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Words, words and more words
After I posted to complain about the word 'gotten', only to learn that it is correct usage as the past tense of 'get', in American English, I thought I would ask another question, rather than make assumptions in ignorance.
It's the word 'said', used to mean 'the' or 'that particular one', as in, for example, 'Jack and Bob were in a hotel room and Jack spoke as he paced around said room.'
I see it a lot and, on the few occasions I have thought to look, the writers were American. To me, it feels like a very old fashioned and stilted word usage and it usually causes me to back-button out of the story, if it occurs before I have had time to engage with the writing.
But I remember noticing Giles use it once, in an episode of BtVS, so I'm wondering if this is a word in common usage in America, or whether it is believed by Americans to be in common usage in Britain.
For that matter, is it in common usage in Britain and I've just avoided picking it up?
What do you think?
I don't necessarily expect it to bother you, because, well, we all have our own pet likes and dislikes. But I would be interested to know if 'said' used in that way is considered common usage. Do you use it in everyday speech or thought?
It's the word 'said', used to mean 'the' or 'that particular one', as in, for example, 'Jack and Bob were in a hotel room and Jack spoke as he paced around said room.'
I see it a lot and, on the few occasions I have thought to look, the writers were American. To me, it feels like a very old fashioned and stilted word usage and it usually causes me to back-button out of the story, if it occurs before I have had time to engage with the writing.
But I remember noticing Giles use it once, in an episode of BtVS, so I'm wondering if this is a word in common usage in America, or whether it is believed by Americans to be in common usage in Britain.
For that matter, is it in common usage in Britain and I've just avoided picking it up?
What do you think?
I don't necessarily expect it to bother you, because, well, we all have our own pet likes and dislikes. But I would be interested to know if 'said' used in that way is considered common usage. Do you use it in everyday speech or thought?
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My objection to it in narration is that it makes the author seem very present in the story. I could put up with a pompous person using it in dialogue though.
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From the world past hope and fear...
I bid you, Genie, now appear.
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Reminds me of his 'blueberry scone' line, at the prom - that always jarred on me.
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Pompous is a good word.
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There's certainly nothing wrong with that.
I think it's when I see it in narrative that I find it jarring.
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Actually D-d says 'gotten' sounds OK to her in certain circumstances such as 'I have gotten used to it' of 'If I'd gotten up earlier I would have got more done.' She thinks it flows better that 'I have got used to it'.
We think it is not when she uses 'got' to mean 'received', but when she uses it as part of a compound verb such as to get up, or get over and so on... she is currently sitting here deciding if it is the perfect tense or something - but I was never very good at tenses!
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I beta for an American who refused a change of gotten to got from me, for exactly the same reason your daughter stated. (That was before I posted about it.)
Interesting example she quotes. What about if she put the contraction into 'I have', so it is 'I've got used to it' or 'I've gotten used to it'?
I'm pretty sure Americans use it in the context of 'They had gotten to the place' as well as 'He had gotten the coffee from the cupboard'. I'm no good at the names of tenses either, but I don't think that is past perfect.
ETA: *points at next comment*
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I suspected as much, but I didn't want to assume. *sighs* Okay, I've managed to adapt to 'gotten', I'll see if I can do the same for this use of 'said'.
Thanks for the confirmation, hon.
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I'm Australian BTW.
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Thank you for the Australian take on it.
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Ah - now I'd say the former, but she says she might well say the latter...
But we agree that 'They had gotten to the place' as well as 'He had gotten the coffee from the cupboard'. both sound horrible!
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*laughs* That is actually a relief to hear.
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it's not *common*, and it is a touch formal, ... but it's not something most Americans would look twice at.
That's interesting, compared to smwright, above. I have a vague recollection that you are in one of the flat ones, in the middle, as Buffy said to Riley. smwright is in the south.
but it's not something most Americans would look twice at
Thanks for the confirmation.
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Well, i *am* in the middle - Missouri - but it's not remotely flat.
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Still, must be over 1,000 miles, so I imagine there would be differences in the way people everyday-speak.
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I haven't the slightest idea as to who wrote what lines in Buffy. I generally assumed Americans were responsible, mostly because supposedly British characters said "guys" instead of "blokes", which always sounds odd to me. (I wasn't sure if that meant -- were the people writing the script unaware of the difference in vocabulary? Or -- if someone with the appropriate knowledge were writing the script, perhaps they were pandering to American sensibilities?)
BASICALLY I KNOW NOTHING. Except that it was used to make American audiences feel "ah, I am listening to a stuffy British man". Not that "aforementioned" would be any better, but -- in terms of speech patterns, it sounds pretentious, either way.
As an aside, I am here and sniffing around your livejournal because your writing made me purr on the inside. (And possibly on the outside, but try not to judge. We all have our own bizarre mannerisms, yeah?) Like -- I'd be reading a paragraph of one of your stories, and then I'd go back and re-read it, simply because I liked how everything was structured. Pretty, pretty writing. Excuse me while I roll around and make adoring noises.
(Meanwhile, in my kitchen, my baby brother is inventing words, like 'inhuming', as in the opposite of 'exhuming', mixed up somewhere with 'interring'; he likes to make words. He's decided that a word like 'inhuming' would be a useful addition to the vocabulary of someone in an assassin's guild. I have a very strange family.)
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Yes, this post was about the word 'said' in that context. From the conversations that happened in the comments threads, I have come to the conclusion that 'said' is used fairly commonly in (at least parts of) the US. The writers on Buffy were American and they wrote the lines without really trying to exclude American word usage from Giles' dialogue, and Anthony Head didn't correct them.
It sounds like you have a very interesting family, or a family that is interested in words, which is almost the same thing *g* I like your brother's 'inhuming' although I'm not sure how one would use it outside of the assassin's guild, or some equivelent organisation. The grave robbers' guild?
One of my favourite non-words is 'couth'. Saying "I don't have much couth" is not nearly as bad as admitting to being uncouth. *g*
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