The Innovative Usage Thread

[Travis B.]

Your explanation here seems to actually make quite a deal of sense as a way to explain this without resorting to telicity (and the problems with its use here).

About "We ate all the food / I ate snails", to me they are almost identical to "We've ate all the food / I've ate snails" respectively. I do not perceive any need to have any adverbial forms with them.

There is one remaining issue, however. In your scheme here "I've aten snails" is quite different from "I've ate snails", but to me the two are quite similar, with the only real difference being perfectivity. The are also quite similar to "I ate snails". So hence it might make sense to modify it slightly, so as to give:

"I have eaten snails.": static imperfective perfect
"I have aten snails.": dynamic imperfective perfect
"I have ate snails.": dynamic perfective perfect, but implying simple past
"I ate snails.": simple past, but implying dynamic perfective perfect

I don't think "perfective perfect" works, as the perfect seems to be inherently imperfective (yay confusing terms!), since by its very definition it refers to the temporal structure of an event, so "I have ate snails" must be something else. Maybe the term you want is completive (i.e. referring to / emphasizing the completion of an event)? Otherwise I'm not sure ... maybe "dynamic perfective" for the third, and "static perfective" (i.e. could the distinction be similar to that for the two perfect forms?) If not, then "simple past" / "preterite" / "aorist" (???) for the last one -- it doesn't seem to have any strong connotations of aspect.

Completive is one that probably works well; the second is completive perfect while the third is completive perfective, and in both cases it sums up at a much more transparent level the difference between them and the first and the similarity between each other. I could use dynamic perfective for the third, but the term dynamic seems much more opaque in relation with the actual immediate meaning of these words.

This really is not an innovation at all. People speak of things such as "He grows vegetables in his garden" all the time, in the present tense. You might not be familiar with this usage personally, but it really is a common one in reality. It is this usage from which Obama's stems, and its commonness is why people have not remarked on his usage there.

Phrases like "growing the economy" or "growing your business" don't feel like the same thing to me, though (even if they're almost certainly based on analogy with phrases like "growing vegetables"). I think the problem is that when you talk of "growing vegetables", the meaning behind "growing" seems to be "raising" or "nurturing" *, whereas in "growing the economy" it sounds like a more literal "making bigger".

* That is, "I'm growing vegetables" doesn't mean I'm taking existing vegetables and making them bigger, which is what the examples with "economy" or "business" feel like.

In this sense Obama's usage is a tad odd, in that he is using the word growing in the place of the more literary but probably more applicable expanding.

[Rui]

This really is not an innovation at all. People speak of things such as "He grows vegetables in his garden" all the time, in the present tense. You might not be familiar with this usage personally, but it really is a common one in reality. It is this usage from which Obama's stems, and its commonness is why people have not remarked on his usage there.

...I...can't actually tell if you read my post from this response, and if you did, what point you are trying to make, because I actually said "this isn't innovation" and "I do say 'I grew vegetables'"...?

I guess my main point, like Boskoventi said, is that "growing the economy" is not being used in the same way or something else to make it sound ungrammatical.

[Jetboy]

"it became a thing that people would casually mention it to each other"

At first I took that as a subordinate clause (I assume you're pointing out a relative clause with a resumptive pronoun?), like "It became a thing that John would buy her a cup of coffee every morning".
Something kind of similar that came up in my precal class; the teacher explained sine inverse to us by saying that sin^-1x is basically asking "What angle when you take sine of it gives you x?" The sentence struck me, for some reason. It's rather unwieldy, and yet it seems like it would be easy to make less so, but the teacher repeated it several times. Interestingly, "What angle gives you x when you take sine of it" still feels somewhat weird, though "when you take its sine" doesn't raise any problems.
As for the growing thing, "grow the economy" doesn't work for me as "make the economy bigger", but instead gives an impression of starting with a patch of dirt and ending up with the economy, some sort of weird metaphorical version of, for example, "grow vegetables".
I guess I'd say I have two or three different meanings of "grow"; intransitively, it can mean "to increase in size", like "I've grown an inch since Tuesday", or, of sessile life, to live or be located somewhere, like "trees grow in the forest"– nothing to do with their size changing, really. More closely related to the second meaning is the transitive "grow", meaning "cultivate a plant", as in "Johnny grew apples all over", or, now that I think about it, develop an appendage, as in "I grew a mustache".

[TaylorS]

Travis, could you give some examples if the usage of "have eaten/aten/ate"?

[Travis B.]

Travis, could you give some examples if the usage of "have eaten/aten/ate"?

I could try, except that almost every sentence that can contain one can contain the other, due to the different aspects being essentially interchangeable in place aside from how the speaker views the actions in question...

When trying to show distinctions, forms that reinforce this and which will very typically be used in practice are shown.

"They have eaten some of the Cheetos." - They have have not completed eating the Cheetos, also stated by some of the, the eating of which is a process and not a fixed action.
"They have aten up all the Cheetos." - They have completed eating the Cheetos, reinforced by up and all, the eating of which is a process and not merely a fixed action, hence imperfective (i.e. perfect) rather than perfective.
?"The have ate the Cheetos." - This is typically not found, but is strictly speaking grammatical, indicating a singular act of eating all the Cheetos in one great munching.

"They have eaten dinner." - They have finished eating dinner (for now), even though occasionally seconds may not be out of the question.
"They have aten dinner." - They are have truly completed eating dinner, in a more final kind of way.
"They have ate dinner" - This is occasionally found, and shows eating dinner to be a singular, final act.

"He has eaten the Easter Bunny." - He has eaten, likely only part of, a (chocolate) Easter Bunny, as a process.
"He has aten the Easter Bunny." - He has completed eating a (chocolate) Easter Bunny, as a process, albeit one that may have been executed in one sitting.
"He has ate the Easter Bunny." - He has devoured a (chocolate) Easter Bunny in a singular act of gluttony.

"She has eaten the M&Ms." - She has eaten some sum of M&Ms, as a process.
"She has aten the M&Ms." - She has completed eating some sum of M&Ms, as a process.
"She has ate the M&Ms." - She has completed eating some sum of M&Ms as a singular act, regardless of quantity.

[Nortaneous]

"it became a thing that people would casually mention it to each other"

At first I took that as a subordinate clause (I assume you're pointing out a relative clause with a resumptive pronoun?), like "It became a thing that John would buy her a cup of coffee every morning".

In context, I think it was the same as "it became a thing that people would casually mention to each other", which is why it struck me as odd. I'm used to resumptive pronouns with relatives in 'where' (for example, "the brand of cigarettes where you get a coupon for $1 off snus with them", as opposed to "the brand of cigarettes that you get a coupon for $1 off snus with"), but not "that".

Speaking of snus, my English appears to be turning topic-commenty: (ordinarily I'd expect an "of" at least, but this came pretty naturally)
13:01 <+Nortaneous> snus you get 15 for like $3

Something kind of similar that came up in my precal class; the teacher explained sine inverse to us by saying that sin^-1x is basically asking "What angle when you take sine of it gives you x?" The sentence struck me, for some reason. It's rather unwieldy, and yet it seems like it would be easy to make less so, but the teacher repeated it several times. Interestingly, "What angle gives you x when you take sine of it" still feels somewhat weird, though "when you take its sine" doesn't raise any problems.

The first one would make more sense to me when spoken than when written, I think. The second sounds better than the third.

[Bob Johnson]

I know we've been over this before but "Woah there's a million things over there" "Yeah there are". Italics in original, underlining added. (okay it was speech but you know what I mean)

Speaking of snus, my English appears to be turning topic-commenty: (ordinarily I'd expect an "of" at least, but this came pretty naturally)
13:01 <+Nortaneous> snus you get 15 for like $3

I do that occasionally; that sounds like the second half of "Widgets you get for $5 but ..." It doesn't feel like I'm copying Japanese, but then I don't think I would notice that.

[Nortaneous]

[quote="Bob Johnson"]I know we've been over this before but "Woah there's a million things over there" "Yeah there are". Italics in original, underlining added. (okay it was speech but you know what I mean)/quote]
yeah, "there are" contracts to "there's" IMD also, probably because "there're" is ridiculous and unpronounceable. same with "where are" -> "where's"

[Bob Johnson]

Yeah, I never really paid attention to that until that second speaker emphasized the "are". Probably not meant as a correction, but it sounded a little like one. I suppose I could manage [ðɛɻ.ɻ] but I don't mind <there's> there.

In another case: "How much people are in there?" and similar; not just once either.

[finlay]

I keep finding myself saying "there's" instead of "there are" in English lessons, which is annoying when I'm trying to teach them the difference between singular there is and plural there are. When I pronounce "there're", I go sort of non-rhotic and pronounce it like [ðɛɹə], because [ðɛɹəɹ] is silly.

[jmcd]

Yeah normally I always say "there's" but I consciously make it more standard and use less abbreviations with the pupils and so then I use "there are [[ðɛɾaɾ]".

[Rui]

Interesting vowel alternation:

At my school, when people (including myself) shorten the word "library," it is shortened to "lib" in writing, which is then pronounced [lɪb] rather than [laɪb].

This seems like something people across the country would do, but I found it interesting nonetheless.

[linguoboy]

At my school, when people (including myself) shorten the word "library," it is shortened to "lib" in writing, which is then pronounced [lɪb] rather than [laɪb].

There's some variation here, with /lɪb/ preferred for some abbreviations (e.g. MetaLib) and /laib/ for others. This was particularly amusing when we participated in LibQUAL, a library quality assessment programme. The dominant pronunciation sounded to the German-speakers on staff like Leibqual "body torture".

[Travis B.]

At my school, when people (including myself) shorten the word "library," it is shortened to "lib" in writing, which is then pronounced [lɪb] rather than [laɪb].

There's some variation here, with /lɪb/ preferred for some abbreviations (e.g. MetaLib) and /laib/ for others. This was particularly amusing when we participated in LibQUAL, a library quality assessment programme. The dominant pronunciation sounded to the German-speakers on staff like Leibqual "body torture".

In computing the /lɪb/ pronunciation is the only one I have heard for lib, this being extremely common in some areas thereof (e.g. libraries in UNIX systems traditionally begin with lib).

[Jetboy]

So I realized today that one of my friends has doesn't have the CAUGHT-COT merger (as someone who's always wished that had phonemic /ɔ/, this is exciting), and when I pointed it out to him, he tried to get me to produce his CAUGHT vowel. However, while he was doing this, I noticed that the vowel didn't seem to be [ɔ], but instead, perhaps, [α̃]; as he said to me, "you have to do something with your nose, like in French." I'm not sure if that actually is his usual realization of it, but if it is, is that at all innovative?

[Travis B.]

So I realized today that one of my friends has doesn't have the CAUGHT-COT merger (as someone who's always wished that had phonemic /ɔ/, this is exciting), and when I pointed it out to him, he tried to get me to produce his CAUGHT vowel. However, while he was doing this, I noticed that the vowel didn't seem to be [ɔ], but instead, perhaps, [α̃]; as he said to me, "you have to do something with your nose, like in French." I'm not sure if that actually is his usual realization of it, but if it is, is that at all innovative?

Where is your friend from, as I have heard of people with a front-back cot-caught distinction in some NCVS speakers, such as many people from Chicago or Kenosha?

[Jetboy]

He's from DC, as far as I know, though he spent a lot of time in Europe as a child (he is a native speaker, though). Still, it doesn't seem to be a front-back distinction; I was pretty sure he did have [α] in COT, and CAUGHT sounded like [α̃]. I'm going to try to double check, though.

EDIT: So, I asked him to hold his nose while saying "thought", and he said he didn't feel anything, but did when saying "caught". So. I'm quite confused.

[finlay]

ɑ, not alpha.

also, it sounds like he doesn't have a true phonemic distinction but might be aware that there's "meant to be" a difference between the two, and has applied nasalization to it for some reason. I do something similar – if I pronounce the two words together I tend to get something like [kɒt] and [kɒˑt] – or [ɔ], whatever, they're definitely the same vowel quality, and I only have a length difference because I'm pronouncing the two next to each other in isolation.

[Nortaneous]

Two things:

1. What's the distribution of ɹ > ɾ / θ_ in AmE?
2, One of my professors nasalizes voiced plosives before nasals, so he'll say things like [əmˈnɑkʃəs]. Is it just him? (I don't think so; I think I heard it from some students also, but I'll have to pay more attention.)

[äreo]

Two things:

1. What's the distribution of ɹ > ɾ / θ_ in AmE?
2, One of my professors nasalizes voiced plosives before nasals, so he'll say things like [əmˈnɑkʃəs]. Is it just him? (I don't think so; I think I heard it from some students also, but I'll have to pay more attention.)

1: I hear it sometimes here in Houston's suburbs, and I've heard it in Florida too (tho I'm not sure whether the person in the latter case was a Florida native).

2: Hadn't thought about it, but now that you mention it, I probably hear this all the time. And in any case, I do hear a good deal of final plosive fuckery around here, like [ɒdvjɪsli] for obviously, and /k/ merging with /t/ as [ʔ] (to the point that I've heard final /t/ hypercorrected to /k/, as in 'off the back' for off the bat).

Another thing I hear a lot in this area is (what seems to be) free variation between [ɪ̃] and [ɛ̃] before /n m/ (which I'll mark here as /N/), or at least some degree of hypercorrection.
At first I thought that some speakers (in this generally pin-pen merged area) simply merged most /ɛN/ with /ɪn/ while leaving a few - very common, mostly monosyllabic - words, with /ɛN/, such as friend, pen (yes, pen), and men, as opposed to intend, em and en (the letters), and den, which all have /ɪN/; but then I noticed that a friend of mine (born and raised here) says, for example, [mɛ̃nɪʔ] for minute, but [fɪ̃nts] for fence. My mother, raised in Arizona, also says minute that way, but she doesn't show any sign of a general merger of the two vowels - just that and a few other cases of /ɛN/ encroaching on /ɪn/. I've also heard [lɛ̃nɪ̃n] for linen, [bɛ̃n] for been, and (very frequently) [wɛ̃mɪ̃n] for women.

[----]

1. What's the distribution of ɹ > ɾ / θ_ in AmE?

My Math teacher does it and he's from Alabama.

[clawgrip]

On the subject of innovative usages, one of my students said "I found it internetically."

[brandrinn]

1. What's the distribution of ɹ > ɾ / θ_ in AmE?

Only among recent immigrants from lowland Scotland.

2, One of my professors nasalizes voiced plosives before nasals, so he'll say things like [əmˈnɑkʃəs]. Is it just him? (I don't think so; I think I heard it from some students also, but I'll have to pay more attention.)

Yes.

[Travis B.]

2, One of my professors nasalizes voiced plosives before nasals, so he'll say things like [əmˈnɑkʃəs]. Is it just him? (I don't think so; I think I heard it from some students also, but I'll have to pay more attention.)

I am used to /d/ nasalizing before /n/, without nasalizing the vowel before that, but other such cases I am not familiar with offhand but may hear since they do not sound strange when I say them out loud.

[jmcd]

1. What's the distribution of ɹ > ɾ / θ_ in AmE?

Only among recent immigrants from lowland Scotland.

I doubt it because that would be more likely just ɹ > ɾ.