Author Topic: Funny English and Linguistics stuff... (Read 217612 times)

BlackBlade · « **Reply #575 on:** October 01, 2012, 08:29:13 PM »

So remember that phase you, a sibling, or a friend went through (or may still be in), where you took say the verb or adjective in a sentence somebody said and turned it around?

"Gosh that's pathetic."

"You're pathetic."

---

"I should clean up"

"I'll clean you up!" often adapted to moms, "I'll clean up your mom."

So I was watching It's a Wonderful Life and there's this gut wrenching scene where George Bailey after realizing he's going to lose the bank, chews out his daughter's teacher over the phone, and when his horrified wife takes the phone back there's this exchange.

"Hello? Hello?!.....She's hanged up."

"I'll hang her up!"

So I'm hearing this turn of phrase in old movies, but how old is it really? I'm starting to think if we looked at books we might find it goes even further back than the 90's where I thought it did initially.

Jonathon · « **Reply #576 on:** October 01, 2012, 08:47:16 PM »

The problem with trying to trace it back in time is that it's so variable. What do you search for? There's no set words or phrases, just a repetition that turns the first speaker's sentence around on them.

I'd never realized that it went that far back, though. At one of my former jobs, we had a pretty set formula for escalation:

x
You x.
Your mom x.
Your mom x when she had you.

BlackBlade · « **Reply #577 on:** October 01, 2012, 08:51:18 PM »

I know it's hard to trace. But I'm going to start listening for it in Shakespeare plays. I figure if I find it there, then I've leapfrogged a few centuries. It might even be that English was invented purely so that turn of phrase could be employed!

pooka · « **Reply #578 on:** October 04, 2012, 10:56:59 AM »

The thumb biting bit comes to mind.

pooka · « **Reply #579 on:** October 04, 2012, 11:25:09 AM »

I wonder if any of the resistance on funnier is because of funny/funnier.

Annie Subjunctive · « **Reply #580 on:** October 05, 2012, 06:40:57 AM »

I bite my thumb at YOUR MOM!

Annie Subjunctive · « **Reply #581 on:** October 05, 2012, 06:42:56 AM »

I used to hang out all the time with my best friend Abby and her now-husband Wes. Wes and I would torment Abby endlessly with a shtick that went like this:

Abby: I need to whip up the cream.
Annie: (flirty voice) I'll whip up your cream.
Wes: (angry threatening voice) I'll whip up your cream.

pooka · « **Reply #582 on:** October 10, 2012, 10:53:07 PM »

I'm thinking of entire Skaespeare plays in the Your mom theme.
As your mom likes it
Your mom's midsummer nights dream
Your mom's labors lost
Much ado about your mom
Romeo and your mom
Your mom III
Your mom IV
The Taming of Your mom
Julius Caesarean

Jonathon · « **Reply #583 on:** October 11, 2012, 09:23:17 AM »

Tante Shvester · « **Reply #584 on:** October 11, 2012, 09:37:38 AM »

Quote from: pooka on October 10, 2012, 10:53:07 PM

I'm thinking of entire Skaespeare plays in the Your mom theme.
As your mom likes it
Your mom's midsummer nights dream
Your mom's labors lost
Much ado about your mom
Romeo and your mom
Your mom III
Your mom IV
The Taming of Your mom
Julius Caesarean

Oh my! You are in rare form today, and I'm loving it.

Almost as much as your mom loved those Two Gentlemen from Verona.

Brinestone · « **Reply #585 on:** October 11, 2012, 01:09:34 PM »

Annie Subjunctive · « **Reply #586 on:** October 12, 2012, 01:38:29 AM »

Quote from: Tante Shvester on October 11, 2012, 09:37:38 AM

Quote from: pooka on October 10, 2012, 10:53:07 PM
I'm thinking of entire Skaespeare plays in the Your mom theme.
As your mom likes it
Your mom's midsummer nights dream
Your mom's labors lost
Much ado about your mom
Romeo and your mom
Your mom III
Your mom IV
The Taming of Your mom
Julius Caesarean

Oh my! You are in rare form today, and I'm loving it.

Almost as much as your mom loved those Two Gentlemen from Verona.

Those both deserve a regal hats off.

BlackBlade · « **Reply #587 on:** October 13, 2012, 11:55:31 PM »

Fake prescriptivist rule contest winner is kind of convincing...

The Genuine · « **Reply #588 on:** October 14, 2012, 07:41:18 AM »

I like it!

Jonathon · « **Reply #589 on:** October 14, 2012, 11:11:25 AM »

It worries me. I can just imagine it catching on and needing to be debunked.

BlackBlade · « **Reply #590 on:** October 14, 2012, 11:34:46 AM »

Quote from: Jonathon on October 14, 2012, 11:11:25 AM

It worries me. I can just imagine it catching on and needing to be debunked.

Yes, but in the debunking you can actually cite the very first time this rule was invoked. How often can you do that?

Tante Shvester · « **Reply #591 on:** October 14, 2012, 01:19:26 PM »

Even if you do debunk it, some high school English teacher somewhere will just rebunk it.

Porter · « **Reply #592 on:** October 25, 2012, 03:16:19 PM »

So, I'm watching My Fair Lady for the first time in decades.

My attention is being split 3 ways:

1) Thinking of you gigantic language nerds and wondering what your response to everything Higgins says would be
2) A desire to punch Higgins in the nose every time he opens his mouth
3) Holy crap! Since when is Audrey Hepburn in this movie?

Brinestone · « **Reply #593 on:** October 25, 2012, 05:25:09 PM »

1) I've wanted Jonathon to watch it for years because of that very question, but he hates musicals with a passion. Oh well.
2) I hate that Eliza comes back to him at the end. He's a self-obsessed, arrogant jerk. And I hate the last line.
3) WHAT?! It's one of her top three movies, IMO. I've never seen Breakfast at Tiffany's, though, and I really should. Or her Sabrina.

Porter · « **Reply #594 on:** October 25, 2012, 07:16:55 PM »

1) Yeah, I go back and forth between not caring for musicals and actively disliking them. I'm only about a third of the way through, with lots of breaks inbetween, and I am already weary of the incessant singing. Oh well.
2) What sort of people prefers that she end up with that creep at the end? I weep for my culture.
3) Yeah. I have no excuse. Part of me knew that she was in the movie. But somehow I had never made the connection that Eliza Doolittle and Holly Golightly were played by the same actress.

BTW, I recently saw Roman Holiday with Hepburn. Not only was it a lovely movie, and not only was Hepburn perfect as that character, but it had a really good ending. I was so afraid that they were going to force a "Hollywood" ending like in MFL, but somehow they avoided it.

BlackBlade · « **Reply #595 on:** October 25, 2012, 10:07:59 PM »

I like musicals quite a bit. I like playing in the band for musicals even more.

Amilia · « **Reply #596 on:** October 25, 2012, 10:47:33 PM »

1) I like musicals too, but would Pygmalion be more palatable for those of you who don't? I was curious if there were filmed versions, and I looked it up, and it looks like there was one in 1938 starring Leslie Howard and Wendy Hiller, and one in 1981 starring Twiggy and Robert Powell. And it looks like both are available on youtube.

2) I always hated the ending. The best part of discovering Pygmalion when I was in high school was learning that the crappy ending was something tacked on so that the musical would have a Hollywood happy ending. (Note, I watched the ends of both the filmed versions on youtube just now, and the 1938 one has the crap ending too. Hollywood. The 1981 one has the good ending. British television.) My favorite part of the play is Shaw's afterword:

Quote

The rest of the story need not be shown in action, and indeed, would hardly need telling if our imaginations were not so enfeebled by their lazy dependence on the ready-makes and reach-me-downs of the ragshop in which Romance keeps its stock of "happy endings" to misfit all stories. . . .

Eliza, in telling Higgins she would not marry him if he asked her, was not coquetting: she was announcing a well-considered decision. . . .

This being the state of human affairs, what is Eliza fairly sure to do when she is placed between Freddy and Higgins? Will she look forward to a lifetime of fetching Higgins's slippers or to a lifetime of Freddy fetching hers? There can be no doubt about the answer. Unless Freddy is biologically repulsive to her, and Higgins biologically attractive to a degree that overwhelms all her other instincts, she will, if she marries either of them, marry Freddy.

And that is just what Eliza did.

The whole thing's on Project Gutenberg if you're interested.

I agree about Roman Holiday. It did not have a "happy ending to misfit the story." Instead it had the right, and true, and perfect ending.

pooka · « **Reply #597 on:** October 26, 2012, 01:01:27 PM »

I guess I learned the ending was wrong young enough I just kind of ignore it. I saw Hepburn in War and Peace last year. I thought Henry Fonda was such an odd choice for Pierre.

Porter · « **Reply #598 on:** November 07, 2012, 12:12:57 PM »

Is there any non-contradictory sense that can be made out of this sentence from the new Total Recall movie:

"No word yet on the fate of Chancellor Cohaagen, but we are being told that he perished along with his forces."

Which is it? Is there no word on his fate, or are you being told what his fate was?

The Genuine · « **Reply #599 on:** November 07, 2012, 05:34:48 PM »

"No [official] word yet on the fate of Chancellor Cohaagen, but we are [receiving unconfirmed reports] that he perished along with his forces."