mike. |
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Mike Lyle
Guest
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| Posted: Tue Oct 25, 2005 9:32 pm
Post subject: Re: Positive "anymore" [was: Re: Stress and articulation [wa |
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John Holmes wrote:
| Quote: | Donna Richoux wrote:
The 1946 Merriam-Webster collegiate has no entry for "anymore". It
has: anybody, anyhow, anyone, anything, anyway, anyways, anywise.
The current edition (MW11) dates it to the 14th century and says:
Although both anymore and any more are found in
written use, in the 20th century anymore is the more
common styling. Anymore is regularly used in
negative <no one can be natural anymore -- May
Sarton>, interrogative <do you read much anymore?>,
and conditional <if you do that anymore, I'll leave
contexts and in certain positive constructions <the
Washingtonian is too sophisticated to believe
anymore in solutions -- Russell Baker>. In many
regions of the United States the use of anymore in
sense 2 is quite common in positive constructions,
especially in speech <everybody's cool anymore
[...]
Are they right to call the Russell Baker example a positive
construction? Doesn't it mean that the Washingtonian is so
sophisticated that it does not believe in solutions any more?
That looks like enough of a negative trigger to me. I wonder
whether
John Lawler is reading this.
|
It's certainly negative in sense: it's only the _construction_ which
is positive, at least in the dubious sense of not containing "not" or
a similar word. "Too xx to yy" is a clearly negative expression.
--
Mike. |
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Maria Conlon
Guest
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| Posted: Tue Oct 25, 2005 10:25 pm
Post subject: Re: Positive "anymore" [was: Re: Stress and articulation [wa |
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Robert Lieblich wrote:
| Quote: | In fairness, I think unskunking does occur, but only when the old
generation dies out and the meaning fully changes. An example is
"nauseous," which has meant "nauseated" for so long that you have to
be in your sixties -- or a usage fanatic -- to think there's anything
wrong with using it that way. In another couple of decades, no one
will remember the controversy. Another example is "data," so far
along the road to being singular that soon no one will remember or
care that it began life as a plural.
Contrast this completion of the transition to a new usage with a
retreat from the new to the original. I can't think of a single
example; by the time a word is skunked, it's too late to walk the
skunk back. Sooner or later the word emerges from transition, but
before that it's skunked. It can't go back to what it was. What are
the chances, for example, that "media" (for means of communication)
will again ever become a plural in near-universal usage, as once, long
ago, it was? Who wants to bet that "refute" will ever again be
clearly used and understood to mean "prove the contrary" as opposed to
simply "deny"? It follows that I think "alot" will eventually
conquer. Alright, already?
So, okay, Tootsie, Pepe wasn't complete right. But I think he figured
out what you really meant to say, and from that perspective he's
gotcha. The river of usage doesn't reverse its course.
Please, someone, prove me wrong.
|
I do hope you've seen Donna's reply.  It may not prove you wrong (how
would that ever be possible?) but it does provide something for Pepe to
"chew on."
--
Maria ("Tootsie")Conlon |
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Maria Conlon
Guest
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| Posted: Tue Oct 25, 2005 10:39 pm
Post subject: Re: Positive "anymore" [was: Re: Stress and articulation [wa |
|
|
Donna Richoux wrote:
| Quote: | Robert Lieblich wrote:
Contrast this completion of the transition to a new usage with a
retreat from the new to the original. I can't think of a single
example; by the time a word is skunked, it's too late to walk the
skunk back. Sooner or later the word emerges from transition, but
before that it's skunked. It can't go back to what it was. What are
the chances, for example, that "media" (for means of communication)
will again ever become a plural in near-universal usage, as once,
long ago, it was? Who wants to bet that "refute" will ever again be
clearly used and understood to mean "prove the contrary" as opposed
to simply "deny"? It follows that I think "alot" will eventually
conquer. Alright, already?
Some misspellings have persisted for decades without taking over. I
remember that some turn-of-the-century children's book made a point
about separate/seperate.
So, okay, Tootsie, Pepe wasn't complete right. But I think he
figured out what you really meant to say, and from that perspective
he's gotcha. The river of usage doesn't reverse its course.
Please, someone, prove me wrong.
Well, it's not proof, but one data point. On March 25, 2001, the
question of "a lot" vs. "alot" was raised (by Steven Hayes), and Evan
Googled these figures:
"a lot" 5,570,000
"alot" 1,060,000
Ratio 5:1
When I redo that search now, I get:
"a lot" 357 million
"alot" 16 million Ratio 22:1
If that has any validity (maybe in 2001, Google was not indexing "a"
consistently?), that means the situation is improving. Not necessarily
that individuals are fixing their own spelling mistakes, but at least
that as more material is posted to the Web and indexed by Google, the
more the correct spelling shows up.
To check to see if irrelevant uses of those words are contaminating
the results, I also tried, just now:
"a lot of" 267 million
"alot of" 10 million Ratio 27:1
However,
"does it a lot" 15,800
"does it alot" 2,540 Ratio 6:1
"do it a lot" 120,000
"do it alot" 16,200 Ratio 7:1
Adverbial differs from quantifier...
|
Thank you very much Donna -- and Evan. I didn't even think of Googling,
but I'm certainly glad you two did. The results make me feel a bit
better about the statement of mine that BobL found... well, lacking.
When I was still working, my employer saw to it that business writing
seminars were conducted for all the managers (nation-wide). As a
supplement to that, we ran occasional items in the company newsletter
about certain writing/spelling errors. "Alot" was among the things
mentioned.[1] I would think (and hope) that other companies have done
likewise.
[1] As were "beg the question" and "compliment/complement." (I wrote a
little verse explaining that last one. If I ever find it, I'll post it.)
--
Maria Conlon |
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Bob Cunningham
Guest
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| Posted: Tue Oct 25, 2005 11:57 pm
Post subject: Re: Positive "anymore" [was: Re: Stress and articulation [wa |
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|
On Tue, 25 Oct 2005 16:25:53 GMT, "Maria Conlon"
<maria.c-b@sbcglobal.net> said that Robert Lieblich wrote:
| Quote: | In fairness, I think unskunking does occur, but only when the old
generation dies out and the meaning fully changes. An example is
"nauseous," which has meant "nauseated" for so long that you have to
be in your sixties -- or a usage fanatic -- to think there's anything
wrong with using it that way. In another couple of decades, no one
will remember the controversy. Another example is "data," so far
along the road to being singular that soon no one will remember or
care that it began life as a plural.
|
Yes, in another generation or so people will probably be
ordering their steak media rare with no one taking exception
to it. |
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